Easy Fix to an Apparently Common FlashPaper 2 Issue
FlashPaper 2 was arguably, at one point, a competitor with Adobe Acrobat. I’m not suggesting this was Macromedia’s intent, back in the day — maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t — and now that Adobe owns the lot, the discussion is moot. In a nutshell, FlashPaper 2 converts documents into PDFs (just like Acrobat does, but with far fewer options), and it also converts documents into SWFs that “read” like PDFs. They can be paged, searched, printed, and so on. Neat concept, nicely executed. I wouldn’t say these SWFs have especially caught on, but that’s fine … I use FlashPaper 2 in certain cases, and because it’s so pared down, the app loads much quicker than Acrobat. That makes it an easy choice for no-frills PDF conversion.
FlashPaper 2 is available both as a stand-alone product and bundled with Studio 8. On Windows, the Studio 8 version suffers a technical issue, apparently fairly common, in that it fails when used as a printer (as in, File > Print, and choose FlashPaper 2 as the print device). Sure enough, when I re-installed Studio 8 after a recent hardware issue (completely unrelated), I could no longer create FlashPaper SWFs by printing to the app.
It didn’t take me long to find a solution, but it’s one I would never have thought to attempt. Without further ado, then, for anyone who has suffered the same fate, here it is:
- Open your Command Prompt (Start > Run… type “cmd” without quotes and click OK).
- Type cd C:\Program Files\Macromedia\FlashPaper 2\i386, then press Enter. (Note, your mileage may vary, here. Just make sure this ends up in the i386 folder of your FlashPaper 2 installation folder.)
- Type ..\fpdriversetup.exe -ui, then press Enter. This invokes the fpdriversetup.exe executable in the parent folder with the -ui switch. What it does is reinstall FlashPaper 2’s printer driver … and whatdya know, it works!
Thanks to the Adobe support forum user who goes by the name miss-n-me. Your sleuthing helped me out!
April 10th, 2007 at 7:26 am
Have a Flashpaper2 question that I was hoping you might be able to answer… since I am using it for the first time (came as part of my Macromedia Studio 8.
How long does it take to convert a ppt to a swf file????
It seems to be taking forever - and my ppt file only has 3 slides in it - I started it (by pushing the stand-alone “convert current document to flash” button)
Up pops a window saying “Converting - Please Wait Working ..
It’s been that way for over 40 minutes now ???
Could this be related issue you talked about in this post?
or does it just take a LONG time???
Alice
April 10th, 2007 at 7:54 am
Alice,
Converting your file to FlashPaper should take about as long as it does to send that file to a printer — so yes, your experience sounds like the issue I was facing before I wrote this blog entry. You may want to give miss-n-me’s solution a shot. Best of luck!
April 10th, 2007 at 7:55 am
OK, so now I see that my one comment did make it to the blog - as a follow up - I did do the above - still seems to be non-functional aka hanging ??
Alice
April 10th, 2007 at 8:02 am
thanks for the quick reply David - how can I contant miss-n-me
Alice
April 10th, 2007 at 8:24 am
Alice,
Alas, the only solution I have is the one I posted in the article above, which was provided by an anonymous Adobe.com forum user under the pen name miss-n-me. I have no idea who she (or he?) is and can only be thankful her/his solution worked in my case.
April 29th, 2007 at 5:35 pm
I’m having the same problem as Alice. Let me know if there’s a solution, and I’ll do the same.
Thanks,
–Forrest
April 30th, 2007 at 8:38 am
Forrest,
I imagine there is a solution, but I’m not an expert on the FlashPaper 2 product. (Wish I was, so I could help you and Alice!) The only fix I know is the one I found on the Adobe forum … I’m baffled as to why it works for me, but not the two of you.
July 29th, 2007 at 6:10 am
Hi !
Anyone noticed that flash effects like bevel , drop shadow are vanished from flashPaper.
Is there any option to print these effects.
Thanks
July 31st, 2007 at 8:48 pm
Raj,
I haven’t noticed that, but then I haven’t tried to make a FlashPaper document with effects in it. Are you talking about the sort of effects that were introduced in Flash 8?
September 12th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
Hi!
The solution worked for me! I am truly thankful that I came across your blog and found this solution. You’re a lifesaver!
September 24th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
R.,
Glad to hear it!
January 19th, 2008 at 9:01 am
Brilliant. I’ve been scratching my head and searching the web for hours. As you say it’s not an obvious solution but it worked a treat.
I have just set up my new computer and flashpaper just seemed to hang …… Not anymore
Many thanks
January 19th, 2008 at 10:04 am
By the way my system is running on windows XP pro. With regard to those where this solution didn’t work … are they using vista?
January 21st, 2008 at 8:56 am
Steve,
That’s a fair question. I haven’t installed FlashPaper on Vista yet, so I don’t have any practical experience. Glad to hear the solution worked for you on XP, though!