How to Download PDF Links in Column and Save to Common Folder - pdf

Question

We have a column that contains links to PDFs that starts on line 4 (e.g B4:B). I am trying to find a way to automatically download the PDF files that are accessed via the links to a folder on Drive. This is what I have so far:
function savePDFs() {
var sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSheet();
var data = sheet.getDataRange().getValues();
for (var i = 3; i < data.length; i++) {
Logger.log(data[i][1]);
}
}
Presumably the above code would write the links starting in column B (index value of [1]) on row 4 (i value of 3) (ie., B4) until the bottom of the data set (eg., data.length()).
I'm now confused about how to access and save the PDF link that are written in the logger to a folder.
Would someone be willing to help me out? I'm currently having to go to each link, click Save Link As... and then navigate to the folder that I'd like to save the linked PDF to. My hope is to modify the above process using code.
Update: I found this bit of code here that may help me out. Note, I changed the PDF link to a currently valid PDF link.
var urlOfThePdf = 'http://download.p4c.philips.com/l4b/9/929000277411_eu/929000277411_eu_pss_aenaa.pdf';// an example of online pdf file
var folderName = 'GAS';// an example of folder name
function saveInDriveFolder(){
var folder = DocsList.getFolder(folderName);// get the folder
var file = UrlFetchApp.fetch(urlOfThePdf); // get the file content as blob
folder.createFile(file);//create the file directly in the folder
}
Okay, I'm going to go and noodle with the data that is in the logger to confirm that the data is in properly formatted PDF links, then I'm going to test this new bit of code out. I feel like I'm getting close.

Answer 1

You can't force a download of a file from an apps script, you must try that from an HTMLService and not sure it will work.
For your need I would recommend to create a dedicated folder and you add all the pdf in it and you use the download function of the drive interface to download all files in one clic.
In drive, a file can be put in several folders so the pdf files stay in the original folder but you create a new folder 'PDF for download" for example and you put them in it. To do that from drive interface you have to click on "shift"+Z when file(s) is/are selected.
For you current list of file you just have to add in your loop the add to folder function. You can use this function.
function addFileToFolder(id){
var folderPDF = DriveApp.getFolderById("Id OFFolder to put pdf");
var file = DriveApp.getFileById(id);
folderPDF.addFile(file);
}
EDIT : Function will browse list of url, get the file and make a copy in a dedicated folder on the user drive.
function downloadInDriveFolder(){
var folderID = 'Id of the folder';// put id of the folder
var folder = DriveApp.getFolderById(folderID)// get the folder
var sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSheet();
var data = sheet.getDataRange().getValues();
for (var i = 3; i < data.length; i++) {
var blob = UrlFetchApp.fetch(data[i][1]).getContent();
var pdf = DriveApp.createFile(blob);
pdf.setName(data[i][0]);//Put as name of the file the value in col A
folder.addFile(pdf);
}
}

Answer 2

Well I figured it out. I was expecting more code, but this does it for me:
function listPDFs() {
var out = new Array();
var row = 3; //row index of 0 = row 1
var column = 4; // column index of 0 = column A
var sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSheet();
var data = sheet.getDataRange().getValues();
var folder = DriveApp.getFolderById("this is where you paste your folder id"); // destination folder (this is the 0978SDFSDFKJHSDF078Y98hkyo looking value when you right click your folder and select "Get Link")
for (var i=row ; i<data.length ; i++) {
if(data[i][column] !== "") {
var file = UrlFetchApp.fetch(data[i][column]);
folder.createFile(file);
}
}
return
}
As you can see, I included a row and column variable so that I could easily change these.
I haven't figured out how to assemble them into a merged PDF, but I did figure out that I could sort them by date (which places the top most item first) and then right click and select "Open With...PDF Mergy", which then moves the PDFs into PDF Mergy and merges them up in the correct order. You can find PDF Mergy in the Chrome App Store. If I figure out how to automatically call PDF Mergy from GAS, I'll post that up--but for the time being the above code has saved us a ton of time...so I'm calling it good enough for the time being.