CakePdf plugin
, (*1)
Plugin containing CakePdf lib which will use a PDF engine to convert HTML to PDF., (*2)
Engines included in the plugin:
* DomPdf (^2.0)
* Mpdf (^8.0.4)
* Tcpdf (^6.3)
* WkHtmlToPdf RECOMMENDED ENGINE, (*3)
Community maintained engines:
* PDFreactor, (*4)
Requirements
- One of the following render engines: DomPdf, Mpdf, Tcpdf or wkhtmltopdf
- pdftk (optional) See: http://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-the-pdf-toolkit/
Installation
Using Composer:, (*5)
composer require friendsofcake/cakepdf
CakePdf does not include any of the supported PDF engines, you need to install
the ones you intend to use yourself., (*6)
Packages for the recommend wkhtmltopdf engine can be downloaded from https://wkhtmltopdf.org/downloads.html.
DomPdf, Mpdf and Tcpdf can be installed via composer using one of the following commands:, (*7)
composer require dompdf/dompdf
composer require tecnickcom/tcpdf
composer require mpdf/mpdf
Setup
Loading the plugin using CakePHP's console:, (*8)
./bin/cake plugin load CakePdf
If you plan to use the PDF view functionality
that automatically renders and returns the PDF for sending it to the browser,
you should also register the pdf extension in your config/routes.php file:, (*9)
$routes->scope('/', function (\Cake\Routing\RouteBuilder $routes) {
$routes->setExtensions(['pdf']);
// ...
});
Further setup information can be found in the usage section., (*10)
Configuration
Use Configure::write('CakePdf', $config); or in controller use view builder to
set view option named pdfConfig (only when used with PdfView). You need to
define at least $config['engine']. When using CakePdf directly you can also
pass the config array to constructor. The value for engine should have the
Plugin.ClassName format without the Engine suffix., (*11)
Configuration options:
* engine: Engine to be used (required), or an array of engine config options
* className: Engine class to use
* binary: Binary file to use (Only for wkhtmltopdf)
* cwd: current working directory (Only for wkhtmltopdf)
* options: Engine specific options. Currently used for following engine:
* WkHtmlToPdfEngine: The options are passed as CLI arguments
* TexToPdfEngine: The options are passed as CLI arguments
* DomPdfEngine: The options are passed to constructor of Dompdf class
* MpdfEngine: The options are passed to constructor of Mpdf class
* crypto: Crypto engine to be used, or an array of crypto config options
* className: Crypto class to use
* binary: Binary file to use
* pageSize: Change the default size, defaults to A4
* orientation: Change the default orientation, defaults to portrait
* margin: Array or margins with the keys: bottom, left, right, top and their values
* title: Title of the document
* delay: A delay in milliseconds to wait before rendering the pdf
* windowStatus: The required window status before rendering the pdf
* encoding: Change the encoding, defaults to UTF-8
* download: Set to true to force a download, only when using PdfView
* filename: Filename for the document when using forced download, (*12)
Example:, (*13)
Configure::write('CakePdf', [
'engine' => 'CakePdf.WkHtmlToPdf',
'margin' => [
'bottom' => 15,
'left' => 50,
'right' => 30,
'top' => 45,
],
'orientation' => 'landscape',
'download' => true,
]);
use CakePdf\View\Pdfiew;
class InvoicesController extends AppController
{
// In your Invoices controller you could set additional configs,
// or override the global ones:
public function view($id = null)
{
$invoice = $this->Invoice->get($id);
$this->viewBuilder()->setOption(
'pdfConfig',
[
'orientation' => 'portrait',
'filename' => 'Invoice_' . $id,
]
);
$this->set('invoice', $invoice);
}
/**
* Add Pdfiew::class to this $viewClasses property so that CakePHP automatically
* switches the view class for URLs ending with `.pdf` or with appropriate `Accept` header.
*
* @see https://book.cakephp.org/5/en/controllers.html#content-type-negotiation
* @var array<string>
*/
public function viewClasses(): array
{
return $this->viewClasses[] = Pdfiew::class;
}
}
The engine and crypto config options can also be arrays with configuration
options for the relevant class. For example:, (*14)
Configure::write('CakePdf', [
'engine' => [
'className' => 'CakePdf.WkHtmlToPdf',
// Options usable depend on the engine used.
'options' => [
'print-media-type' => false,
'outline' => true,
'dpi' => 96,
'cover' => [
'url' => 'cover.html',
'enable-smart-shrinking' => true,
],
'toc' => true,
],
/**
* For Mac OS X / Linux by default the `wkhtmltopdf` binary should
* be available through environment path or you can specify location as:
*/
// 'binary' => '/usr/local/bin/wkhtmltopdf',
/**
* On Windows the engine uses the path shown below as default.
* You NEED to use the path like old fashioned MS-DOS Paths,
* otherwise you will get error like:
* "WKHTMLTOPDF didn't return any data"
*/
// 'binary' => 'C:\\Progra~1\\wkhtmltopdf\\bin\\wkhtmltopdf.exe',
],
]);
Usage
You can use CakePdf in two ways, read carefully which one you actually need.
Many people mix both ways and don't get the expected results., (*15)
1: Render as PDF (including forced download) in the browser with PdfView
You can create PDF template and layout files for your controller actions and have
them automatically rendered. Place the templates in a pdf subdir, for
instance templates/Invoices/pdf/view.php, layouts will be in
templates/layout/pdf/default.php., (*16)
Then for e.g. accessing the URL http://localhost/invoices/view/1.pdf would
give you the generated PDF., (*17)
Additionally you can map resources by adding Router::mapResources(['Invoices']);
to your routes file and you can access the same document at
http://localhost/invoices/1.pdf., (*18)
In case you don't want to use the pdf extension in your URLs, you can omit
registering it in your routes configuration. You can then set the Accept
request header to application/pdf to make CakePHP automatically switch to PdfView
(required the viewClasses() method to be set as shown above), or explicity switch
the view class in your controller action:, (*19)
$this->viewBuilder()->setClassName('CakePdf.Pdf');
Instead of having the pdf rendered in the browser itself, you can force it to be
downloaded by using download option. Additionally you can specify custom filename
using filename options., (*20)
$this->viewBuilder()->setOption(
'pdfConfig',
[
'download' => true, // This can be omitted if "filename" is specified.
'filename' => 'Invoice_' . $id, // This can be omitted if you want a file name based on URL.
]
);
2: Create PDF for email attachment, file storage etc.
You can use CakePdf to create raw PDF data with a view template.
The view file path would look like templates/pdf/newsletter.php.
Layout file path would be like templates/layout/pdf/default.php
Note that layouts for both usage types are within same directory, but the view
templates use different file paths Optionally you can also write the raw data to
file., (*21)
Example:, (*22)
$CakePdf = new \CakePdf\Pdf\CakePdf();
$CakePdf->template('newsletter', 'default');
$CakePdf->viewVars(['key' => 'value']);
// Get the PDF string returned
$pdf = $CakePdf->output();
// Or write it to file directly
$pdf = $CakePdf->write(APP . 'files' . DS . 'newsletter.pdf');
Encryption
You can optionally encrypt the PDF with permissions, (*23)
To use encryption you first need to select a crypto engine. Currently we support
the following crypto engines:
* Pdftk, (*24)
Usage
Add the following in your bootstrap., (*25)
Configure::write('CakePdf.crypto', 'CakePdf.Pdftk');
Options in pdfConfig:
* protect: Set to true to enable encryption
* userPassword (optional): Set a password to open the PDF file
* ownerPassword (optional): Set the password to unlock the locked permissions
* one of the above must be present, either userPassword or ownerPassword
* permissions (optional): Define the permissions, (*26)
Permissions:, (*27)
By default, we deny all permissions., (*28)
To allow all permissions:, (*29)
Set 'permission' to true, (*30)
To allow specific permissions:, (*31)
Set 'permissions' to an array with a combination of the following available permissions:
* print
* degraded_print
* modify,
* assembly,
* copy_contents,
* screen_readers,
* annotate,
* fill_in, (*32)
How to
Ensure css, images etc. are loaded in PDF
Use absolute URLs for static assets in your view templates for PDFs.
If you use HtmlHelper::image(), or HtmlHelper::css()
make sure you have set fullBase option to true., (*33)
For example, (*34)
echo $this->Html->image('logo.png', ['fullBase' => true]);
echo $this->Html->css('bootstrap.css', ['fullBase' => true]);
If you are enable to get URLs for assets working properly, you can
try using file system paths instead for the assets., (*35)
<img src="<?= WWW_ROOT ?>img/logo.png" />
Note: Since v0.12.16 wkhtmltopdf requires the option enable-local-file-access
to be able to use local filesytem paths for assets. You can enable it by setting
'enable-local-file-access' => true in the engine config array., (*36)
Get header and footer on all pages
Here are a couple of CSS based solutions you can refer to for easily
getting header footer on all PDF pages., (*37)
- https://ourcodeworld.com/articles/read/687/how-to-configure-a-header-and-footer-in-dompdf
- https://jessicaschillinger.com/print-repeating-header-browser/
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