The Portable Freeware Collection Forums

Problem

I need to get out of the terrible Microsoft PDF competition "XPS" files (Microsoft Word can't even open them)? I was surprised at how little there was out there for this format. It comes with every copy of Windows but seems to have no functionality from Microsoft beyond:

• 1. Create
  2. View
  3. Print

(There's a signing function I wasn't able to decipher.)

My guess is that this was created when Microsoft ran into problems some time back with adding export-to-PDF functionality to Office. So they pasted this extremely basic feature into their OS and then shrugged.

Does anyone know how to get files exported out of this junk format?

Tested so far: LibreOffice, Inkscape, GIMP, IrfanView, FS Image Viewer, XNview. Only Universal Viewer can *view* them, which is roughly the same as Microsoft's built-in XPS viewer.

I have Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro (non-free) on my machine which will quickly and seamlessly convert it to PDF, but the only free thing I can find is use PDFCreator [http://www.pdfforge.org/] (non-portable) to do a print-to-PDF.

More on this format:
http://www.prepressure.com/library/technology/xps
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/wind ... =windows-7

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Solution 1: To convert to PDF, do the following:

ONLYOFFICE (not portable as of this writing) has a super easy conversion system. You literally open the XPS file and then just save it to PDF. In my tests, it worked great.


Solution 2: To convert to PNG or PDF, do the following:

Requires

• STDU Viewer (http://www.portablefreeware.com/index.php?id=2045)
• I2PDF (http://www.portablefreeware.com/index.php?id=1908)

Steps:

1. Open the XPS file in STDU Viewer
2. From the File menu select Export - To Image
3. In the next window under "Image Type" select PNG and save to a temporary folder
4. Open I2PDF, drag-and-drop images, and click Build PDF

Alternatively, you can use LibreOffice instead of I2PDF:

• In LibreOffice, open a new Draw document (File - New - Drawing)
• From the Insert menu, choose Image and select the first PNG file
• If the XPS file was multi-page, select Insert - Slide and repeat step 5
• From the file menu, select Export as PDF

Also: Sumatra will export to text and STDU Viewer will export to both text and image.

For the sake of future memory of XPS, a nice write up, webfork.

IMHO, XPS was a sprout of M$ Triple-E strategy (Embrace, Extend, Extinguish); it just didn't pull through for lack of intent, it seems...

And in the same idle spirit, here's some follow up pointers:

• STDU Viewer: http://www.portablefreeware.com/?id=2045
  Sumatra PDF: http://www.portablefreeware.com/?id=1193
  Universal Viewer: http://www.portablefreeware.com/?id=1079 (official forum topic overdue for a move to "Submissions", IMHO)

Midas wrote:For the sake of future memory of XPS, a nice write up, webfork.

Heh ... yeah this is as simple as thinking "I need to print-to-save something ... would XPS work?" and then the successive 2 hours I spent regretting that decision.

Midas wrote:IMHO, XPS was a sprout of M$ Triple-E strategy (Embrace, Extend, Extinguish); it just didn't pull through for lack of intent, it seems...

Good call. I hadn't thought of that. As bad as Word is at consistency between versions and Mac vs. PC, you'd think they'd want a tool like that to succeed.

Midas wrote:And in the same idle spirit, here's some follow up pointers

Cool, thanks.

Old thread update:

An open source (GPL), cross platform, free XPS and PDF viewer: http://mupdf.com/ ... softpedia claims portability http://www.softpedia.com/get/Office-too ... uPDF.shtml but I haven't tested it. The program is very light both on features and system resources, which makes me lean a bit closer to conversion options mentioned above. Still it's nice to see.

FYI, there's an Android port of muPDF (see http://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?f ... .mupdfdemo).

There are even some other muPDF forks: APV PDF Viewer (development appears to have stopped; http://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?f ... id.pdfview) and PDF Reader[4Android] (http://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?f ... .pdfreader).

webfork wrote:Old thread update:

An open source (GPL), cross platform, free XPS and PDF viewer: http://mupdf.com/ ... softpedia claims portability http://www.softpedia.com/get/Office-too ... uPDF.shtml but I haven't tested it. The program is very light both on features and system resources, which makes me lean a bit closer to conversion options mentioned above. Still it's nice to see.

FYI, Sumatra PDF is based on MuPDF.

SYSTEM wrote:

free XPS and PDF viewer: http://mupdf.com/

FYI, Sumatra PDF is based on MuPDF.

lol ... thanks SYSTEM

webfork wrote:My guess is that this was created when Microsoft ran into problems some time back with adding export-to-PDF functionality to Office. So they pasted this extremely basic feature into their OS and then shrugged.

Questions that kept coming up while working on this is both a "why" and a "what is XPS?" Well, I came across a good answer:

"It’s unclear why you’d actually want to create an XPS file instead of a PDF file, unless you need to print a document to a file and can’t install a PDF printer. Microsoft has certainly not been making a case for XPS files being better than PDF files and has been silent on any reason to use them in recent years. In fact, Windows 8’s inclusion of a PDF viewer can be seen as Microsoft taking a step back, introducing support for a competing document format."

http://www.howtogeek.com/148499/what-is ... nt-to-one/

Quick note to divulge a recent Ghacks post about removing XPS Document Writer :

• Remove the Microsoft XPS Document Writer printer
  www.ghacks.net /2016/05/18/remove-microsoft-xps-document-writer-printer/

To the same effect, there's XPS Removal Tool, a single executable run-once adware (opens developer website) tool that might interest the less tweak inclined (stealth status unknown!)...

http://www.rogosoft.com/xps.html wrote:XPS Removal Tool is used to remove the Microsoft XPS Document Writer (MXDW) print queue and driver package from a Windows 10, Windows 8.1, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2016 installation. XPS Removal Tool can also uninstall XPS Essentials Pack from Windows XP and Windows Server 2003.

Midas wrote:... recent Ghacks post about removing XPS Document Writer

Good thread update, thanks.

Old thread update: I've added easily the best route to success to the first post: ONLYOFFICE has an excellent converter.

Further XPS to PDF conversion resource, somewhat belatedly...



Well noted, free on-line multi-format file converter.
Used it a couple of times for a few one-off conversions, worked fine.

Claims to convert XPS to PDF as well. (which I did not try yet).

__philippe wrote:Further XPS to PDF conversion resource, somewhat belatedly...

http://www.docspal.com/

Well noted, free on-line multi-format file converter.
Used it a couple of times for a few one-off conversions, worked fine.

Claims to convert XPS to PDF as well. (which I did not try yet).

I'm not discounting that for most people this would be the best solution, but I like finding local software to solve this problem for a few reasons:

1. Web services like these seem to come and go. I'm not saying programs here on the site aren't also subject to the rise and fall of developer interest, but if someone's got a local copy, we can usually keep a mirror.
2. Not really sure who's running this and what their privacy policy is like (i.e. I wouldn't convert my Taxes).
3. The original problem I posted about was for a document up at work and use of online converters (or basically any web-based programs) for work stuff was frowned upon.

That said, I've got to admit that one seems to cover the most formats of any tool I've yet seen, and it's undoubtedly the ideal solution for most people.

@webfork

I'll readily second your fair and balanced rationale in favour of local, stand-alone tools in general, of course.

Let me just highlight the "one-off" operative word qualifying the pertinence of the suggested on-line solution.

__philippe wrote:Let me just highlight the "one-off" operative word qualifying the pertinence of the suggested on-line solution.

I often think of this site as getting around stupid admin restrictions to get work done, and web tools sometimes do that even better than portable ones. Also, for better or worse I try to think of these forums as goldmines of great ideas and information for those that are willing to dig, so more info is generally better.