Currently only BMP, JPG or GIF files are an option to attach an image file to an inventory item using the supplied image field. Many customers use PDF's as image files, but a PDF file cannot be linked to an item without creating a memo (and that's only been available since 4.40) or a more complicated/custom solution using Custom Office. PDF's are extremely common and widely used, and it would be very helpful if they were supported in this field of Item Maintenance.
by: Jeff L. | over a year ago | Sales & Distribution
Comments
Even though a PDF can be used to store an image, it's really a document type like Word or Excel. I would suggest using the inventory memo feature for PDFs. If just one field were created in inventory maintenance for a PDF, what happens when you want to store multiple PDFs? The memo field is a solution for this dilemma.
The snipping tool can save as a gif or jpg.
If we could add PNG as well, that would save our design department a lot of time. Finally, the ability to have the image be a constant size no matter what it is imported as would be nice.
PNG is many times a better choice for companies with Web images to manage. They are portable, widely supported, loss-less and very compact for the data they contain.
PDF may technically be a "container" of stuff, but that doesn't make it less useful as an image file for inventory.
In Item Maintenance, when you click on the Show Image (camera icon) button, it launches a (small) window to display the image. Changing the Image link to allow PDFs would mean that the (small) window would ALSO have to be changed to be able to handle PDF display as well. This may require licensing software from Adobe or Foxit, etc. to enable display.
As an alternative, for those with the e-Business Manager application, it is also possible to click on the "More" button in Item Maintenance, select IT Item, and in the Internet Item window that appears, click on the Attachments button to add links that may include off-site PDFs or web pages.
A better alternative that doesn't require e-Business Manager is in Item Maintenance, click the Item Memo (notepad button) icon. Create a Memo for the item to add an attachment that may be a PDF, Powerpoint, etc.
In the 2022 Release, scheduled for March/April 2022, we have added support for *.jpeg, *png, *.tiff in addition to the current file types. Unfortunately, the existing components being used to render or display the image do not support PDFs.