Generating Acrobat PDF

[David L Morris]

Just a question to see if anyone has been working with PDFLib
and may have converted the PdfLib.h to Powerbasic? The package
can be sourced from http://www.pdflib.com and includes examples
to run with C, C++, Java, Perl and Python. The licence is free
for non-commercial use. There is a ActiveX control demo for VB.

David

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[Stuart McLachlan]

Originally posted by David L Morris:
Just a question to see if anyone has been working with PDFLib
and may have converted the PdfLib.h to Powerbasic? The package
can be sourced from http://www.pdflib.com and includes examples
to run with C, C++, Java, Perl and Python. The licence is free
for non-commercial use. There is a ActiveX control demo for VB.

David

No, but I have written a couple of small PB/DLL apps which use AFPL Ghostscript as the back end to create PDFs.
Essentially the apps are a front end to parse the users inputs and pass the appropriate paramters to Ghostscript using a simple SHELL()

That may be a simpler solution for you than trying to get PdfLib working with PowerBasic.

You can find my apps at http://www.lexacorp.com.pg (click on the Free Software button).



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Check out my free software at http://www.lexacorp.com.pg(all written in PB/DLL)

[David L Morris]

Thanks Stuart.

I have visited your site in PNG and downloaded your program.

With PDFLib, one can generate the PDF on the fly, so it is not
a multi stage process. The package is very professional and has
many good examples in C. These are fairly simple to compile
and alter on all platforms, if you have a good C compiler.

For the present, I may extract data with PB and pass it to a
C program to generate the PDF report. That will most likely be
faster than converting the PDFLib.h file and testing etc.

There is also another package called CLibPDF from
http://www.fastio.com

It is similar.

Regards,

David

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[Lance Edmonds]

CLIBPDF is pretty expensive for commercial use. One seat is US$1000, and license fees range up to US$25,000.


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Lance
PowerBASIC Support
mailto:[email protected][email protected]</A>

[David L Morris]

Lance,

PDFLib is out of Germany and they are not as expensive.

The licence if free for non commercial users. The commercial range from US$500.
for 1-2 production servers up to redistributable unlimited at US$4000.

I am using the package as a non commercial skill building exercise. There
is included, a wealth of code in several languages to learn from.

Regards,

David




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[Brian Reynolds]

I do not know of any of the programmes which have been referred
to here but some may be interested in my experiences with PostScript
and PDF files.
I run a newspaper and when we initially went into computers,
about 20 years ago, I saw great advantage in the journalist
typing straight into a computer but some disadvantages in getting
the journalist to learn all the stuff that went with some of the
programmes.
I decided to write a programme which used only the essentials for
a journalist to get a story into a computer, but with the necessary
codes so it would print out on a PostScript printer. Naturally, I had
to write the code to convert the story and the codes into the
PostScript language so it would print.
The first programme I wrote was in GWBASIC, then converted to Turbo
Basic, then PowerBasic. All have worked successfully and we still
use the programme in our office today.
More recently, I have been using the PostScript files produced to
convert some files into PDF format.
Initially I used Adobe Acrobat Distiller, and still do in the production
area, but at $549 a throw here in Australia for the full Adobe
Acrobat, I found something a bit cheaper for our office and tested,
then bought a couple of copies of GPStill which, in Australia, cost about
$80 each.
GPStill turns a file into PDF format and does it very well but it
is still necessary to have a PostScript file to start with, unless
any sort of layout of the output is unnecessary.
If the latter is the case, I would suggest downloading GPStill from
the Internet site:
http://www.shareit.com
to see if it suits your needs. I think it was $46 in US currency.
As you would imagine, the PSDOS programme I have for producing
PostScript Files, allows the operator to define type sizes, styles,
line spacing and width of copy output.
I hope this is of some help.
Brian.



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[David L Morris]

Thanks for the reference Brian.

I visited the site. I notice also that they have - iSEDQuickPDF
ActiveX PDF Creating Library at USD 50.00 for the component and
USD 150.00 with source code. I haven't downloaded yet.

Have you tried that one?

David

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[Robert Wallace]

David,
Did you actually find "GPStill" - if so where - I can't!!
Thanks Bob


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[Joseph W Murphy]

Try Mr. Siegert home page: http://www.wizards.de/~frank/pstill.html

I registered the shareware and it works for all my postscript files but 5D PDF Creator is faster, you can get a 'free' copy for personal use in exchange for your valid e-mail address from ctrlp.com I have not gotten any spam from them.
5D PDF Creator has been purchased by Jaws Systems and is now called Jaws PDF Creator and is available for commercial sale through programmers paradise and other sites.

Joe Murphy

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[Michael Meeks]

Hi, since we are talking about PDF Files...
http://www.bluesquirrel.com/so/specials.html
$18.95 you can do it all, and save money!

I'm still looking for the perfect source-code to
incorporate your own PDF Creation within your
application!

Have a great day!

MWM




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mwm