iOS - Creating multi page PDF from HTML content [closed] - objective-c

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Closed 10 years ago.
I have a long html page and wanted to convert it in to a multipage PDF file.
I have followed the instructions provided in
apple and here - how to make multi page PDF for a given string content.
But the formatting the NSString ( with some like data ) is difficult than creating a html page. I have created this html and displaying it in a UIWebView.
Now I want to create a PDF out of this HTML to a Multi page PDF file.
The code I'm using can create single PDF.
- (void)createPDFfromUIView:(UIWebView *)aView saveToDocumentsWithFileName:(NSString*)aFilename
{
// Creates a mutable data object for updating with binary data, like a byte array
NSMutableData *pdfData = [NSMutableData data];
// Points the pdf converter to the mutable data object and to the UIView to be converted
UIGraphicsBeginPDFContextToData(pdfData, aView.bounds, nil);
UIGraphicsBeginPDFPage();
CGContextRef pdfContext = UIGraphicsGetCurrentContext();
// draws rect to the view and thus this is captured by UIGraphicsBeginPDFContextToData
[aView.layer renderInContext:pdfContext];
// remove PDF rendering context
UIGraphicsEndPDFContext();
// Retrieves the document directories from the iOS device
NSArray* documentDirectories = NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(NSDocumentDirectory, NSUserDomainMask,YES);
NSString* documentDirectory = [documentDirectories objectAtIndex:0];
NSString* documentDirectoryFilename = [documentDirectory stringByAppendingPathComponent:aFilename];
// instructs the mutable data object to write its context to a file on disk
[pdfData writeToFile:documentDirectoryFilename atomically:YES];
NSLog(#"documentDirectoryFileName: %#",documentDirectoryFilename);
}
Can any one give some help ?

Answer 1

I created a class based on every good advice I found around. I've been digging a lot and I hope my class will offer some good start for anyone trying to create multi-page PDF directly out of some HTML source.
You'll find the whole code here with some basic sample code : https://github.com/iclems/iOS-htmltopdf
I had just the same issue as you and my requirements were:
- full PDF (real text, no bitmap)
- smart multi-pages (compared to cutting a full height webview every X pixels...)
Thus, the solution I use is pretty nice as it resorts to the same tools iOS uses to split pages for print.
Let me explain, I setup a UIPrintPageRenderer based on the web view print formatter (first tip) :
UIPrintPageRenderer *render = [[UIPrintPageRenderer alloc] init];
[render addPrintFormatter:webView.viewPrintFormatter startingAtPageAtIndex:0];
CGRect printableRect = CGRectMake(self.pageMargins.left,
self.pageMargins.top,
self.pageSize.width - self.pageMargins.left - self.pageMargins.right,
self.pageSize.height - self.pageMargins.top - self.pageMargins.bottom);
CGRect paperRect = CGRectMake(0, 0, self.pageSize.width, self.pageSize.height);
[render setValue:[NSValue valueWithCGRect:paperRect] forKey:#"paperRect"];
[render setValue:[NSValue valueWithCGRect:printableRect] forKey:#"printableRect"];
NSData *pdfData = [render printToPDF];
[pdfData writeToFile: self.PDFpath atomically: YES];
In the meantime, I have created a category on UIPrintPageRenderer to support:
-(NSData*) printToPDF
{
[self doNotRasterizeSubviews:self.view];
NSMutableData *pdfData = [NSMutableData data];
UIGraphicsBeginPDFContextToData( pdfData, CGRectZero, nil );
[self prepareForDrawingPages: NSMakeRange(0, self.numberOfPages)];
CGRect bounds = UIGraphicsGetPDFContextBounds();
for ( int i = 0 ; i < self.numberOfPages ; i++ )
{
UIGraphicsBeginPDFPage();
[self drawPageAtIndex: i inRect: bounds];
}
UIGraphicsEndPDFContext();
return pdfData;
}