How to merge PDF files in Microsoft Flow, Azure Logic Apps and PowerApps

[anton-khrit]

This article demonstrates how to merge PDF files with the help of Microsoft Flow and Plumsail Documents connector.

Before starting, ensure that you added Plumsail Documents connector to Microsoft Flow.

In this example, we will read three DOCX files from a specific folder, convert these files to PDF, merge them and send the result PDF file by email.

For instance, it may be useful in a situation when a few employees prepare different sections of a contract at the same time. They load the parts of the contract to a folder, then all files from this folder are merged to form the final document.

We will use Merge PDF action to combine documents.

Our source DOCX files have to be stored somewhere. Microsoft Flow has a lot of connectors for different systems. Here are just a few of them:

• SharePoint
• Salesforce
• Box
• OneDrive
• Google Drive
• Dropbox
• SFTP
• File System

In this example, we will store our source DOCX files in SharePoint in a library that we named Source Files Library, but you can get data from other sources. You may use these links to download 3 sample DOCX files: 1, 2, 3.

 

Merging PDF files

Here, we will guide you step by step through creating the flow. You also will find a screenshot of the complete flow at the end of the article.

 

Flow trigger

You can actually pick any trigger. For example, you can start Flow on file creation in a SharePoint document library. We use Manually trigger a flow trigger here to simplify the Flow.

 

Get files (properties only)

We start with getting properties of all our DOCX files stored in a specific folder - Source Files Library. In the next step, we will iterate through the output from this action to get those files contents.

You can use any other connector to get files from your system.

 

Initialize variable

We need to prepare an array of files, that we will put in Plumsail Documents - Merge PDF action when composing the final document.

Add a new action and search for Variables - Initialize variable action. Enter a name for the variable and choose the Array type for it.

 

Get file content using path

Now, you need to add Get file content using path action to get source DOCX files contents.

Click File Path field and add there Folder Path and File name with an extension from a menu on the right. This will automatically transform this action into repeating one which will be performed for each file from the source folder.

 

Convert DOCX to PDF

This is an action from Plumsail Documents connector.

Put here File content from the output of the previous action.

You can find more detailed information about Convert DOCX to PDF action here.

 

Append to an array variable

Now, add Variables - Append to array variable action, enter an element of the array into the Value field as shown in the screenshot below. Result file here is the output from the previous operation:

The array of PDF files is ready, now we can move to the main step - merging PDFs into the final document.

 

Merge PDF

This is an action from Plumsail Documents connector.

Click a small array icon on the right to switch to the view where you can input an entire array. Add the Array of the PDF files you received in the loop to the Content of PDF documents field:

You can find more detailed information about Merge PDF action here.

 

Send an Email

Once the result file is generated, we send an email using Office 365 Outlook - Send email action. In the Attachments section, we add a name and the extension for the merged PDF file and choose Result file output from the previous Merge PDF action.

So, here is the complete flow:

 

Conclusion

That is all, the flow is configured. Hope, these steps will help to ease the work with documents.

This article was originally published here.