pub2pdf

Converts Microsoft Publisher (.pub) files to PDF.

Two deliverables in this repo:

1. pub2pdf.py — script with two engines, auto-detected (see table below)
2. standalone app — fully self-contained, no Office, no LibreOffice, no Python needed: libmspub 0.1.4 + librevenge 0.0.5 (compiled with MinGW-w64), svg2pdf (Rust/resvg), and a PyInstaller orchestrator (standalone/pub2pdf_app.py). It is not committed — CI builds it on each v* tag and publishes the zip to Releases. To build it yourself, see BUILD.md.

Engine	Needs	Fidelity
publisher	MS Publisher + pywin32 (Windows)	Pixel-identical — drives Publisher's own "Save as PDF" via COM
libreoffice	LibreOffice (free, any OS)	Approximate — LibreOffice re-renders the layout with its libmspub filter
standalone app	nothing	Approximate — same libmspub parser as LibreOffice, rendered via resvg

Auto-detection prefers Publisher when installed, otherwise falls back to LibreOffice (soffice on PATH or in the standard install directory). So the same script works on machines without any Microsoft Office install — just install LibreOffice there.

Usage

pub2pdf <path> [options]

  path                a .pub file or a directory containing .pub files
  -o, --output-dir D  write PDFs into D (default: next to each source file)
  -r, --recurse       when path is a directory, also search subdirectories
  -f, --force         overwrite existing PDFs instead of skipping
  -e, --engine E      auto (default) | publisher | libreoffice

Examples:

pub2pdf newsletter.pub
pub2pdf C:\flyers --recurse --output-dir C:\flyers\pdf
pub2pdf C:\flyers --engine libreoffice --force

Exit code is 1 if any file failed to convert, 0 otherwise.

Note: this is a Python tool on purpose — powershell.exe is blocked by group policy on this machine, so a .ps1 converter would not run. Run it via py or the pub2pdf.cmd wrapper.

Gotchas

• Publisher's COM Open rejects the documented ReadOnly/SaveChanges arguments for .pub files with E_INVALIDARG; the script opens with the path only and never saves, so source files are not modified.
• With the publisher engine, Publisher briefly starts in the background (one instance reused across the whole batch). Close any interactive Publisher session with unsaved work before running large batches.
• The libreoffice engine starts one soffice process per file; large batches are slower but require no Office license.
• LibreOffice fidelity caveats: complex Publisher layouts (linked text boxes, WordArt, master pages) may shift or simplify. Spot-check output when the source design matters.