Extracting content from various types of file formats is a big challenge for .NET developers. However, third party components such as Gears.IFilterHelper enable developers to fetch content from various file and document formats such as PDF, Microsoft Office, Zip and CHM.
The key feature of the product is its ability to automatically detect all the installed IFilters. However, relevant application will work only if the filters are compatible with the operating system. For instance, a 32 bit filter will only work with 32 bit applications. You cannot use a 32 bit filter in an application developed using 64 bit operating system.
Gears.IFilterHelper works with .NET Framework 1.1, 2.0, 3.5 and 4.0 and supports C#, Visual Basic, Visual C++ and all other languages which support .NET Framework. The product also supports all versions of Microsoft Office and Adobe PDF.
In order to work with the product, you need to add reference to Gears library from the installation folder as shown below.
using NineRays.Gears;
You can then fetch content from any document with the help of a single line of code using GetText() method.
String text = IFilterHelper.GetText("Welcome.docx");Console.WriteLine(text);
I was able to successfully compile a sample program but Visual Studio 2010 returned a blank console screen during execution of the application despite the installation of filters meant for 64 bit operation system. I had compiled the project to run in 64 bit platform since the product was tested using Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit.
I had contacted the technical support through e-mail to resolve the problem and they gave certain hints quickly. However, the problem persists despite the installation of all the required filters meant for Microsoft Office and Adobe PDF.
I would suggest the vendor to provide a list of common error messages which the product will throw so that developers will be able to resolve issues quickly.
The product also has the ability to extract text from the given file or folder and writes the contents to a text file. The vendor provides a detailed documentation which contains sample applications with complete source code in both C# and VB.
I would prefer to see few video demos regarding the usage of the product along with live compilation and execution using Visual Studio 2010.
I hope the vendor will improve the quality of the product in upcoming releases. From my point of view, Gears.IFilterHelper will help advanced developers in their quest to build robust and powerful .NET applications.