topic Create PDF ? in ArcGIS API for Silverlight Questions

Create PDF ?

CraigPerreault — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:02:21 GMT

Does anyone have a code sample to create a PDF file using the Silverlight API?

Re: Create PDF ?

dotMorten_esri — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:40:38 GMT

Take a look at this PDF libary: http://silverpdf.codeplex.com/

Re: Create PDF ?

MarkCederholm — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 21:48:25 GMT

That's fine as long as you're not trying to render a map with a layer defined by a URL, because then you can't access the WriteableBitmap pixels to create the image to add to the PDF. I haven't been able to find a true code-behind solution. There may be a way to do it through a custom web service, but I haven't figured out how to do that either.

Re: Create PDF ?

DominiqueBroux — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 17:19:15 GMT

Using the SL4 print with a PDF driver is another option, but there is some UI side effect (the user has to select the PDF printer)

Re: Create PDF ?

MarkCederholm — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 15:18:09 GMT

I did find a code-behind workaround to access the restricted Map content after all! The basic approach is to export dynamic and tiled service layers through the REST API to image streams and overlay the results in a WriteableBitmap. You can then render graphics layers and UIElements on top of that. Probably more work than just using a PDF browser extension, but what the heck.

Anyway, I've created a first draft of a PDF creation class and added it to the code gallery as well as my web site: http://www.pierssen.com/arcgis10/silverlight.htm 🙂

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:42:02 GMT

I did find a code-behind workaround to access the restricted Map content after all! The basic approach is to export dynamic and tiled service layers through the REST API to image streams and overlay the results in a WriteableBitmap. You can then render graphics layers and UIElements on top of that. Probably more work than just using a PDF browser extension, but what the heck.

Anyway, I've created a first draft of a PDF creation class and added it to the code gallery as well as my web site: http://www.pierssen.com/arcgis10/silverlight.htm 🙂

I took a look at your code and have been playing around with it. Great work! Unfortunately, I've found a bug, or rather an intentional limitation (on the Microsoft side). Your line of code:

i = wbm.Pixels[0];

(located on line 252) is throwing a handled error of type System.Security.SecurityException. The error is: "WriteableBitmap has protected content. Pixel access is not allowed." After research, I found out this is due to accessing maps from other sites. For example, if your base layers are coming from ESRI (and maybe Bing, I'm not sure), you'll get this error. This is due to the fact that WriteableBitmap has been prevented from accessing anything in another domain. Setting clientaccess.xml or crossdomain.xml doesn't seem to help.

This is a built-in limitation with WriteableBitmap as a security measure.

More information is available here:

http://forums.silverlight.net/forums/t/148589.aspx

And here:

http://forums.silverlight.net/forums/t/118030.aspx

I'm looking through seeing how best to work around this issue, but due to the fact that some of our layers are coming from ESRI, I'm not sure how we can address this. Any ideas?

Re: Create PDF ?

MarkCederholm — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:47:52 GMT

You need to study the code more closely. In the download, that line is within a try block to test for restricted content. If restricted content is encountered, then the workaround is invoked.

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 15:16:44 GMT

I did find a code-behind workaround to access the restricted Map content after all! The basic approach is to export dynamic and tiled service layers through the REST API to image streams and overlay the results in a WriteableBitmap. You can then render graphics layers and UIElements on top of that. Probably more work than just using a PDF browser extension, but what the heck.

Anyway, I've created a first draft of a PDF creation class and added it to the code gallery as well as my web site: http://www.pierssen.com/arcgis10/silverlight.htm 🙂

I see where you're catching the System.Security.SecurityException from WriteableBitmap for the layer defined by the URL in your code. The situation I'm running into seems to be related to the fact that by the time the code is trying to do document.Save(_streamOutPDF) (on line 198), silverPDF (or rather PdfSharp) has already closed the document. I'm getting a "PrepareForSave: Number of deleted unreachable objects: 1" from what looks to be PdfSharp.Pdf.PdfDocument.Save, followed by two "A first chance exception of type 'System.ObjectDisposedException' occurred in mscorlib.dll". I'm not familiar with SilverPDF, not to mention PdfSharp. Any thoughts on how to work around this?

Probably a newbie situation.

Re: Create PDF ?

MarkCederholm — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 15:31:10 GMT

Interesting. I haven't encountered that error myself, but I'm wondering if in your case it takes so long to create the image that the output stream provided by Silverlight is expiring. Try asking for the output PDF file right at the start of the PDF creation stage and see if that solves the problem.

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Sat, 11 Dec 2021 11:09:09 GMT

Interesting. I haven't encountered that error myself, but I'm wondering if in your case it takes so long to create the image that the output stream provided by Silverlight is expiring. Try asking for the output PDF file right at the start of the PDF creation stage and see if that solves the problem.

That's what I'm doing, actually.

                SaveFileDialog savePDF = new SaveFileDialog();
                savePDF.DefaultExt = ".pdf";
                savePDF.ShowDialog();
                System.IO.Stream PDFstream = savePDF.OpenFile();
                PDFNew.SetOutputStream(PDFstream);
                PDFNew.DoExport();

Re: Create PDF ?

MarkCederholm — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:32:40 GMT

Sorry, I should have been more specific. In PDFExporter.cs, comment out all the _streamOutPDF lines and move your SaveFileDialog lines to just before the document.Save line. If that's actually the problem, then I'll revise the class accordingly.

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 16:34:52 GMT

Attempting to set a WriteTimeout (System.IO.Stream.WriteTimeout) on PDFstream.WriteTimeout =4000; fails with "Timeouts are not supported on this stream". I'm stumped, as I have no idea what alternatives I have.

Leave it to me to find the one situation that is just plain bizarre.

You're right though, when you say that it is taking a while. I think I can time the whole operation on my watch, it's easily over 5 seconds.

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 17:11:51 GMT

Sorry, I should have been more specific. In PDFExporter.cs, comment out all the _streamOutPDF lines and move your SaveFileDialog lines to just before the document.Save line. If that's actually the problem, then I'll revise the class accordingly.

Close. Unfortunately SaveFileDialog has to be called by a user-initiated event, like a Button_Click event. I created a new property for a SaveFileDialog object, and passed it in from my Button_Click event after showing the dialog, then created the stream from the SaveFileDialog.OpenFile() method inside PDFExporter.cs. Thanks for the suggestion, I now have a PDF file to work with.

Unfortunately, I seem to be missing layers. How exactly does your class determine the order of your layers?

Re: Create PDF ?

KevinSesock — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 17:35:30 GMT

Close. Unfortunately SaveFileDialog has to be called by a user-initiated event, like a Button_Click event. I created a new property for a SaveFileDialog object, and passed it in from my Button_Click event after showing the dialog, then created the stream from the SaveFileDialog.OpenFile() method inside PDFExporter.cs. Thanks for the suggestion, I now have a PDF file to work with.

Unfortunately, I seem to be missing layers. How exactly does your class determine the order of your layers?

Not only am I missing layers, but a Dynamic Service Layer is drawing... oddly. As in, the colors of the Dynamic Service Layer are messed up. I assume this is in the bmp conversion method. Any thoughts?

Mark:

I'd be happy to email you the pdfs that were output if you'd like to take a look. Otherwise I'll debug later, right now I've got to get other things taken care of in my app, so maybe I can find a fix if you don't have the time.

Re: Create PDF ?

TomArnold1 — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 20:03:25 GMT

Can someone send an example of they are using the export to pdf? Thank you.

Re: Create PDF ?

CraigPerreault — Sat, 11 Dec 2021 11:09:12 GMT

using PdfSharp.Pdf;

        private void PDFbutton_MouseLeftButtonUp(object sender, MouseEventArgs e)
        {
                    SaveFileDialog savePDF = new SaveFileDialog();
                    savePDF.Filter = "PDF file format|*.pdf";
                    savePDF.DefaultExt = ".pdf";
                    if (savePDF.ShowDialog() == true)
                    {
                        System.IO.Stream PDFstream = savePDF.OpenFile();
                        PDFExporter PDFNew = new PDFExporter();
                        PDFNew.SetMap(myMap);
                        PDFNew.SetOutputStream(PDFstream);
                        PDFNew.DoExport();
                    }
        }

Re: Create PDF ?

DavidAshton — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 21:47:55 GMT

Can someone tell me where to place the download dll from the PDF libary: http://silverpdf.codeplex.com/

I tried to register the PDF library silverPDF.dll but no luck

So I just added it to my vs project as a ref.... but I'm getting an error message stating it could load the assembly file silverPDF.dll

If I go to the file and right click it and click register. The "Register ArcGIS Assembly" dialog window pops up. I can either select Desktop or Server. I tired both and they both give me the error "Registration Failed" - Could not load file or assembly 'System Windows, Version = 2.0.5.0 culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken 7cec85d7bea7798e or one of its dependencies. The system cannont find the specified.

O.K. Here's a little more info. After just adding it to the references in VS I ran debug and got an error stating it was being blocked but I unblocked it after downloading so I went into the debug directory and unblocked again. No the application luanches but it just hangs and never gets past the original silverlight blue logo. When I take out all the PDF stuff the app is fine.

Thanks

Re: Create PDF ?

DavidAshton — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 22:29:51 GMT

I got it....

Thanks Kevin! Great Tool.

Re: Create PDF ?

VikramS — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 14:10:30 GMT

Hi DAvid ,

Can u please tell me how did u register silver.dll . I am also getting the same error .. Thank u very much

I got it....

Thanks Kevin! Great Tool.

Re: Create PDF ?

DavidAshton — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 02:16:25 GMT

I just opened my project in VS.
Right click on References
Click Add Reference
Click the Browse button and browse to the dll. This add the dll to your VS project