# Wicked PDF [](http://travis-ci.org/mileszs/wicked_pdf)
## A PDF generation plugin for Ruby on Rails
Wicked PDF uses the shell utility [wkhtmltopdf](http://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/) to serve a PDF file to a user from HTML. In other words, rather than dealing with a PDF generation DSL of some sort, you simply write an HTML view as you would normally, then let Wicked take care of the hard stuff.
_Wicked PDF has been verified to work on Ruby 1.8.7 and 1.9.2; Rails 2 and Rails 3_
### Installation
First, be sure to install [wkhtmltopdf](http://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/).
One simple way to install all of the binaries (Linux, OSX, Windows) is through the gem [wkhtmltopdf-binary](https://github.com/steerio/wkhtmltopdf-binary).
To install, simply add
```ruby
gem 'wkhtmltopdf-binary'
```
To your Gemfile.
If your wkhtmltopdf executable is not on your webserver's path, configure it in an initializer:
```ruby
WickedPdf.config = {
:exe_path => '/usr/local/bin/wkhtmltopdf'
}
```
Note that versions before 0.9.0 [have problems](http://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/issues/detail?id=82&q=vodnik) on some machines with reading/writing to streams.
This plugin relies on streams to communicate with wkhtmltopdf.
More information about [wkhtmltopdf](http://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/) could be found [here](http://madalgo.au.dk/~jakobt/wkhtmltoxdoc/wkhtmltopdf-0.9.9-doc.html).
Next:
script/plugin install git://github.com/mileszs/wicked_pdf.git
script/generate wicked_pdf
or add this to your Gemfile:
```ruby
gem 'wicked_pdf'
```
You may also need to add
```ruby
Mime::Type.register "application/pdf", :pdf
```
to `config/initializers/mime_types.rb`
### Basic Usage
```ruby
class ThingsController < ApplicationController
def show
respond_to do |format|
format.html
format.pdf do
render :pdf => "file_name"
end
end
end
end
```
### Usage Conditions - Important!
The wkhtmltopdf binary is run outside of your Rails application; therefore, your normal layouts will not work. If you plan to use any CSS, Javascript, or image files, you must modify your layout so that you provide an absolute reference to these files. The best option for Rails without the asset pipeline is to use the `wicked_pdf_stylesheet_link_tag`, `wicked_pdf_image_tag`, and `wicked_pdf_javascript_include_tag` helpers or to go straight to a CDN (Content Delivery Network) for popular libraries such as jQuery.
#### wicked_pdf helpers
```html
<%= wicked_pdf_stylesheet_link_tag "pdf" -%>
<%= wicked_pdf_javascript_include_tag "number_pages" %>
<%= yield %>
```
#### CDN reference
In this case, you can use that standard Rails helpers and point to the current CDN for whichever framework you are using. For jQuery, it would look somethng like this, given the current versions at the time of this writing.
```html
<%= javascript_include_tag "http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.10.0.min.js" %>
<%= javascript_include_tag "http://code.jquery.com/ui/1.10.3/jquery-ui.min.js" %>
```
#### Asset pipeline usage
The way to handle this for the asset pipeline on Heroku is to include these files in your asset precompile list, as follows:
config.assets.precompile += ['blueprint/screen.css', 'pdf.css', 'jquery.ui.datepicker.js', 'pdf.js', ...etc...]
### Advanced Usage with all available options
```ruby
class ThingsController < ApplicationController
def show
respond_to do |format|
format.html
format.pdf do
render :pdf => 'file_name',
:disposition => 'attachment', # default 'inline'
:template => 'things/show.pdf.erb',
:file => "#{Rails.root}/files/foo.erb"
:layout => 'pdf.html', # use 'pdf.html' for a pdf.html.erb file
:wkhtmltopdf => '/usr/local/bin/wkhtmltopdf', # path to binary
:show_as_html => params[:debug].present?, # allow debuging based on url param
:orientation => 'Landscape', # default Portrait
:page_size => 'A4, Letter, ...', # default A4
:save_to_file => Rails.root.join('pdfs', "#{filename}.pdf"),
:save_only => false, # depends on :save_to_file being set first
:proxy => 'TEXT',
:basic_auth => false # when true username & password are automatically sent from session
:username => 'TEXT',
:password => 'TEXT',
:cover => 'URL',
:dpi => 'dpi',
:encoding => 'TEXT',
:user_style_sheet => 'URL',
:cookie => ['_session_id SESSION_ID'], # could be an array or a single string in a 'name value' format
:post => ['query QUERY_PARAM'], # could be an array or a single string in a 'name value' format
:redirect_delay => NUMBER,
:javascript_delay => NUMBER,
:zoom => FLOAT,
:page_offset => NUMBER,
:book => true,
:default_header => true,
:disable_javascript => false,
:grayscale => true,
:lowquality => true,
:enable_plugins => true,
:disable_internal_links => true,
:disable_external_links => true,
:print_media_type => true,
:disable_smart_shrinking => true,
:use_xserver => true,
:no_background => true,
:extra => '' # directly inserted into the command to wkhtmltopdf
:margin => {:top => SIZE, # default 10 (mm)
:bottom => SIZE,
:left => SIZE,
:right => SIZE},
:header => {:html => { :template => 'users/header.pdf.erb', # use :template OR :url
:layout => 'pdf_plain.html', # optional, use 'pdf_plain.html' for a pdf_plain.html.erb file, defaults to main layout
:url => 'www.example.com',
:locals => { :foo => @bar }},
:center => 'TEXT',
:font_name => 'NAME',
:font_size => SIZE,
:left => 'TEXT',
:right => 'TEXT',
:spacing => REAL,
:line => true,
:content => 'HTML CONTENT ALREADY RENDERED'}, # optionally you can pass plain html already rendered (useful if using pdf_from_string)
:footer => {:html => { :template => 'shared/footer.pdf.erb', # use :template OR :url
:layout => 'pdf_plain.html', # optional, use 'pdf_plain.html' for a pdf_plain.html.erb file, defaults to main layout
:url => 'www.example.com',
:locals => { :foo => @bar }},
:center => 'TEXT',
:font_name => 'NAME',
:font_size => SIZE,
:left => 'TEXT',
:right => 'TEXT',
:spacing => REAL,
:line => true,
:content => 'HTML CONTENT ALREADY RENDERED'}, # optionally you can pass plain html already rendered (useful if using pdf_from_string)
:toc => {:font_name => "NAME",
:depth => LEVEL,
:header_text => "TEXT",
:header_fs => SIZE,
:l1_font_size => SIZE,
:l2_font_size => SIZE,
:l3_font_size => SIZE,
:l4_font_size => SIZE,
:l5_font_size => SIZE,
:l6_font_size => SIZE,
:l7_font_size => SIZE,
:l1_indentation => NUM,
:l2_indentation => NUM,
:l3_indentation => NUM,
:l4_indentation => NUM,
:l5_indentation => NUM,
:l6_indentation => NUM,
:l7_indentation => NUM,
:no_dots => true,
:disable_links => true,
:disable_back_links => true},
:outline => {:outline => true,
:outline_depth => LEVEL}
end
end
end
end
```
By default, it will render without a layout (:layout => false) and the template for the current controller and action.
### Super Advanced Usage ###
If you need to just create a pdf and not display it:
```ruby
# create a pdf from a string
pdf = WickedPdf.new.pdf_from_string('Hello There!
')
# create a pdf from string using templates, layouts and content option for header or footer
WickedPdf.new.pdf_from_string(
render_to_string('templates/pdf.html.erb', :layout => 'pdfs/layout_pdf'),
:footer => {
:content => render_to_string(:layout => 'pdfs/layout_pdf')
}
)
# or from your controller, using views & templates and all wicked_pdf options as normal
pdf = render_to_string :pdf => "some_file_name"
# then save to a file
save_path = Rails.root.join('pdfs','filename.pdf')
File.open(save_path, 'wb') do |file|
file << pdf
end
```
If you need to display utf encoded characters, add this to your pdf views or layouts:
```html
```
### Page Numbering
A bit of javascript can help you number your pages. Create a template or header/footer file with this:
```html
Page of
```
Anything with a class listed in "var x" above will be auto-filled at render time.
If you do not have explicit page breaks (and therefore do not have any "page" class), you can also use wkhtmltopdf's built in page number generation by setting one of the headers to "[page]":
```ruby
render :pdf => 'filename', :header => { :right => '[page] of [topage]' }
```
### Configuration
You can put your default configuration, applied to all pdf's at "wicked_pdf.rb" initializer.
### Rack Middleware
If you would like to have WickedPdf automatically generate PDF views for all (or nearly all) pages by appending .pdf to the URL, add the following to your Rails app:
```ruby
# in application.rb (Rails3) or environment.rb (Rails2)
require 'wicked_pdf'
config.middleware.use WickedPdf::Middleware
```
If you want to turn on or off the middleware for certain urls, use the `:only` or `:except` conditions like so:
```ruby
# conditions can be plain strings or regular expressions, and you can supply only one or an array
config.middleware.use WickedPdf::Middleware, {}, :only => '/invoice'
config.middleware.use WickedPdf::Middleware, {}, :except => [ %r[^/admin], '/secret', %r[^/people/\d] ]
```
If you use the standard `render :pdf => 'some_pdf'` in your app, you will want to exclude those actions from the middleware.
### Further Reading
Andreas Happe's post [Generating PDFs from Ruby on Rails](http://www.snikt.net/blog/2012/04/26/wicked-pdf/)
StackOverflow [questions with the tag "wicked-pdf"](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/wicked-pdf)
### Debugging
Now you can use a debug param on the URL that shows you the content of the pdf in plain html to design it faster.
First of all you must configure the render parameter ":show_as_html => params[:debug]" and then just use it like normally but adding "debug=1" as a param:
http://localhost:3001/CONTROLLER/X.pdf?debug=1
However, the wicked_pdf_* helpers will use file:/// paths for assets when using :show_as_html, and your browser's cross-domain safety feature will kick in, and not render them. To get around this, you can load your assets like so in your templates:
```html
<%= params[:debug].present? ? image_tag('foo') : wicked_pdf_image_tag('foo') %>
```
### Inspiration
You may have noticed: this plugin is heavily inspired by the PrinceXML plugin [princely](http://github.com/mbleigh/princely/tree/master). PrinceXML's cost was prohibitive for me. So, with a little help from some friends (thanks [jqr](http://github.com/jqr)), I tracked down wkhtmltopdf, and here we are.
### Awesome Peoples
Also, thanks to [unixmonkey](https://github.com/Unixmonkey), [galdomedia](http://github.com/galdomedia), [jcrisp](http://github.com/jcrisp), [lleirborras](http://github.com/lleirborras), [tiennou](http://github.com/tiennou), and everyone else for all their hard work and patience with my delays in merging in their enhancements.