Convert Microsoft Word documents (.doc, MS Word 97) into plain text, using R and libreoffice

convert_doc_to_txt.R

# Assuming we are in the directory with the docs
# get a list of the files
the_docs <- list.files(pattern = ".doc$")

# remove spaces from the file names
file.rename(the_docs, gsub(" ", "_", the_docs))

# get the file names again
the_docs <- list.files(pattern = ".doc$|docx$")

# set the location of the libreoffice program
libreoffice <- "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\LibreOffice 5\\program\\soffice.exe" 

# loop over each file and convert to txt, output is in the same directory
for(i in seq_along(the_docs)){
# construct the command...
x <- paste0("\"",
            libreoffice,
            # see https://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/core/tree/filter/source/config/fragments/filters for
            # other converters for other versions of Word, etc.
            "\" --headless --convert-to txt:\"MS Word 97\"",
             " --outdir",
             " \"",
             getwd(),
             "\" ",
             " \"",
             paste0(getwd(), "/", the_docs[i]),
             "\"")
 # run the command
system(x)
}