Exporting a DataTable to PDF

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Introduction

MigraDoc Foundation is an Open Source .NET library that easily creates documents based on an object model with paragraphs, tables, styles, etc. and renders them into PDF, XPS, or RTF. A new feature I have added is when you provide a datatable (.NET) it will be easily converted to a PDF file.

Using the code

The zip file is a Visual Studio 2010 solution. PdfForm.cs has the functionality for converting a datatable to PDF and the remaining work is done using code inside the Default.aspx file.

public Document CreateDocument()
{
    // Create a new MigraDoc document
    this.document = new Document();
    this.document.Info.Title = "";
    this.document.Info.Subject = "";
    this.document.Info.Author = "Aftab";

    DefineStyles();
    CreatePage();
    FillContent();
    return this.document;
}

Here, CreateDocument() in PDFform.cs creates a new MigraDoc. Take a look at the three functions called for creating style and page and fill the content of the tables.

//
void DefineStyles()
{
    // Get the predefined style Normal.
    Style style = this.document.Styles["Normal"];
    // Because all styles are derived from Normal, the next line changes the 
    // font of the whole document. Or, more exactly, it changes the font of
    // all styles and paragraphs that do not redefine the font.
    style.Font.Name = "Verdana";

    style = this.document.Styles[StyleNames.Header];
    style.ParagraphFormat.AddTabStop("16cm", TabAlignment.Right);

    style = this.document.Styles[StyleNames.Footer];
    style.ParagraphFormat.AddTabStop("8cm", TabAlignment.Center);

    // Create a new style called Table based on style Normal
    style = this.document.Styles.AddStyle("Table", "Normal");
    style.Font.Name = "Verdana";
    style.Font.Name = "Times New Roman";
    style.Font.Size = 9;

    // Create a new style called Reference based on style Normal
    style = this.document.Styles.AddStyle("Reference", "Normal");
    style.ParagraphFormat.SpaceBefore = "5mm";
    style.ParagraphFormat.SpaceAfter = "5mm";
    style.ParagraphFormat.TabStops.AddTabStop("16cm", TabAlignment.Right);
}

DefineStyles() does the job of styling the document:

void CreatePage()
{
    // Each MigraDoc document needs at least one section.
    Section section = this.document.AddSection();
 
    // Put a logo in the header
    Image image= section.AddImage(path);

    image.Top = ShapePosition.Top;
    image.Left = ShapePosition.Left;
    image.WrapFormat.Style = WrapStyle.Through;
   
    // Create footer
    Paragraph paragraph = section.Footers.Primary.AddParagraph();
    paragraph.AddText("Health And Social Services.");
    paragraph.Format.Font.Size = 9;
    paragraph.Format.Alignment = ParagraphAlignment.Center;

    ............

    // Create the item table
    this.table = section.AddTable();
    this.table.Style = "Table";
    this.table.Borders.Color = TableBorder;
    this.table.Borders.Width = 0.25;
    this.table.Borders.Left.Width = 0.5;
    this.table.Borders.Right.Width = 0.5;
    this.table.Rows.LeftIndent = 0;

    // Before you can add a row, you must define the columns
    Column column;
    foreach (DataColumn col in dt.Columns)
    {
        column = this.table.AddColumn(Unit.FromCentimeter(3));
        column.Format.Alignment = ParagraphAlignment.Center;
    }

    // Create the header of the table
    Row row = table.AddRow();
    row.HeadingFormat = true;
    row.Format.Alignment = ParagraphAlignment.Center;
    row.Format.Font.Bold = true;
    row.Shading.Color = TableBlue;

    for (int i = 0; i < dt.Columns.Count; i++)
    {
        row.Cells[i].AddParagraph(dt.Columns[i].ColumnName);
        row.Cells[i].Format.Font.Bold = false;
        row.Cells[i].Format.Alignment = ParagraphAlignment.Left;
        row.Cells[i].VerticalAlignment = VerticalAlignment.Bottom;
    }
    
    this.table.SetEdge(0, 0, dt.Columns.Count, 1, Edge.Box, 
         BorderStyle.Single, 0.75, Color.Empty);
}

Here CreatePage() adds a header, footer, and different sections into the document and then the table is created to display the records. Columns from the datatable are added into the table inside the document and then a header row that contains the column names is added.

column = this.table.AddColumn(Unit.FromCentimeter(3)); 
//creates a new column and width of the column is passed as a parameter.

Row row = table.AddRow();
//A new header row is created  

row.Cells[i].AddParagraph(dt.Columns[i].ColumnName);
//this will add the column name to header of the row.

this.table.SetEdge(0, 0, dt.Columns.Count, 1, Edge.Box, 
           BorderStyle.Single, 0.75, Color.Empty);
//sets the border of the row


void FillContent()
{
    ...............

    Row row1;
    for (int i = 0; i < dt.Rows.Count; i++)
    {

        row1 = this.table.AddRow();
        row1.TopPadding = 1.5;

        for (int j = 0; j < dt.Columns.Count; j++)
        {
            row1.Cells[j].Shading.Color = TableGray;
            row1.Cells[j].VerticalAlignment = VerticalAlignment.Center;
           
            row1.Cells[j].Format.Alignment = ParagraphAlignment.Left;
            row1.Cells[j].Format.FirstLineIndent = 1;
            row1.Cells[j].AddParagraph(dt.Rows[i][j].ToString());

            this.table.SetEdge(0, this.table.Rows.Count - 2, dt.Columns.Count, 1, 
                 Edge.Box, BorderStyle.Single, 0.75);
        }
    }

    .............

}

FillContent() fills the rows from the datatable into the table inside the document:

row1.Cells[j].AddParagraph(dt.Rows[i][j].ToString());
//adds the value of column into the table row

The Default.aspx file contains the code for generating the PDF:

using MigraDoc.DocumentObjectModel;
using MigraDoc.Rendering;
using System.Diagnostics;

MigraDoc libraries are used for generating PDF documents, and System.Diagnostics for starting a PDF Viewer:

PDFform pdfForm = new PDFform(GetTable(), Server.MapPath("img2.gif"));

// Create a MigraDoc document
Document document = pdfForm.CreateDocument();
document.UseCmykColor = true;

// Create a renderer for PDF that uses Unicode font encoding
PdfDocumentRenderer pdfRenderer = new PdfDocumentRenderer(true);

// Set the MigraDoc document
pdfRenderer.Document = document;


// Create the PDF document
pdfRenderer.RenderDocument();

// Save the PDF document...
string filename = "PatientsDetail.pdf";

pdfRenderer.Save(filename);
// ...and start a viewer.
Process.Start(filename);

The PdfForm object is created and using it, a new MigraDoc is generated. PdfDocumentRenderer renders the PDF document and then saves it. Process.Start(filename) starts a PDF viewer to open the PDF file created using MigraDoc.