How to merge PDFs into a PDF Portfolio? - pdf

Question

I am looking for the functionality that creates PDF Portfolios:
The image shows the free adobe reader that can be downloaded from Adobe (duh!). When I open this particular PDF, I was surprised that it has all these Layout, Files and Attachment features. It is definitely not the normal "PDF merge". It is more like a package with multiple PDFs.
Can itextsharp do this? What is the search term for this PDF functionality?

Answer 1

The term you're looking for is PDF Portfolios. You can create PDFs like this with iTextSharp. Here are a couple of C# examples from the iText book:
Chapter16 - KubrickCollection
Chapter16 - KubrickMovies
If you choose to download the KubrickMovies result file, change the extension to ".pdf". Just noticed it now - will try and fix the error this weekend.

Answer 2

To generate pdf portfolio (using iTextSharp) first we need to create a collection, then store it.
Example read one pdf file, create from it a collection of 2 files hello.pdf,united_states.pdf finally store as Test.pdf
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Document pdfDoc = null;
FileStream fstr = null;
try
{
pdfDoc = new Document(PageSize.A4);
fstr = new FileStream("Test.pdf", FileMode.Create);
var pdfWriter = PdfWriter.GetInstance(pdfDoc, fstr);
pdfDoc.Open();
pdfDoc.Add(new Chunk());
PdfCollection collection = new PdfCollection(PdfCollection.TILE);
var filePath = #"somePDF.pdf";
var fileInfo = new FileInfo(filePath);
var pdfDictionary = new PdfDictionary();
pdfDictionary.Put(PdfName.Moddate, new PdfDate(fileInfo.LastWriteTime));
pdfWriter.Collection = collection;
PdfFileSpecification fileSpec = PdfFileSpecification.FileEmbedded(
pdfWriter,
filePath,
fileInfo.Name,
null
);
pdfWriter.AddFileAttachment("united_states.pdf", fileSpec);
fileSpec = PdfFileSpecification.FileEmbedded(pdfWriter, filePath, fileInfo.Name, null);
pdfWriter.AddFileAttachment("hello.pdf", fileSpec);
pdfDoc.Close();
}
finally
{
pdfDoc.Close();
pdfDoc = null;
fstr.Close();
}
}

Answer 3

Here is the simple sample to show how we can attach files to a new PDF file:
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.IO;
using iTextSharp.text;
using iTextSharp.text.pdf;
namespace PDFAttachment
{
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
using (var pdfDoc = new Document(PageSize.A4))
{
var pdfWriter = PdfWriter.GetInstance(pdfDoc, new FileStream("Test.pdf", FileMode.Create));
pdfDoc.Open();
pdfDoc.Add(new Phrase("Test"));
var filePath = #"C:\path\logo.png";
var fileInfo = new FileInfo(filePath);
var pdfDictionary = new PdfDictionary();
pdfDictionary.Put(PdfName.MODDATE, new PdfDate(fileInfo.LastWriteTime));
var fs = PdfFileSpecification.FileEmbedded(pdfWriter, filePath, fileInfo.Name, null, true, null, pdfDictionary);
pdfWriter.AddFileAttachment("desc.", fs);
}
Process.Start("Test.pdf");
}
}
}
Or to an existing PDF file:
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.IO;
using iTextSharp.text;
using iTextSharp.text.pdf;
namespace PDFAttachment
{
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var reader = new PdfReader("Test.pdf");
using (var stamper = new PdfStamper(reader, new FileStream("newTest.pdf", FileMode.Create)))
{
var filePath = #"C:\path\logo.png";
addAttachment(stamper, filePath, "desc.");
stamper.Close();
}
Process.Start("newTest.pdf");
}
private static void addAttachment(PdfStamper stamper, string filePath, string description)
{
var fileInfo = new FileInfo(filePath);
var pdfDictionary = new PdfDictionary();
pdfDictionary.Put(PdfName.MODDATE, new PdfDate(fileInfo.LastWriteTime));
var pdfWriter = stamper.Writer;
var fs = PdfFileSpecification.FileEmbedded(pdfWriter, filePath, fileInfo.Name, null, true, null, pdfDictionary);
stamper.AddFileAttachment(description, fs);
}
}
}