MacOS Automator + Applescript solution for exporting docx to pdf

Question

Scratching my head after reading lots of different threads on this and tried a bunch of scripts but none seem to work.

I'd like to use Automator to automate Word 2016 conversion of a selection of docx files to pdf.

Used the following Automator Service:

Used the following script:

on run {input, parameters}
    tell application id "com.microsoft.Word"
        activate
        open input
        set doc to name of active window
        set theOutputPath to (input & ".pdf")
        save as active document file name theOutputPath file format format PDF
    end tell
end run

Which results in error: Microsoft Word got an error: active document doesn’t understand the “save as” message.

Answer 1

The main issue is that input is a list. You have to use a repeat loop to process each file separately

I added a line to close the current document after having been converted

on run {input, parameters}
    tell application id "com.microsoft.Word"
        activate
        repeat with aFile in input
            open aFile
            set theOutputPath to ((aFile as text) & ".pdf")
            tell active document
                save as it file name theOutputPath file format format PDF
                close saving no
            end tell
        end repeat
    end tell
end run