ppt2pdf

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ppt2pdf — download, convert, merge, compress right from your terminal!

ppt2pdf is a command-line utility that downloads presentations (PPT, PPTX, Google Slides) and PDFs from a Google Drive folder, converts presentations to PDF as needed, and merges selected PDFs into a single file.

This document describes how to install, configure, and use the tool.

Features

• Fetch presentations and PDFs from a Google Drive folder
• Preserve a user-specified order (supports individual indices and ranges)
• Convert PPT/PPTX/Slides to PDF using LibreOffice headless
• Include existing PDFs without conversion
• Merge PDFs with pypdf and optionally compress the result with Ghostscript
• Clean up intermediate files automatically (safe default)

Requirements

• Python 3.10+ (3.11 recommended)
• LibreOffice (for PPT/PPTX -> PDF conversion)
• Ghostscript (optional, for PDF compression)

Platform install notes:

• macOS (Homebrew):

  • LibreOffice: brew install --cask libreoffice
  • Ghostscript: brew install ghostscript
  • Python 3.11: brew install python@3.11

• Ubuntu / Debian:

  • LibreOffice: sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y libreoffice
  • Ghostscript: sudo apt install -y ghostscript

• Windows (recommended: WSL):

  • Install WSL2, then follow the Linux instructions inside the WSL environment.
  • Alternatively, use Chocolatey (choco install libreoffice ghostscript python) but behavior may vary.

Create and activate a virtual environment and install Python dependencies:

python3.11 -m venv .venv || python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
.venv/bin/pip install -r requirements.txt

Google Drive API setup (one-time)

1. In the Google Cloud Console enable the Google Drive API for a project.
2. Create OAuth 2.0 credentials (Application type: Desktop app).
3. Download the credentials JSON and save it as credentials.json in the project root.

On first run the tool opens a browser to authorize access and caches a token.json file.

Usage

Run the tool and follow the interactive prompts:

source .venv/bin/activate
python main.py

Scripts & helpers

The repository includes convenience helpers:

• scripts/bootstrap.sh — creates .venv (prefers python3.11 if available) and installs dependencies. Make it executable if needed: chmod +x scripts/bootstrap.sh.
• Makefile targets:
  • make setup — runs the bootstrap script
  • make run — runs the CLI using the virtualenv python
  • make clean — removes .venv and downloads/

Examples:

./scripts/bootstrap.sh
# or
make setup

make run
# or
source .venv/bin/activate && python main.py

Interactive prompts:

• Paste a Google Drive folder URL or raw folder ID (both accepted)
• Choose ordering: press Enter or type d for default order, or m to enter manual order
• When manual: enter indices and ranges (examples: 3,1,2, 3-8,1-2,9-11, 5,2-4); ranges may be ascending or descending
• Choose whether to compress the merged PDF and the output filename/location

Command-line options (use python main.py --help):

• --sort — initial sort applied before numbering (name by default)
• --quality — Ghostscript compression preset (screen, ebook, printer, prepress)
• --work-dir — specify an alternate directory for intermediates; when omitted a downloads/ folder inside the repo is used and removed after completion

Ordering rules

• Indices are 1-based and refer to the order displayed after listing files.
• Manual input supports single indices and ranges (e.g. 3-6).
• The user may specify any subset of files — the tool will download and merge only the selected items in the provided order.

Output & cleanup

• The merged PDF is written to the user-specified location.
• By default intermediate PPT/PPTX and per-file PDFs are stored in a local downloads/ folder and removed after completion or on abort. If a custom --work-dir is provided, that directory is preserved by default.

Compression options

The tool uses Ghostscript presets for compression. Available presets:

• screen — lowest quality, smallest size (suitable for preview)
• ebook — balanced quality/size (default)
• printer — higher quality for printing
• prepress — minimal compression, preserves quality

Troubleshooting

• 403 / Access Denied: confirm the Drive folder is shared with the Google account used to authorize the tool; ensure the Drive API is enabled in the Cloud Console and, if the OAuth consent screen is in testing mode, add the Google account as a test user.
• LibreOffice not found: install with Homebrew: brew install --cask libreoffice.
• Compression unavailable: install Ghostscript: brew install ghostscript.

License & contribution

• License: This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file.

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