Generate thumbnails from PDFs

[buzzsaw]

I have a Lasso8/Filemaker6 install that contains a PDF link using: [variable: 'file' = (string_concatenate: ('/volumes/pdfs/'), (field: 'Job Number'), '.pdf')]. I have all my PDFs in a read only server directory - the name of each PDF matches the record name in the database and makes a nice hot-link on a web page.

I have a thumbnail for each PDF that uses a container in a separate FileMaker database that uses some older Lasso code and some Java script:<a href="action.lasso?-Image&-Database=picturesx1&-KeyValue=[field:'pictures::recid']&Picture=jpeg" target="_blank" onMouseOver="javascript:window.status='Click here to view this image in a new window'; return true" onMouseOut="javascript:window.status=''; return true;">. This works OK.

My problem is that I have consistantly reached the 2gb (too many JPEGS) database limit in FileMaker6 and am not ready to convert to FMP7. I am also experiencing corruption within the picture container fields and get a lot of FMP crashes. I'd like to do away with the FileMaker thumbnails and use my PDFs as a starting point. I have over 2000 pdfs posted, so I can't create a new thumbnail from scratch for each one.

I'm looking for a way to auto generate (on the fly) a 72dpi JPEG from the PDF that I already have linked through Lasso. Is there any function within Lasso that can do this? Maybe there is another 3rd party plugin?

Any suggestions would be most appreciated.