I need to write a program that retrieves information from a database and creates an invoice in a pdf format based on the information.
I would like to write the program in C# or Java, preferably not C++ as I think it would take too long to code.
I was wondering what Language would be best and what api's from these languages would provide the best results, and if possible some documentation(and a little tutorial would be nice). I need something simple but has to have a bit of customised content(colored Tables and fonts and whatnot).
In Java, I have found the iText API to be very handy.
http://www.itextpdf.com/
iText is the de-facto standard for creating PDFs in Java, I would recommend this. There is also a C# implementation of the iText API.
Also, as a sidenote, Adobe flex allows you to create client-side PDFs using an open source library called AlivePDF, which I've found to work well for basic PDF generation that bypasses server-side processing.
For C# you could use ITextSharp
http://sourceforge.net/projects/itextsharp/
Typically you're scenario calls for some form of Business Intelligence and/or Reporting Tool. There are a few around (some open source, some not):
BIRT
Crystal Reports
Jasper Reports
..
The ones I know are not heavy on programming but more on configuration of the data-sources and creation of the templates.
Related
I am searching from last two days but did not find any thing.
My requirement is to create a document viewer in my web application (C#.Net) and I don't want to use any third party tool for this. Can I convert the files in image or PDF or in any common formate which can be easly render on web page. I also can not use Introp object.
Any help will be highly appreciated
You mention in one of your comments that you'd like to write all the code yourself but don't know where to start. Here's how I would go about it...
First, you'll need to familiarize yourself with the Microsoft Office Format specification. You can find that here (there's a link to the technical specification). Office documents are actually a .zip file with an XML file inside along with any binary data representing attachments. Just renamed a .docx file as .zip and you'll be able to open it up and see the XML and any other supporting documents inside (same is true for xlsx, etc...).
Then you'll need to become intimately familiar with either PDF or HTML, as your job now will be to convert the various Office document structure into PDF or HTML structure, being sure to respect page layout, margins, order, etc...
As others have said, this is a large task which is why third party tools exist today. Also, each third party toolset has it's limitation as this is really hard to "get right" in all situations and there will be edge cases that work for one document and not another (because maybe they didn't use Microsoft Word to save the .docx, maybe they used OpenOffice and OpenOffice interpreted the standard slightly differently...)
If you cannot use COM/Interop technologies in your solution, you can take a look at the specialized 3rd party options. I see that you prefer not to use them, however, there are no existing built-in solutions in the .NET Framework. Check out my answer in a similar thread that describes how to accomplish exactly the same task using 3rd party libraries (for example, DevExpress, since I have experience with it). In addition, take a look at the Documents demo, where you can see how to create images/thumbnails from different types of MS Office documents.
I believe what you need is an intermediate representation of the documents which can be converted into an image for the viewer to display.
Lets me try to explain with the below diagram:
You can use tools like smallpdf or OfficeToPDF to do that. Just integrate them into your application.
Small PDF(https://smallpdf.com/library-detail)
officetopdf (https://officetopdf.codeplex.com/)
In the enterprise world it seems that if you want to display a report, you have to use a reporting framework. You name it: Crystal reports, Jasper reports, ActiveReports, SSRS. But I fail to see why, in 2015, you should prefer a reporting framework over generating an HTML page server side. In a .NET application, for example, what is the advantage of using such framework over a simpler approach of using razor to generate an html web page? That page can be then printed to generate a pdf.
It seems to me that there is a perceived difference when the word "report" is mentioned, that for some reasone requires a separate framework.
Of course usually a reporting framework offer additional features, like a report viewer, but in many cases it's used just to generate a pdf. The advantage of using html+css+js over any other proprietary language to describe a report are to me uncountable: more maintainable, easier to read and write, html is a standard understood by anyone, and there is no need to add another piece to the technology stack of your web service.
I understand my question up to now can be seen as not conforming to SO guidelines, so I'll try to make a more precise question rather than a rant against the enterprise world.
Question
Let's say my use case is to generate a report like this one:
inside a page or an iframe. What are the advantages of using, say, Crystal Reports or ActiveReports, in an ASP.NET web site instead of using Razor rendering as I do for all the rest of my service? Is there anything I should be more careful when generating reports compared to normal reports? If the bonus I get is that crappy top bar at the top of the page, well, I would gladly get rid of the pain of using a Reporting Framework.
So you generate an HTML page. How are you going to print it? Are you going to pull in a library to do it? What's your strategy for properly styling it and making sure that navigation elements don't end up in the printed report? How are you going to support exporting to Word, Excel, CSV, or PDF?
Reporting tools often take care of those details for you.
That said, in my own applications I usually generate PDF's with Razor PDF (and I tell people to print the PDF), generate Excel exports with EPPlus, Word documents with DocX, and don't offer CSV as I hate that format. It means I typically have to redo every single report for each format, but I like the control I get over the output.
From time to time we all need to print a document from our .NET programs. Let's say a simple one page document with some text and image.
So far I know 2 ways to do it:
Using standard PrintDocument class
Generate a pdf/doc document using such tool like PdfSharp
First way I don't like because it takes a lot of time to write all these routines for handling events and standard PrintPreviewDialog is just ugly. Beside that you need to generate and scale 2 different documents on print preview and actual printing.
Second way bothers me because these free components quite often are limited and poorly documented.
What other solutions for printing do you know?
use Crystal Reports for printing. Best Option IMO
I haven't seen an elegant printing solution in .NET yet, except for WPF and XPS. In that case, you can just create a UI in Xaml and print it. But XPS isn't often a viable option. I've worked with XSL-FO also (using NFop and later FO.Net - the latter is better because newer and it doesn't require Visual J#), which works but has a moderately steep learning curve.
I have tried to analyze possible options in the article pdf reports in c#.
iTextSharp - imperative way of doing reports in c#, (-) produce not very readable code
Telerik Reporting, DevExpress reporting, Crystal Reports - similar approach, report editor, great for simple job, able to produce multiple formats, (-) harder to team merge and print complex reports
phantomjs, wkhtmltopdf - html to pdf conversion, (-) extra dependency
jsreport - my solution, javascript templating engines to assemble html report and phantomjs to print it into pdf (-) overhead for simple solutions, extra dependency
Long story short. I was not satisfied with the current options and developed jsreport as a solution for designing and printing pdf reports. Check it out, it's free.
Is there a way to programmatically create PowerPoint presentations? If possible, I'd like to use C# and create PowerPoint 2003 presentations.
Yes, you can.
You will want to look into MSDN which has a pretty good introduction to it.
I might give you a word of warning, Microsoft Office interop is compatible with an API which is now more than 10 years old. Because of this, it is downright nasty to use sometimes. If you have the money to invest in a good book or two, I think it would be money well spent.
Here's a starting point for you. Use the search feature on MSDN MSDN Webpage. It's good for any Microsoft C# .NET style stuff.
Specifically in regards to your question, this link should help: Automate PowerPoint from C#. EDIT LINK NOW DEAD :(. These two links are fairly close to the original KB article:
Automate Powerpoint from C# 1/2
Automate Powerpoint from C# 2/2
Finally, to whoever downvoted this: We were all learning one day, how to do something as a beginner is most definitely programming related, regardless of how new someone might be.
OpenXML looks like the way to go from a web app.
Using the interop libraries is not recommended, as others have stated.
You can also look at Aspose Slides, a component for .NET and Java that makes it easy to generate powerpoint documents.
If you don't really need PowerPoint compatible output, consider using a markup language such as LaTeX with the Beamer package to produce a PDF of the presentation, or use HTML and javascript in a manner similar to Slidy. If you need fancy effects, it might still be easier to use SVG, and you'd have the benefit of getting output that can be reliably viewed with free software.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/hi-in/magazine/cc163471(en-us).aspx
Use this link. Although this is in VB.NET, C# supports the same.
You may also try out SlideMight, a tool for merging hierarchical data with PowerPoint templates.
SlideMight supports:
text substitution in text fields, tables and notes
image substitution, from raw data, files and URLs
images in tables nested
iterations over data to create slides
iterations to populate tables, possibly spanning multiple slides
special formatting for specific cell values
hyperlinks to generated slides
Input data format is at this time just JSON.
There are versions for Windows and Mac OS X.
More information is at http://www.SlideMight.com
Disclaimer:
I am the owner of Delftware Technology, the company that developed SlideMight.
And I am one of the developers.
You can use Essential Presentation product from Syncfusion Software Private Limited. This product can be used to
Create and manipulate PowerPoint presentations
Open, modify, and save existing PowerPoint presentations
Convert PowerPoint presentations to PDF or Image
More information is at https://help.syncfusion.com/file-formats/presentation/overview
Disclaimer:
I work for Syncfusion Software Private Limited
I am developing an application that is able to open and display PDFs after I open them and print them to another PDF using CutePDF, but the originals are not viewable.
I am looking for a way to programmatically open a PDF file, and print to another PDF file (not necessarily using CutePDF, just printing to another PDF is the desired functionality).
This will be integrated into a C# .NET project. Are there any suggestions how to go about doing this?
Thanks.
You could use Office Interop and generate the PDF, when you say "print to another pdf", I imagine you mean just generate? Or are you saying spool them to a pdf print driver that essentially will just create a PDF to be saved.
Use iText, which is available in Java and C# versions. I have used the Java version successfully. I recommend the iText in Action book to help you get up to speed with iText faster. The book discusses only the Java API, but I imagine you will be able to learn the principles of iText from the book and then figure out the minor differences for the C# version.
To implement this you can use PDFFlow library for generating PDF files from C#. It has easy fluent syntax and many features.
Here are many examples of real complex PDF documents: examples
Good luck :)