How to send a PDF file using UIActivityViewController - objective-c

Question

I'm trying to send a PDF using a UIActivityViewController. So far everything works fine using a fairly basic approach but the one issue I have is that when I select the send by mail option, the PDF's file name is Attachment-1 rather than Calculation.PDF which is the name that I give the file.
I don't mind too much the change in title, but the lack of a .pdf extension does seem to cause a problem when sending the file to people with Windows PC's and I'd like to fix that.
I've had a look at:
Control file name of UIImage send with UIActivityViewController
But can't see an equivalent method to:
[mailComposer addAttachmentData: UIImagePNGRepresentation(viewImage) mimeType:#"" fileName:#"myImage.png"];
that will work with a PDF file. Is this something that is not fixable without customization or is there a simple solution to this problem?

Answer 1

try this
NSData *pdfData = [NSData dataWithContentsOfFile:pdfFilePath];
UIActivityViewController *activityViewController = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:#[#"Test", pdfData] applicationActivities:nil];
[self presentViewController:activityViewController animated:YES completion:nil];
and also
NSString *str = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:#"AppDistributionGuide" ofType:#"pdf"];
UIActivityViewController *activityViewController = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:#[#"Test", [NSURL fileURLWithPath:str]] applicationActivities:nil];

Answer 2

Swift
let url = NSURL.fileURLWithPath(fileName)
let activityViewController = UIActivityViewController(activityItems: [url] , applicationActivities: nil)
presentViewController(activityViewController, animated: true, completion: nil)

Answer 3

Swift 4.0
Here I attached code.I just added thread handling in to present "activityViewController" because of this viewcontroller present before load actual data.
let url = NSURLfileURL(withPath:fileName)
let activityViewController = UIActivityViewController(activityItems: [url] , applicationActivities: nil)
DispatchQueue.main.async {
self.present(activityViewController, animated: true, completion: nil)
}

Answer 4

Above listing about Swift is deprecated in Swift 3
let url = NSURL.fileURL(withPath: fileName)
let activityViewController = UIActivityViewController(activityItems: [url] , applicationActivities: nil)
present(activityViewController,
animated: true,
completion: nil)

Answer 5

For Objective-C tested code to share PDF
- (void)downloadPDFfile:(NSString *)fileName withFileURL:(NSString *)shareURL {
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^ {
NSString *documentDir = [NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(NSDocumentDirectory, NSUserDomainMask, YES) firstObject];
NSString *filePath = [documentDir stringByAppendingPathComponent:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"/%#",[self generateName:fileName withFiletype:#"pdf"]]];
NSURLRequest *request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL:[NSURL URLWithString:shareURL]];
NSURLSession *session = [NSURLSession sharedSession];
NSURLSessionDataTask *task = [session dataTaskWithRequest:request
completionHandler:
^(NSData *data, NSURLResponse *response, NSError *error) {
if (error) {
NSLog(#"Download Error:%#",error.description);
} else if (data && error == nil) {
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^{
[data writeToFile:filePath atomically:YES];
[self shareFile:fileName withFilepath:filePath];
});
}
}];
[task resume];
});
}
-(void)shareFile:(NSString*)withfileName withFilepath:(NSString*)filePath {
NSMutableArray *items = [NSMutableArray array];
if (filePath) {
[items addObject:[NSURL fileURLWithPath:filePath]];
}
UIActivityViewController *activityViewController = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:items applicationActivities:nil];
[activityViewController setValue:withfileName forKey:#"subject"];
if (UI_USER_INTERFACE_IDIOM() == UIUserInterfaceIdiomPad) {
activityViewController.modalPresentationStyle = UIModalPresentationPopover;
UIPopoverPresentationController *popPC = activityViewController.popoverPresentationController;
popPC.sourceView = self.view;
CGRect sourceRext = CGRectZero;
sourceRext.origin = CGPointMake(self.view.frame.size.width-30, 0);
popPC.sourceRect = sourceRext;
popPC.permittedArrowDirections = UIPopoverArrowDirectionDown;
}
[activityViewController setCompletionWithItemsHandler:
^(NSString *activityType, BOOL completed, NSArray *returnedItems, NSError *activityError) {
}];
[self presentViewController:activityViewController animated:YES completion:nil];
}
-(NSString*)generateName:(NSString*)title withFiletype:(NSString*)type {
NSString *subject = [title stringByReplacingOccurrencesOfString:#" " withString:#"_"];
subject = [NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#.%#",subject,type];
return subject;
}
call function like below
[self downloadPDFfile:#"yourFileName" withFileURL:shareURL];

Answer 6

For Swift 3
You have to have a URL array with the path of the PDF you want to send.
let urlArray = [pdfPath1, pdfPath2]
Then create an UIActivityViewController:
let activityController = UIActivityViewController(activityItems: urlArray, applicationActivities: nil)
If you are using a UIBarButtonItem to make that action, you can implement this to prevent an error on iPad:
if let popover = activityController.popoverPresentationController {
popover.barButtonItem = self.barButtonItem
}
Finally you have to present the activityController:
self.present(activityController, animated: true, completion: nil)

Answer 7

The reply by Muruganandham K is simple and quite elegant. However, it doesn't work in iOS 9. In order to make it work, if you remove the #[#"Test" and just pass the pdfData, an attachment is made.
NSData *pdfData = [NSData dataWithContentsOfFile:pdfFilePath];
UIActivityViewController *activityViewController = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:pdfData applicationActivities:nil];
[self presentViewController:activityViewController animated:YES completion:nil];

Answer 8

May be try this..
#define IS_IPAD UI_USER_INTERFACE_IDIOM() == UIUserInterfaceIdiomPad
// Validate PDF using NSData
- (BOOL)isValidePDF:(NSData *)pdfData {
BOOL isPDF = false;
if (pdfData.length >= 1024 ) {
int startMetaCount = 4, endMetaCount = 5;
// check pdf data is the NSData with embedded %PDF & %%EOF
NSData *startPDFData = [NSData dataWithBytes:"%PDF" length:startMetaCount];
NSData *endPDFData = [NSData dataWithBytes:"%%EOF" length:endMetaCount];
// startPDFData, endPDFData data are the NSData with embedded in pdfData
NSRange startRange = [pdfData rangeOfData:startPDFData options:0 range:NSMakeRange(0, 1024)];
NSRange endRange = [pdfData rangeOfData:endPDFData options:0 range:NSMakeRange(0, pdfData.length)];
if (startRange.location != NSNotFound && startRange.length == startMetaCount && endRange.location != NSNotFound && endRange.length == endMetaCount ) {
// This assumes the checkstartPDFData doesn't have a specific range in file pdf data
isPDF = true;
} else {
isPDF = false;
}
}
return isPDF;
}
// Download PDF file in asynchronous way and validate pdf file formate.
- (void)downloadPDFfile:(NSString *) fileName withFileURL:(NSString *) url {
NSString *filePath = #"";
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^ {
NSString *documentDir = [NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(NSDocumentDirectory, NSUserDomainMask, YES) firstObject];
filePath = [documentDir stringByAppendingPathComponent:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"/Attachments/%#",[self generateName:fileName withFiletype:#"pdf"]]];
NSURLRequest *request = [NSURLRequest requestWithURL:[NSURL URLWithString:url]];
[NSURLConnection sendAsynchronousRequest:request queue:[NSOperationQueue currentQueue] completionHandler:^(NSURLResponse *response, NSData *data, NSError *error) {
if (error) {
NSLog(#"Download Error:%#",error.description);
} else if (data && error == nil) {
bool checkPdfFormat = [self isValidePDF:data];
if (checkPdfFormat) {
//saving is done on main thread
dispatch_async(dispatch_get_main_queue(), ^{
[data writeToFile:filePath atomically:YES];
NSURL *url = [NSURL fileURLWithPath:filePath];
[self triggerShare:fileName withFilepath:filePath];
});
}
}
}];
});
}
// Trigger default share and print functionality using UIActivityViewController
-(void) triggerShare:(NSString*)fileName withFilepath:(NSString*)filePath {
* Set this available field on the activity controller */
NSMutableArray *items = [NSMutableArray array];
if (filePath) {
[items addObject:[NSURL fileURLWithPath:filePath]];
}
UIActivityViewController *activityViewController = [[UIActivityViewController alloc] initWithActivityItems:items applicationActivities:nil];
[activityViewController setValue:fileName forKey:#"subject"]; // Set the mail subject.
if (IS_IPAD) {
activityViewController.modalPresentationStyle = UIModalPresentationPopover;
UIPopoverPresentationController *popPC = activityViewController.popoverPresentationController;
popPC.sourceView = self.view;
CGRect sourceRext = CGRectZero;
sourceRext.origin = CGPointMake(self.view.frame.size.width-30, 0 ); // I have share button in navigation bar. ;)
popPC.sourceRect = sourceRext;
popPC.permittedArrowDirections = UIPopoverArrowDirectionUp;
}
[activityViewController setCompletionWithItemsHandler:
^(NSString *activityType, BOOL completed, NSArray *returnedItems, NSError *activityError) {
}];
[self presentViewController:activityViewController animated:YES completion:nil];
}
-(NSString*) generateName:(NSString*)title withFiletype:(NSString*)type {
NSString *subject = [title stringByReplacingOccurrencesOfString:#" " withString:#"_"];
subject = [NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#.%#",subject,type];
return subject;
}