Overview

This article answers the query: Is it possible to have scheduled GFI EventsManager reports delivered in PDF format?

Process

It is possible to generate scheduled reports in PDF format. However, these are sent via email.

These are the steps to configure this:

1. Open the GFI EventsManager configuration.
2. Open the Events Browser.
3. Select Windows Events > Application Events (just as a test).
4. Select Report from View.
5. Under Reporting, edit the new custom report and set a scheduled date/time.

The report will run immediately and create an HTML version. Once the report runs on its scheduled time, it will send a PDF via email.

Currently, it is not possible to generate straight to PDF (or automatically convert to PDF in the background) without having an email sent to the administration. However, there is a workaround to achieve this. There are free tools that convert HTML to PDF from command line.

For example, PDF 995 (a virtual print driver printing to PDF) and Omniformat - a free tool that allows command line to do the silent conversion of files from HTML to PDF. Both tools are available on Software 995. There are also commercial versions that do a similar job.

You can follow these steps to achieve this:

1. Disable emailing of scheduled reports.
2. Configure scheduled reports to save resulting HTML reports on the HDD, in a repository.
3. Create a script that:
   • Enumerates files in the repository.
   • Parses extension to identify the HTML. For each HTML found, it should:
     • Call the command line (e.g. the Omniformat tool) to convert the HTML file to PDF.
     • Delete the HTML file once done.
   • Runs the script daily.