[OFBiz] Users - PDF forms

Chris Chesney cchesney at go-integral.com
Mon Apr 18 11:00:28 EDT 2005 

Chris:

We're working on a similar initiative with one of our clients.  They
have a multitude of forms and the majority of the information is
repeated on each form.  We took an interview approach to collect all of
the necessary information once via web forms and then create the
completed PDF docs and combine them into a single PDF.

Some of the forms are form-fillable PDF's where we use iText to fill in
the forms.  With some of the other forms, we created FOP definitions.
We also have word/excel/pdf documents that users upload to the server
which then get combined into the final PDF.  The final PDF can be easily
printed or routed via email.

The version we are currently working on will add workflow and digital
signatures.

If any of this is has overlap in what you are doing, let me know and we
can discuss in more detail.

Chris

> -----Original Message-----
> From: users-bounces at lists.ofbiz.org 
> [mailto:users-bounces at lists.ofbiz.org] On Behalf Of Chris Howe
> Sent: Sunday, April 17, 2005 9:31 PM
> To: users at lists.ofbiz.org
> Subject: [OFBiz] Users - PDF forms
> 
> the webapp component has a couple of itext jars.  How do I 
> access those? the packages from those jars don't seem to be 
> used anywhere
> --- bjfree at free-man.net  wrote:
> 
> > 
> > have you looked at the results of PDFBox?
> > Have you run PDFBox against your completed PDF's to see the results?
> >  
> > as far as free consulting. That is an animal I try to stay 
> away from. 
> > LOL.
> > I am already losing weight.
> >  
> >  
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Chris Howe [mailto:cjhowe76013 at yahoo.com]
> > Sent: Sunday, April 17, 2005 9:14 PM
> > To: users at lists.ofbiz.org
> > Subject: [OFBiz] Users - PDF forms
> > 
> > 
> > I keep finding more and more information on what I'm
> > 
> > wanting to do.  A lot of brick walls and a couple of doors. 
>  Allow me 
> > to better iterate my problem.
> > 1)  50 or so Industry utilized forms written in or easily 
> scanned into 
> > PDF format.
> > 2)  PDF allows for forms data to be passed to it using FDF or XFDF 
> > (XFDF would be more desirable)
> > 3)  Administratively we are moving towards paperless office 
> scenarios.
> >    a) We're not totally paperless yet
> >    b) Those who do business with us are no where near being 
> paperless 
> > Therefore we need to be able to incorporate paper based 
> forms with our 
> > web forms.  PDF forms does this quite nicely.
> > 
> > PDFBox < http://pdfbox.org <http://pdfbox.org> > appears 
> promising to 
> > solve my problem, however, I have no clue on how to integrate this 
> > into OFBiz
> > 
> > This integration (or something very similar) would be a terrific 
> > feature for those of you in !
> > 
> > the
> > 
> >  consulting
> > business. (yes that's my lame attempt to get free
> > help)
> > 
> > --- vhikida at inreach.com wrote:
> > > 
> > > I'm not actually a user of Ofbiz although I'm on
> > the
> > > mailing list. However,
> > > I do use both FOP and JasperReports to create PDF files.
> > > 
> > > For simple reports with lines and columns the
> > Jasper
> > > is pretty good. If
> > > you need a very complex layout you probably want
> > to
> > > use FOP.
> > > 
> > > To answer the question about FOP, you need the variable data that 
> > > goes into the PDF to be in XML format. The basic 
> formatting of the 
> > > data into PDF has to be coded XSL-FO (a superset of XSL).
> > FOP
> > > takes the XML and the
> > > xsl file and creates a PDF file.
> > > 
> > > It should be noted that FOP does not completely implement 
> the XSL-FO 
> > > standards (perhaps 75%). I don't think any other XSL-FO 
> engine does 
> > > either. However, I was pr!
> > 
> > etty much
> > 
> >  do almost all the
> > > formatting that I
> > > wanted.
> > > 
> > > > I am not very knowledgeable about FOP.
> > > > Have you looked into using the jasperreports
> > with
> > > PDF output that is in
> > > > the
> > > > system already.
> > > > you can use Ireports to rebuild the reports.
> > > > you can also output them as XLM and uses XLST
> > for
> > > transforms
> > > >
> > > > -----Original Message-----
> > > > From: Chris Howe [mailto:cjhowe76013 at
> > yahoo.com]
> > > > Sent: Saturday, April 16, 2005 11:04 PM
> > > > To: users at lists.ofbiz.org
> > > > Subject: [OFBiz] Users - PDF forms
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Adobe Pro's "save as xml" feature creates an xml
> > > document
> > > > but saves much of the formating as small images
> > > (over 100
> > > > in the one I tested).  Using the fdf format, I
> > now
> > > understand
> > > > to be extremely resource needy:  Your
> > applicatio!
> > 
> > n
> > >
> > 
> >  will
> > > > generate the FDF, and serve it to the user.
> > > Acrobat
> > > > will open, parse the FDF, and request the PDF
> > from
> > > > your server. The PDF loads, and Acrobat will
> > > combine
> > > > the PDF and FDF.
> > > > I don't know that the xsl:fo is any more
> > friendly.
> > > >
> > > > Would saving each page of the PDF as an image
> > > calling
> > > > it through the xsl:fo and layering the fields on
> > > top of
> > > > the images be viable?  I understand that would
> > > make editing
> > > > the now image portion of the PDF dificult, but
> > > that might be
> > > > beneficial in my case.  Any ideas?
> > > >
> > > > ============ Original Message ===== Chris Howe wrote:
> > > >
> > > >>Our company has quite a few pdf files that use
> > > forms
> > > >>in them.  I've used PHP and the FDF (form data
> > > format)
> > > >>library in t!
> > >
> > 
> >  >
> > > > he past
> > > >
> > > >  to pass variables to those PDF
> > > >>files.  I realize that fop can do the same
> > thing,
> > > >>except my understanding is that I would need to 
> recreate those pdf 
> > > >>files in the xsl-fop format.
> > > Am I
> > > >>correct in that assumption?  And if so, is there
> > a
> > > >>conversion program that will save me some
> > trouble?
> > >  Or
> > > >>am I making this more difficult than it is?
> > > >
> > > >
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