I am using itextsharp to generate PDF in MVC application and this works very well on dev machine. When i deploy this on pre-production machine, this generates blank PDF page and no exception. I tried quick debugging using logging to see if I'm getting content or not after line StringReader sr = new StringReader(sb.ToString()); and i see it has content.
After some research I found one faced similar issue and he resolved this issue just by writing document.Open() after PdfWriter.GetInstance. Source: "The document is not open" error only in production with iTextSharp
After that, I thought to use code which worked for many developers How to convert HTML to PDF using iTextSharp and I still see blank PDF on pre-production but works on dev machine.
I doubt if itextsharp has some sort of dependency on operation system or office suit (with itextsharp latest updates) because as I said it works on dev machine.
Here's the code which generates blank PDF on production machine Windows Server 2012 R2.
public ActionResult DownloadOrderReceipt(string id)
{
string companyName = "Name Here";
int orderNo = 2303;
DataTable dt = new DataTable();
dt.Columns.AddRange(new DataColumn[5]
{
new DataColumn("ProductId", typeof(string)),
new DataColumn("Product", typeof(string)),
new DataColumn("Price", typeof(int)),
new DataColumn("Quantity", typeof(int)),
new DataColumn("Total", typeof(int))
});
dt.Rows.Add(101, "Sun Glasses", 200, 5, 1000);
dt.Rows.Add(102, "Jeans", 400, 2, 800);
dt.Rows.Add(103, "Trousers", 300, 3, 900);
dt.Rows.Add(104, "Shirts", 550, 2, 1100);
using (StringWriter sw = new StringWriter())
{
using (HtmlTextWriter hw = new HtmlTextWriter(sw))
{
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
// generate invoice header
sb.Append("<table width='100%' cellspacing='0' cellpadding='2'>");
sb.Append("<tr><td align='center' style='background-color: #18B5F0' colspan = '2'><b>Order Sheet</b></td></tr>");
sb.Append("<tr><td colspan = '2'></td></tr>");
sb.Append("<tr><td><b>Order No: </b>");
sb.Append(orderNo);
sb.Append("</td><td align = 'right'><b>Date: </b>");
sb.Append(DateTime.Now);
sb.Append(" </td></tr>");
sb.Append("<tr><td colspan = '2'><b>Company Name: </b>");
sb.Append(companyName);
sb.Append("</td></tr>");
sb.Append("</table>");
sb.Append("<br />");
// generate invoice items grid
sb.Append("<table border = '1'>");
sb.Append("<tr>");
foreach (DataColumn column in dt.Columns)
{
sb.Append("<th style = 'background-color: #D20B0C;color:#ffffff'>");
sb.Append(column.ColumnName);
sb.Append("</th>");
}
sb.Append("</tr>");
foreach (DataRow row in dt.Rows)
{
sb.Append("<tr>");
foreach (DataColumn column in dt.Columns)
{
sb.Append("<td>");
sb.Append(row[column]);
sb.Append("</td>");
}
sb.Append("</tr>");
}
sb.Append("<tr><td align = 'right' colspan = '");
sb.Append(dt.Columns.Count - 1);
sb.Append("'>Total</td>");
sb.Append("<td>");
sb.Append(dt.Compute("sum(Total)", ""));
sb.Append("</td>");
sb.Append("</tr></table>");
// export html string into PDF
StringReader sr = new StringReader(sb.ToString());
Document pdfDoc = new Document(PageSize.A4, 10f, 10f, 10f, 0f);
HTMLWorker htmlparser = new HTMLWorker(pdfDoc);
PdfWriter writer = PdfWriter.GetInstance(pdfDoc, Response.OutputStream);
pdfDoc.Open();
htmlparser.Parse(sr);
pdfDoc.Close();
Response.ContentType = "application/pdf";
Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", "attachment;filename=Invoice_" + orderNo + ".pdf");
Response.Cache.SetCacheability(HttpCacheability.NoCache);
Response.Write(pdfDoc);
Response.End();
}
}
return new EmptyResult();
}
Any help on this is highly appreciated.
Updated 1 (still same issue)
I just updated and simplified my code according to suggestions, but I still see same issue:
public ActionResult DownloadOrderReceipt(string id)
{
var order = orderRepository.Get(id);
if (order == null)
return new EmptyResult();
using (MemoryStream stream = new MemoryStream())
{
string htmlContent = "<p>Write this on PDF Page</p>";
StringReader sr = new StringReader(htmlContent);
Document pdfDoc = new Document(PageSize.A4, 10f, 10f, 100f, 0f);
PdfWriter writer = PdfWriter.GetInstance(pdfDoc, stream);
pdfDoc.Open();
XMLWorkerHelper.GetInstance().ParseXHtml(writer, pdfDoc, sr);
pdfDoc.Close();
return File(stream.ToArray(), "application/pdf", "Invoice_121212.pdf");
}
}
This also works on dev machine but on pre-production this generates blank PDF page.
Updated 2 (still same issue)
My attempt to fix this working on pre-production is ON. Here's the another two samples which I just tried and no help.
public ActionResult DownloadOrderReceipt(string id)
{
byte[] bytes;
using (var ms = new MemoryStream())
{
using (var doc = new Document())
{
using (var writer = PdfWriter.GetInstance(doc, ms))
{
doc.Open();
var example_html = @"<p>This <em>is </em><span class=""headline"" style=""text-decoration: underline;"">some</span> <strong>sample <em> text</em></strong><span style=""color: red;"">!</span></p>";
var example_css = @".headline{font-size:200%}";
// example 1
//using (var srHtml = new StringReader(example_html))
//{
// XMLWorkerHelper.GetInstance().ParseXHtml(writer, doc, srHtml);
//}
// example 2
using (var msCss = new MemoryStream(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(example_css)))
{
using (var msHtml = new MemoryStream(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(example_html)))
{
XMLWorkerHelper.GetInstance().ParseXHtml(writer, doc, msHtml, msCss);
}
}
doc.Close();
}
}
bytes = ms.ToArray();
}
Response.ContentType = "application/pdf";
Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", "attachment;filename=Invoice_1212121212.pdf");
Response.Cache.SetCacheability(HttpCacheability.NoCache);
Response.BinaryWrite(bytes);
Response.End();
return new EmptyResult();
}
SOLUTION
Updating this question after long time, because i noticed new comments. In the process of code review I found that developer had wrote logic to minify HTML content dynamically that caused the bites removed from PDF too and hence empty PDF.
