Small document decisions make a big difference when you share a report, submit an application, or collect a few pages into one readable file. This guide explains what AllDoc actually does, how to get useful results from its free tools, and when your original Office application is the better place to finish a complex document.
01 / WORD TO PDFA readable report, ready to share.
PDF is convenient when the recipient needs a stable, easy-to-open copy rather than an editable Word document. The connected Raspberry Pi LibreOffice engine imports DOC and DOCX files and exports a PDF using an actual office layout engine. It supports images, tables, headers, footers and many original layout settings without a paid conversion API. Complex Microsoft Office features and unavailable fonts can still render differently.
- Prepare the source. Save your Word document as DOCX, or use an existing DOC file when the Pi engine is connected. Accept or resolve tracked changes and check the text you intend to share.
- Choose Word to PDF. Open the tool, select a DOC or DOCX up to 8 MiB, and confirm the filename before continuing. If the file is encrypted, unlock a permitted copy with the password you already know.
- Convert. Select “Convert to PDF” and leave the page open while the server builds the result. No API key, paid conversion account or credit allowance is used.
- Review and download. Save the result within five minutes. Check page breaks, table content and special characters. Check images, headers, footers and the position of tables against the original. Missing fonts may be substituted.
The Pi has compatible office fonts and Noto fonts for scripts including Hindi. A formatted Hindi sample has been visually checked, but that is not a guarantee for every script or font. For exact Microsoft Office fidelity, compare with the original application’s own PDF export. If no Pi engine is configured, the basic fallback supports DOCX paragraphs and simple tables only; its limits are displayed in the tool.
02 / EXCEL TO PDFGive your spreadsheet a clear reading copy.
An Excel workbook contains more than the values you see: it may include formulas, charts, hidden sheets, number formatting and print settings. The connected Pi uses LibreOffice Calc to open XLS/XLSX files, calculate supported formulas, and export using workbook print settings. Tables, formatting and supported charts can be retained. Microsoft-specific functions, external connections and advanced features still need review.
- Recalculate and save. Open the workbook in your spreadsheet application, recalculate formulas and save it as XLSX. This helps preserve expected results, particularly for formulas that depend on external data. Macros and external data refresh are disabled during conversion.
- Tidy the sheets. Keep only the visible sheets and cells you want to share. Set the print area, page orientation, paper size and fit-to-page options before uploading. A large unused range can produce many pages, so remove unwanted formatted rows and columns. Hidden sheets are not intended for export; check the finished PDF.
- Upload and convert. Choose Excel to PDF, select an XLS or XLSX up to 8 MiB, and run the conversion. The Pi prepares the PDF and returns it through a private server connection.
- Inspect the result. Check dates, numbers, formula results and page breaks before sending it. Review charts, images, merged cells and print scaling. Use Excel’s own PDF export when exact Microsoft rendering is essential. A successful conversion means a usable PDF was produced, not that every formula or visual feature is equivalent.
Keep the original workbook when another person needs to recalculate, filter or edit the data. A PDF is a reading copy and does not retain live spreadsheet formulas. Without a configured Pi engine, the basic fallback reads saved XLSX values only, up to 12 visible sheets, 1,000 rows and 12 columns per sheet. That fallback does not calculate formulas or reproduce print formatting.
Vector precision where it matters
In the PDF workspace, added text is written as text and a drawn signature is written as vector paths. Those additions stay crisp as you zoom. Ordinary annotations preserve the PDF structure; dedicated redaction and text replacement rebuild all pages as images to remove the original content. Existing PDF page content is copied through page operations, but a low-resolution image already inside the source remains low-resolution. “Vector” describes the supported output elements, not a promise to improve scanned image quality.
AllDoc adds no branding watermark. The optional Watermark & page labels tool adds only the text or logo you choose. You can merge documents, split selected page ranges, delete unwanted pages, and reorder pages before export. These operations do not edit the wording already printed in the PDF. Review interactive forms after combining documents, and remember that a drawn signature is a visible mark rather than a cryptographically verified signature.
Getting editable information out of a PDF
PDF to Word extracts readable text into a DOCX with page breaks. It does not reconstruct images, fonts or table layouts. PDF to Excel looks for text-based tables with visible border lines and saves detected cells as text in an XLSX workbook. Review column boundaries, decimal separators and row alignment before using the extracted values. Original Excel formulas cannot be recovered from a reading copy.
Scanned pages need optical character recognition. Use the separate OCR tool to create a searchable PDF, editable Word file or text from up to five pages. Select the printed language; English and Hindi are included among fifteen OCR languages. Review recognition errors, especially numbers and names. The ordinary PDF-to-Office converter reports when it cannot find usable text or tables. This is preferable to offering an empty spreadsheet as a successful extraction. A smaller, clean source document often produces a more useful result than a large collection of mixed scans.
Protect files and work with images
Lock a PDF, DOCX or XLSX with a new file-open password of 8–128 characters. Enter it twice and keep it somewhere safe: AllDoc cannot retrieve forgotten passwords. PDF locking uses AES-256; Office locking uses modern Office file encryption. Older DOC/XLS must be saved in modern formats before locking. This does not add a digital certificate or a legally verified signature.
Image to PDF accepts JPEG, PNG or WebP up to 20 megapixels. Images to PDF combines up to 20 images totaling 8 MiB in the selected order. PDF to images exports up to 30 pages as PNG files in a ZIP, with images up to 1,400 pixels per side. These are image exports, not OCR. The installed desktop web app still needs the document server; it never caches your document uploads for offline use.
Smaller files, without a guessing game
The standard compression tools repack PDF content streams or DOCX/XLSX archives without downsampling images. The separate Compress scanned PDF tool accepts up to 24 MiB and reduces image resolution/quality while keeping existing text selectable. Savings depend on how the original file was created. If a rewritten result would be larger, AllDoc returns the original and says it is already optimized. Compression therefore has no guaranteed percentage reduction, and large embedded photos may remain large.
Keep a copy of the original file, use password unlocking only with permission, and download results promptly. Editor sources expire from server memory after 30 minutes, while generated downloads expire after five minutes. The Privacy Policy explains the application’s zero permanent file-retention design and the separate treatment of messages sent through the contact form.
Translate a document or scan
- Choose Translate document, then select the source and target languages.
- Upload a PDF, Office file, photo or UTF-8 text file up to 8 MiB. PDF inputs allow five pages and translation allows 12,000 characters. Scanned pages are read using OCR; unsupported OCR scripts need selectable text.
- Choose PDF, Word or text and run translation. English and Indian language models run on our Pi; document text is not sent to a paid or public translation API.
- Download promptly and review the result. Translations create a new text layout; names, numbers, context and reading order need checking.
Page tools and safer redaction
Open Edit PDF to add text, a date or a drawn signature, rotate pages by 90 degrees, merge, split, delete and reorder. To remove sensitive content, choose Redact and cover the complete area. This permanently removes original content from the exported copy by rebuilding every page as an image; it also removes attachments, metadata and selectable text. Keep your original separately and inspect the exported copy before sharing. The simple text-replacement tool uses the same flattened approach for single-line selectable matches. These tools support up to 30 pages; they cannot guess what you intended to hide.