/t5/illustrator-discussions/saving-files-from-illustrator-to-enable-word-searching-with-microsoft-word-and-adobe-acrobat/td-p/10965272Mar 05, 2020
Mar 05, 2020
Copy link to clipboard
Copied
I have been given a requirement from a client that all graphics must be word-searchable in the final documents, which are Microsoft Word documents and/or PDF files. The font requirement is TNR, so not decorative or system-specific.
The only solution that I have found so far is to create the graphic in Illustrator, save out the file without the text, paste into PPT and then add text boxes on top, and THEN copy/paste into Word. Please tell me there is an easier way!
/t5/illustrator-discussions/saving-files-from-illustrator-to-enable-word-searching-with-microsoft-word-and-adobe-acrobat/m-p/10965297#M168633Mar 05, 2020
Mar 05, 2020
Copy link to clipboard
Copied
Do you mean that Microsoft Word itself has to be able to search the graphics? A quick experiement shows that exporting as EMF, placing in Word, then converting to a Word object (ungrouping) maintains text, but I don't know how reliable that would be with more complex files.
Thanks for the quick reply! I tried what you mention above, but do not have an option to "ungroup" in word. Any chance it is a discrepency with PC vs Mac (which is what I am using)?
/t5/illustrator-discussions/saving-files-from-illustrator-to-enable-word-searching-with-microsoft-word-and-adobe-acrobat/m-p/10965299#M168634Mar 05, 2020
Mar 05, 2020
Copy link to clipboard
Copied
The PDFs should be no problem, so long as the type isn't coverted to outlines.
The Word documents will probably a much more significant headache. The only fail-safe solution would be to re-set the type in Word. There are quite a few PDF to DOC conversion tools around, including in Acrobat itself, but thankfully I've not had to test many. It's been a while, but last time I tried it was pretty woeful.
7
Replies
AdChoices