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Create a simple PDF file from a text file!
Usefull Functions & Procedures
Create a simple PDF file from a text file!
by
GriffMG
Posted
(Edited
)
** UPDATE 3 *** 24/11/2011
It seems that acrobat specify a set of characters that need to be 'escaped'
for some readers to be able to display even simple text correctly.
So I have modified the text reader function to do the escaping as the file is read.
** UPDATE 2 ***
I have finally worked out to get a bit of precision into the xref block and stream sizes - and now it doesn't throw any errors in PDF X-Change viewer, which makes it about right so far as I am concerned.
** UPDATE 1 ***
I have just realised how the code would be dificult to work with if you cut and pasted it from here. So, I have zipped it up and put it on my web site
http://www.finedata.com/shdata/pdfcreator.zip
** End of Update **
Recently, I needed to convert a simpe text file into a PDF that could be
emailed to recipients.
I tried looking for an existing package, but they were either silly money
or just not very good... so I found a working VB example and partly ported it,
partly rewrote it for VFP.
It started as an enormous single function, but I have broken it down into a
few smaller ones to improve readability.
To execute it you just include the various functions in your source file
and call the PDFCREATE function with the input text file and the output pdf
PDFCREATE("C:\TEMP\MyTextFile.txt","C:\TEMP\MyPDFFILE.pdf")
You can now specify a number of lines per page (third parameter) which defaults to zero to allow for control by chr(12) in the text file, the font to use (fourth parameter) and the size of the font (fifth parameter)
PDFCREATE("C:\TEMP\MyTextFile.txt","C:\TEMP\MyPDFFILE.pdf",0,"Courier",10)
It seems that acrobat specify a set of characters that need to be 'escaped'
for some readers to be able to display even simple text correctly.
So I have modified the text reader function to do the escaping as the file is read.
** UPDATE 2 ***
I have finally worked out to get a bit of precision into the xref block and stream sizes - and now it doesn't throw any errors in PDF X-Change viewer, which makes it about right so far as I am concerned.
** UPDATE 1 ***
I have just realised how the code would be dificult to work with if you cut and pasted it from here. So, I have zipped it up and put it on my web site
http://www.finedata.com/shdata/pdfcreator.zip
** End of Update **
Recently, I needed to convert a simpe text file into a PDF that could be
emailed to recipients.
I tried looking for an existing package, but they were either silly money
or just not very good... so I found a working VB example and partly ported it,
partly rewrote it for VFP.
It started as an enormous single function, but I have broken it down into a
few smaller ones to improve readability.
To execute it you just include the various functions in your source file
and call the PDFCREATE function with the input text file and the output pdf
PDFCREATE("C:\TEMP\MyTextFile.txt","C:\TEMP\MyPDFFILE.pdf")
You can now specify a number of lines per page (third parameter) which defaults to zero to allow for control by chr(12) in the text file, the font to use (fourth parameter) and the size of the font (fifth parameter)
PDFCREATE("C:\TEMP\MyTextFile.txt","C:\TEMP\MyPDFFILE.pdf",0,"Courier",10)
Code:
PDFCREATE("C:\APPS\ACTIONSCAN\FAXFOLDER\XR200365.001","C:\APPS\ACTIONSCAN\FAXFOLDER\XR200365.PDF",0,"Courier",10)
FUNCTION PDFCREATE
PARAMETERS m.INFILENAME,m.OUTFILENAME,m.PAGELENGTH,m.NAMEFONT,m.SIZEFONT
PRIVATE m.INFILENAME,m.OUTFILENAME
PRIVATE m.CRLF
PRIVATE XREF_END_CHAR
PRIVATE PDFOBJECT_END
PRIVATE PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
PRIVATE PDFXREFMARKER
PRIVATE m.STRPAGES
PRIVATE m.NOPAGES
PRIVATE m.STARTAT
PRIVATE STRFONTNAME
PRIVATE m.NOLINES
PRIVATE m.CURRPAGE
DECLARE ARRXREF(10)
DECLARE ARRDATA(29)
DECLARE ARRTMP(1)
IF PCOUNT() < 5
m.SIZEFONT = 12
ENDIF
IF PCOUNT() < 4
m.NAMEFONT = "Courier-Bold"
ENDIF
IF PCOUNT() < 3
m.PAGELENGTH = 0 && 0 is used to force control to look for chr(12) for new page
ENDIF
m.STARTAT = 1
STRFONTNAME = m.NAMEFONT
PDFOBJECT_END = "endobj"
PDFOBJECT_BEGIN = " 0 obj"
PDFXREFMARKER = "PDFXREFMARKER"
XREF_END_CHAR = " 00000 n"
m.OBJECTCOUNT = 6 && AT LEAST 6 OBJECT BLOCKS
m.CRLF = CHR(13)+CHR(10)
ARRXREF(1) = "xref"
ARRXREF(2) = "0 10"
ARRXREF(3) = "0000000000 65535 f"
ARRXREF(4) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 1 - title block
ARRXREF(5) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 2 - catalogue
ARRXREF(6) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 3 - describes the number of pages
ARRXREF(7) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 4 - fonts
ARRXREF(8) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 5 - encoding
ARRXREF(9) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 6 - font description ?
ARRXREF(10) = PDFXREFMARKER && position of obj 7 - describes the container for the pages
PDFINITIALISE()
m.NOPAGES = PDFREADTEXTFILE(m.INFILENAME)
m.STARTAT = 1
m.STRPAGES = ""
FOR m.CURRPAGE = 1 TO m.NOPAGES
PDFCREATEPAGE()
NEXT
** this adds in the objects numbered 2 & 3 - at the end because the pdf does not HAVE to be in numerical order
PDFADDCATALOGDETAILS()
ARRXREF(5) = ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF))
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)) = ""
** INSERT THE UNIQUE POSITION INTO THE XREF TABLE
ARRXREF(6) = PDFXREFMARKER
m.OBJECTCOUNT = m.OBJECTCOUNT + 1
** INSERT THE NUMBER OF 'OBJECTS' INTO THE XREFS TABLE
ARRXREF(2) = "0 " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT))
** ADD THE FOOTER DETAILS AND THEN APPEND TO THE DATA ARRAY
PDFFOOTER()
** WRITE THE DATA ARRAY OUT TO THE PDF FILE
PDFWRITE(m.OUTFILENAME)
RETURN(.T.)
FUNCTION PDFREADTEXTFILE
PARAMETERS m.INFILENAME
PRIVATE m.INFILENAME,m.NOPAGES,I,m.LINENUMBER
** we can read the incoming text file into a string and then fill an array with the string lines
m.NOLINES = ALINES(ARRTMP,FILETOSTR(m.INFILENAME))
m.NOPAGES = 1
m.LINENUMBER = 0
FOR I = 1 TO m.NOLINES
m.LINENUMBER = m.LINENUMBER +1
** STRANSFORM THE INPUT STRING TO GET RID OF HIEND ASCII CHARACTERS
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(205),"=")
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(186),"|")
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(187),"+")
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(188),"+")
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(200),"+")
ARRTMP(I) = STRTRAN(ARRTMP(I),CHR(201),"+")
IF CHR(12) $ ARRTMP(I) .OR. (m.LINENUMBER >= m.PAGELENGTH .AND. m.PAGELENGTH > 0)
m.NOPAGES = m.NOPAGES +1
m.LINENUMBER = 0
ENDIF
NEXT
RETURN(m.NOPAGES)
FUNCTION PDFCREATEPAGE
PRIVATE I,m.STARTSIZE,m.NOROWS,m.LINENUMBER,m.STREAMLENGTH
m.OBJECTCOUNT = m.OBJECTCOUNT + 1
m.STRPAGES = m.STRPAGES + " " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + " 0 R"
*INTLEN = LEN(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + LEN(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT+1))
** KEEP A TRACK OF WHERE THE DATA BLOCK STARTED
m.STARTSIZE = ALEN(ARRDATA)
** ADD 18 LINES TO THE DATA ARRAY
DIMENSION ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)+18)
** FILL IN THE DESCRIPTION OF THE BLOCK
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 1) = ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 2) = "<<"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 3) = "/Type /Page"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 4) = "/Parent 3 0 R"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 5) = "/Resources 6 0 R"
m.OBJECTCOUNT = m.OBJECTCOUNT + 1
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 6) = "/Contents " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + " 0 R"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 7) = ">>"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 8) = PDFOBJECT_END
DIMENSION ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)+1)
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)) = PDFXREFMARKER
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 9) = ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 10) = "<<"
m.OBJECTCOUNT = m.OBJECTCOUNT + 1
** the length if this object (distance from BT to just befor enstream) is recorded in the next object
** having just incremented objectcount
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 11) = "/Length " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + " 0 R"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 12) = ">>"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 13) = "stream"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 14) = "BT" && begin text
** START STRACKING THE LENGTH OF THE STREAM
m.STREAMLENGTH = LEN(ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 14))+2
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 15) = "/F1 "+ALLTRIM(STR(m.SIZEFONT))+" Tf" && fontsize
m.STREAMLENGTH = m.STREAMLENGTH + LEN(ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 15))+2
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 16) = "1 0 0 1 50 802 Tm"
m.STREAMLENGTH = m.STREAMLENGTH + LEN(ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 16))+2
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 17) = ALLTRIM(STR(m.SIZEFONT*1.2))+" TL" && linefeed spacing
m.STREAMLENGTH = m.STREAMLENGTH + LEN(ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 17))+2
** we need to scan the tmpData array for a given page
I = m.STARTAT
m.LINENUMBER = 0
m.FLG = .T.
DO WHILE I <= ALEN(ARRTMP) .AND. m.FLG
m.LINENUMBER = m.LINENUMBER +1
** add an entry to the data array
DIMENSION ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)+1)
ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)) = "T* ("+TRIM(ARRTMP(I))+") Tj"
** add the length of this string to the stream length
m.STREAMLENGTH = m.STREAMLENGTH + LEN(ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)))+2
IF CHR(12) $ ARRTMP(I) .OR. (m.LINENUMBER >= m.PAGELENGTH .AND. m.PAGELENGTH > 0)
m.STARTAT = I+1
m.FLG = .F.
ENDIF
I = I + 1
ENDDO
m.STARTSIZE = ALEN(ARRDATA)
** ADD ANOTHER 18 LINES TO THE DATA ARRAY
DIMENSION ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)+18)
ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)) = "" && BLANK LINE?
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 1) = "ET" && end text
** add the length of this string to the stream length
m.STREAMLENGTH = m.STREAMLENGTH + LEN(ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 1))+2
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 2) = "endstream"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 3) = PDFOBJECT_END
DIMENSION ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)+1)
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)) = PDFXREFMARKER
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 4) = ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT)) + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 5) = ALLTRIM(STR(m.STREAMLENGTH))
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE+ 6) = PDFOBJECT_END
DIMENSION ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)+1)
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)) = PDFXREFMARKER
RETURN(.T.)
FUNCTION PDFWRITE
PARAMETERS m.OUTFILENAME
PRIVATE I, m.OUTFILENAME,m.STRING,m.TEMPBIT,X,XREFINDEX,M.OFFSETPOSN
DECLARE ARRXREFS(m.OBJECTCOUNT-1) && SET UP A NEW XREFS TABLE TO HOLD POSITIONS OF ALL BLOCKS
FOR X = 1 TO ALEN(ARRXREFS)
ARRXREFS(X)=0
NEXT
m.OFFSETPOSN = 0
m.STRING = ""
XREFINDEX = 0
FOR I = 1 TO ALEN(ARRDATA)
m.TEMPBIT = ARRDATA(I)
IF TYPE("m.tempbit") = "C" .AND. !EMPTY(m.TEMPBIT)
DO CASE
CASE RIGHT(UPPER(m.TEMPBIT),LEN(PDFOBJECT_BEGIN)) = UPPER(PDFOBJECT_BEGIN)
** WE HAVE HERE THE STARTING POSITION OF AN OBJECT - WHICH WE NEED IN THE XREFS TABLE
** the xref we are interested in is the value of the bit before the PDFOBJECTBEGIN
X = VAL(LEFT(m.TEMPBIT,LEN(m.TEMPBIT)-LEN(PDFOBJECT_BEGIN)))
ARRXREFS(X) = LEN(m.STRING)
CASE UPPER(m.TEMPBIT) = PDFXREFMARKER && THIS IS AN XREF IN WAITING...
XREFINDEX = XREFINDEX +1
m.TEMPBIT = RIGHT("0000000000"+ALLTRIM(STR(ARRXREFS(XREFINDEX))),10) + XREF_END_CHAR
CASE UPPER(m.TEMPBIT) == "XREF"
** make a note of the position that the xref block starts
m.OFFSETPOSN = LEN(m.STRING)
CASE UPPER(m.TEMPBIT) == "M.OFFSETPOSN"
** put the position of the xref block into the string
m.TEMPBIT = ALLTRIM(STR(m.OFFSETPOSN))
ENDCASE
m.STRING = m.STRING + m.TEMPBIT+m.CRLF
ENDIF
NEXT
STRTOFILE(m.STRING,m.OUTFILENAME)
RETURN(.T.)
FUNCTION PDFADDCATALOGDETAILS
PRIVATE m.STARTSIZE
m.STARTSIZE = ALEN(ARRDATA)
** ADD 15 LINES TO THE DATA ARRAY
DIMENSION ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)+15)
ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)) = ""
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 1) = "2" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 2) = "<<"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 3) = "/Type /Catalog"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 4) = "/Pages 3 0 R" && the number of pages is in section/obj number 3
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 5) = "/PageLayout /OneColumn"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 6) = ">>"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 7) = PDFOBJECT_END
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 8) = "3" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 9) = "<<"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 10) = "/Type /Pages"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 11) = "/Count " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.NOPAGES))
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 12) = "/MediaBox [ 0 0 595 842 ]"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 13) = "/Kids [" + m.STRPAGES + " ]"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 14) = ">>"
ARRDATA(m.STARTSIZE + 15) = PDFOBJECT_END
RETURN(.T.)
FUNCTION PDFINITIALISE
ARRDATA(1) = "%PDF-1.2 "
ARRDATA(2) = "%MGF"
ARRDATA(3) = "1" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(4) = "<<"
ARRDATA(5) = "/Creator (Martin Griffin of Finedata Limited)"
ARRDATA(6) = "/Producer (VFP TXT to PDF martin.griffin@finedata.com)"
ARRDATA(7) = "/Title (VFPTXTTOPDF)"
ARRDATA(8) = ">>"
ARRDATA(9) = PDFOBJECT_END
ARRDATA(10) = "4" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(11) = "<<"
ARRDATA(12) = "/Type /Font"
ARRDATA(13) = "/Subtype /Type1"
ARRDATA(14) = "/Name /F1"
ARRDATA(15) = "/Encoding 5 0 R"
ARRDATA(16) = "/BaseFont /" + STRFONTNAME
ARRDATA(17) = ">>"
ARRDATA(18) = PDFOBJECT_END
ARRDATA(19) = "5" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(20) = "<<"
ARRDATA(21) = "/Type /Encoding"
ARRDATA(22) = "/BaseEncoding /WinAnsiEncoding"
ARRDATA(23) = ">>"
ARRDATA(24) = PDFOBJECT_END
ARRDATA(25) = "6" + PDFOBJECT_BEGIN
ARRDATA(26) = "<<"
ARRDATA(27) = "/Font << /F1 4 0 R >> /ProcSet [ /PDF /Text ]"
ARRDATA(28) = ">>"
ARRDATA(29) = PDFOBJECT_END
RETURN(.T.)
FUNCTION PDFFOOTER
PRIVATE I
DIMENSION ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)+9)
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-8) = "trailer"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-7) = "<<"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-6) = "/Size " + ALLTRIM(STR(m.OBJECTCOUNT))
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-5) = "/Root 2 0 R"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-4) = "/Info 1 0 R"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-3) = ">>"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-2) = "startxref"
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)-1) = "M.OFFSETPOSN" && REPLACE THIS VALUE AS WRITTEN OUT TO TEXT FILE
ARRXREF(ALEN(ARRXREF)) = "%%EOF"
FOR I = 1 TO ALEN(ARRXREF)
IF !EMPTY(ARRXREF(I))
DIMENSION ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)+1)
ARRDATA(ALEN(ARRDATA)) = ARRXREF(I)
ENDIF
NEXT
RETURN(.T.)
Please Note: 1 is Bad, 10 is Good :-)
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