What happened to the PDF Module?

Back in April 2007 i told about the PDF Module for Sitecore, but since then things got quiet around the topic. What happened?
Well, the module is finished, including a manual and API descriptions. It’s just isn’t available through the official Sitecore channels. Here in Pentia A/S we are using it, and it’s running fine.

 

You can use the module for 2 different things. The simple mode is to generate PDF documents from HTML content. This is done by creating a PDF layout (a Sitecore item) and calling the layout with the ID of the page to render as PDF. The layout then uses the “PDF” device of the item to render as input for the text to generate.

A PDF layout contains the paper size, margins and layers for one PDF page. Layers are used for creating headers, footers and watermarks as they are rendered on each page. A layer can be a text, page numbers, a line, an image, an URL and so on.

From HTML to PDF

The advanced mode is used for creating customized PDF books, where the web site user choose the chapters to include in his own book. The book is then compiled from the choices made and a PDF complete with front page, table of contents, page numbers a.s.o is generated.

In the advanced mode, chapters are pre-rendered on publish time together with a table of contents for that chapter. Generating a book is therefore very fast. We create 800 page books in less than 10 seconds. Downloading the book is the slow part here. 

PDF Book Generator

I hope that the module will be available through Sitecore some day. Untill then, you’ll have to contact Pentia A/S if you are interested in hearing more.

PDF module designed for Sitecore

Right now we are finishing off the new PDF Module for Sitecore. If you would like to generate PDF documents from your web pages, and structure them in Books, complete with front page and a table-of-contents, this module is for you.
Right now we are planning to offer the module in 2 versions. The first version will only be able to render single web pages as PDF documents. The second one will also be able to create PDF books from pre-generated PDF documents.

Imagine this setup: You are the web master of the new “United States Constitution” web site. Your site must offer the United States Constituion not only as web pages but also as a complete book. The book must be customer-specific; containing only the chapters selected by the user.

First you set up your web site. The United States Constitution is organized in Sitecore, each chapter has it’s own Sitecore item, sub-chapters are sub-items.

Then you set up a new device, the PDF device. This device renders one complete chapter with sub-chapters as one webpage.

The PDF device is used by the PDF Module to create pre-generated PDF documents stored on the hard-drive of the web server, complete with a table-of-contents for each chapter.
In the PDF module you set up which pages to render as PDF. Your PDF Book needs header and footers, page numbers, date of publishing, some graphics to impress the management and so on. All these elements are added to each page using Layers.

Finally you create a Book page, where your users can select the chapters to add to his or hers own personal copy of the constituion. When presing “Go” your code-behind quickly collects the selected pages and combines then with a frontpage and a table-of-contents containing only the chapters chosen by the user. The book is then streamed to the user, complete with bookmarks and document properties.