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PDF Generation in Java using iText JAR

Generating PDF files in today’s enterprise applications is quite common. Doing this with Java is not an easy task as Java does not gives default api’s to handle PDF files. No worries, iText jar is for you.
iText is a free Java-PDF library that allows you to generate PDF files on the fly (dynamically). iText is an ideal library for developers looking to enhance web- and other applications with dynamic PDF document generation and/or manipulation. iText is not an end-user tool. Typically you won’t use it on your Desktop as you would use Acrobat or any other PDF application. Rather, you’ll build iText into your own applications so that you can automate the PDF creation and manipulation process.

iText (Java-PDF Library) can be used to:

  1. Serve PDF to a browser
  2. Generate dynamic documents from XML files or databases
  3. Use PDF’s many interactive features
  4. Add bookmarks, page numbers, watermarks, etc.
  5. Split, concatenate, and manipulate PDF pages
  6. Automate filling out of PDF forms
  7. Add digital signatures to a PDF file

Technical Requirements to use iText

You should have JDK 1.4 or later to integrate iText PDF generation in your application.

Getting iText

Download iText jar from its home page http://www.lowagie.com/iText/download.html
iText core: iText-5.2.1.jar

Generate simple PDF in Java using free Java-PDF library

It is very easy to generate a simple PDF file in Java using iText. All you have to do is to putitext.jar in your class path and paste following code in GeneratePDF.java class and compile and execute it. After you execute this, a file Test.pdf will be created in C: drive (If you are using Linux, you may want to have /usr/test.pdf as path).
package net.viralpatel.pdf;
 
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileOutputStream;
import java.io.OutputStream;
import java.util.Date;
 
import com.itextpdf.text.Document;
import com.itextpdf.text.Paragraph;
import com.itextpdf.text.pdf.PdfWriter;
 
public class GeneratePDF {
 
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        try {
            OutputStream file = new FileOutputStream(new File("D:\\Test.pdf"));
 
            Document document = new Document();
            PdfWriter.getInstance(document, file);
 
            document.open();
            document.add(new Paragraph("Hello World, iText"));
            document.add(new Paragraph(new Date().toString()));
 
            document.close();
            file.close();
 
        } catch (Exception e) {
 
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
}
In above code snippet we have created Document object which represents our PDF document. Also, by supplying OutputStream object to getInstance() method sends the output to OutputStream. Thus in our case we have created a output file and sent output to it.

Generate PDF as Output Stream in HTTP request

Sometime we may want to add the PDF generation functionality to a web application, where user on clicking some link or button is served with PDF output. Hence the PDF should be generated on fly and sent to client browser.
Consider following simple Struts Action class which uses this mechanism to generate a dummy PDF and sent the output to browser.
package net.viralpatel.struts.helloworld.action;
 
import java.util.Date;
 
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
 
import org.apache.struts.action.Action;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionForm;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionForward;
import org.apache.struts.action.ActionMapping;
 
import com.itextpdf.text.Document;
import com.itextpdf.text.Paragraph;
import com.itextpdf.text.pdf.PdfWriter;
 
/**
 * @author KiranRavi_Hegde
 *
 */
public class PdfHelloWorldAction extends Action {
     
    public ActionForward execute(ActionMapping mapping, ActionForm form,
            HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response)
            throws Exception {
     
    Document document = new Document();
    try{
        response.setContentType("application/pdf");
        PdfWriter.getInstance(document, response.getOutputStream());
        document.open();
        document.add(new Paragraph("Hello Kiran"));
        document.add(new Paragraph(new Date().toString()));
    }catch(Exception e){
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
    document.close();
    return null;
 
    }
}
If you notice in above code, we have passed response.getOutputStream() object to getInstance()method. Thus the output generated by iText will be sent directly to the response. Also don’t forget to set the content type of the response to application/pdf.

Setting attributes of PDF using free Java-PDF library

While you generate a PDF, you may want to set its different attribute like: author name, title, file description etc. iText jar can help you to set different attributes of a PDF file. Document object provide different methods to add various attributes to a PDF file.
document.addAuthor("Kiran Hegde");
document.addCreationDate();
document.addCreator("iText library");
document.addTitle("Hello World PDF");

Download Source Code

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