PDF Nightmare

PDF Nightmare

• rlarno

  acousticStrike wrote:

  Maybe I should have made myself a little more clear as to what it is I want to do. I have information stored in variables and a couple of pictures. All I want to do is take this information and format it (kind of like an invoice format) and then save it to a pdf file. This would not be an exisiting pdf file, it would be a new one that is created when the user saves. I don't want to setup a distiller printer to do this... Is there anyway to do this without spending hundreds of more dollars on software CutePDF requires a redistribution license that costs $500 in order to do this. I spent tons of money on Visual Studio .NET, so there has to be someway to work this. I have heard some mention of the report viewer control but I have no idea if this will do the trick... Anymore thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

  There is nothing that is "free" or "cheap" short of the PDF printer drivers available. Some of the report generation products such as Crystal Reports and ActiveReports can generate PDF files from reports but they cost money because an extensive amount of development is required to create such a product. Unfortunately most of the PDF conversion libraries are expensive as well.

  The following code will handle text files but not images:

  http://www.codeproject.com/dotnet/pdfconverternet.asp
  

  
  
  

• Pankaj11

  You have several options:

  • Learn how postscript works, implement ghostscript to turn postscript files into a PDF Document.
  • Obtain a distribution license for something like CutePDF or PDF995.
  • Have your customers/users install their favorate PDF Printer driver.

  Note that PDF995 is only $10 per user. I'm sure you'd be able to get a license from them at a reasonable price, or negotiate a payment scheme. Generally, you can't expect to make money off someone elses hard work.

  
  
  

• vai2000

  Sweet! Looks awesome! I'll check it out a little more when I'm not so busy at work =). Thanks for sharing this with all of us.
  

• mbfromit

  I heard that php 5 could do this and its free and open sourc also.If there is a way to use those lib in .net ..it could be a starting point...:).
  

• Code Sailor

  Maybe I should have made myself a little more clear as to what it is I want to do. I have information stored in variables and a couple of pictures. All I want to do is take this information and format it (kind of like an invoice format) and then save it to a pdf file. This would not be an exisiting pdf file, it would be a new one that is created when the user saves. I don't want to setup a distiller printer to do this...

  Is there anyway to do this without spending hundreds of more dollars on software CutePDF requires a redistribution license that costs $500 in order to do this. I spent tons of money on Visual Studio .NET, so there has to be someway to work this. I have heard some mention of the report viewer control but I have no idea if this will do the trick...

  Anymore thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

  
  

• Danny M

  I should also mention that I am using Visual Studio .NET 2003 Pro to build a windows applications, not a web app...
  

• Brekbit

  You are missing the big picture from your customer's standpoint. If your application creates text and graphics, (not just a report writer) then you will never be able to compete with (Distiller) Adobe Acrobat with any third party dll. Since your customers use many applications which they may want to create PDF output, it will always be better for them to purchase a full version of Acrobat and use the virtual print driver from Distiller to create PDF files from any application that can print. Using Acrobat will also yield the most reliable compatibility. Just recommend to your customers that they puchase Acrobat and spend your time on improving your applications core functions. - just my opinion
  

• PaulSmithLondon

  Based on your request to create pdf files from scratch, I would suggest you use the
  "PDFReference16.pdf" from Adobe. Then you will learn what makes a pdf file tick. As a programmer you will need to buy Adobe Acrobat, but the users of your program only need the free Reader. It has worked for me. I open a pdf file within the Acrobat-control on the VB form, and then have acess to the zoom and print functions. The possibility to print was my original motivation, but I now find that making charts & graphs is better via pdf than what's available in VB.
  Si far this has worked for both VB6 and VB2005 (express or the studio version). The only disadvantage is the lack of some editing and analysis features for the home-made pdf files. As for most computer programs, it is not fault tolerant, and there is no feature to help you find out why. The byte count in pdf files is (unecessarily) rigid.
  
  
  
  

• Mike Blaszczak

  I worte a library in C# that creates PDF documents in the way you are looking for. It is called PDFsharp and it is OpenSource. More info you can find here:

  www.pdfsharp.com

  
  

• woeter

  Didn't someone just ask about this

  A couple of options are: CutePDF or PDF995 (The one I use). The PDF995 is actually a printer driver, and quite a nice one, too - don't know about CutePDF, but it's apparently free.

  If you want to create your own PDF documents, yo might as well start going to the CutePDF site and find the link to Ghostscript: a postscript to PDF converter - good place to start looking.

  
  
  

• David Makin

  Open source, but not commercial, though...
  
  
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