PDF/A conformity

[JoRoSch]

Hi,
exported pdf from Telerik.Windows.Documents.Model.RadDocument  with Telerik.Windows.Documents.FormatProviders.Pdf.PdfFormatProvider. Export(RadDocument document, Stream output) seem not be compliant with the PDF/A standard. Those exported pdfs are being konverted to PDF/A when opened with Adobe Reader X or XI which leads to a unwanted save dialog when those pdfs are closed again. When searching the forums for help I found e.g this thread (http://www.telerik.com/forums/pdf-a-iso-standard#beAEQxU83ESRLCawuwGPhQ) which confused me a bit because Steve assumes the export functionality fits the needs of PDF/A while Chavdar points out that PDF/A is currently not supported and that it is not clear when it will. I wanted to attach a example pdf so that you maybe could tell when investigating the file if something is wrong in the RadDocument from which the pdf is produced but uploading pdf is not supported. Can you help by any chance?

Thanks in advance  Jo

[Kammen]

Hello Jo,

I think there might be some confusion.

RadDocument is the base class of the document model used with RadRichTextBox. It can be exported to PDF but the produced document has some limitations, the saving dialog being a part of them. We are not sure what causes this dialog to show, but based on the research we've made I don't think it is because the PDF is not PDF/A compliant. We are planning on further investigating the cause of the behavior and you can track this item in the public portal to be notified about the status of the issue.

RadPdfProcessing (the product of this forum section) is our newest library that allows the creation of PDF files. It produces better PDF documents. However it still is not PDF/A compliant due to missing features. However, when you create a PDF using RadPdfProcessing, Adobe Reader won't try to modify the file. Making the PDF's PDF/A compliant is also in our backlog and you can upvote the feature and track its development progress here.

As to the forum thread that you have pointed, it concerns PDF files that are produced by Telerik Reporting.

Also, the public forums do not allow other attachments than images. If you want to send us some files or a sample project to demonstrate an issue, you can create a new support ticket for the respective product from your Telerik Account.

I hope this makes things clear. 

Regards,
Kammen
Telerik

 

 

[JoRoSch]

Hi, Kammen,
thank you for your reply. 
I would like to give it a try with the new RadPdfProcessing but, lazy as I am, don´t want to change so much code to just proof if the change to RadPdfProcessing would solve my problem.
So: I have a RadDocument. Can I easily convert / transform this into an RadFixedDocument. I tried (of course not an perfect approach but good enough for a quick testing) this:

byte[] b = PdfFormatProvider.Export(document);<br>                <br>Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.PdfFormatProvider fixedPdfFormatProvider = new Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.PdfFormatProvider();<br>Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.Model.RadFixedDocument radFixedDocument = fixedPdfFormatProvider.Import(b);<br>return fixedPdfFormatProvider.Export(radFixedDocument);

but that raises an error in the Importline.
What do I have to do to do it right?

Thanks in advance & Kind regards  Jo

[JoRoSch]

Hi Kammen, 
in addition to my last post here´s the stacktrace of the mentioned error:

Der Index war außerhalb des Arraybereichs.
Exception: Der Index war außerhalb des Arraybereichs.
bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.Model.Types.CrossReferenceEntry.Read(PostScriptReader reader)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.Model.Types.CrossReferenceTable.Read(PostScriptReader reader, IPdfImportContext context)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.Import.RadFixedDocumentImportContext.BeginImport(PostScriptReader reader)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.Import.PdfImporter.Import(Stream input, IPdfImportContext context)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Fixed.FormatProviders.Pdf.PdfFormatProvider.ImportOverride(Stream input)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Common.FormatProviders.FormatProviderBase`1.Import(Stream input)
   bei Telerik.Windows.Documents.Common.FormatProviders.BinaryFormatProviderBase`1.Import(Byte[] input)

[Kammen]

Hi Joachim,

The import capabilities of RadPdfProcessing unlike the export one, are still in early stage of development and support only basic scenarios. This is the reason that not every document can be imported correctly. 

I would like to suggest you to try the new RadFixedDocumentEditor class that can be used to create RadFixedDocument in a flow-like manner. This is the easiest way to evaluate if RadPdfProcessing supports all required scenarios. More information about this editor can be found in this article.

Regards,
Kammen
Telerik

 

 

[Olcay]

Hi Kammen,

Is there any change for the "export to PDF/A compliant format" feature for telerik radeditor?
Are you planning to publish this feature within next release?

Thanks in advance,

Olcay

[Deyan]

Hello Olcay,

Support for PDF/A in RadPdfProcessing is in our future implementation plans for the some of the following releases. However we cannot give a more specific time frame. By following the feedback item in Telerik's feedback portal, you will be notified via email when its status is changed to "In Development" and "Done".

As for the export to PDF/A from RadEditor - could you please specify what do you mean by Telerik RadEditor as in our suite for WPF there is no control with that specific name?

I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Regards,
Deyan
the Telerik team

 

 

[Olcay]

Hi Deyan,
I am talking about the RichTextBox control in WPF suite.
Is there any other workaround for getting PDF/A compliant document out of RichTextBox control?

Thanks in advance,

Olcay

[Deyan]

Hello Olcay,

We have not yet planned the PDF/A export from RadDocument and we cannot give you a concrete timeframe for the implementation of this feature request.

As we are intensively working on the RadPdfProcessing's flow to fixed export, we expect in some of the following releases to provide API that supports most of the flow document features as well as PDF/A support. This way in the following releases you will be able to export flow content to pdf either by using RadPdfProcessing's flow API or by generating or importing to a RadFlowDocument with the new RadWordsProcessing library and then export the RadFlowDocument to PDF.

If you have any other questions or concerns do not hesitate to contact us again.

Regards,
Deyan
the Telerik team

 

 

[Christian]

Hi,

I'm also searching for a possibility to create a PDF/A from a RadDocument. It seems like it is only possible to create PDF/A from RadFixedDocument. Is there still no way to convert a RadDocument to a RadFixedDocument to export this as PDF/A?

Best Regards,

Christian

[Tanya]

Hi Christian,

The PdfFormatProvider class of RadRichTextBox cannot currently export PDF/A compliant documents. This functionality is logged in our to-do list and you could vote for its implementation as well as track its status using the related public item on our feedback portal.

What you could do to achieve the requirement, is to export the document from RadRichTextBox to PDF and then import it with the PdfFormatProvider of RadPdfProcessing. Before exporting the final document, you will need to set that it should be PDF/A compliant and the use the Export() method.

Hope this is helpful.

Regards,
Tanya
Progress Telerik

[Christian]

Hi Tanya,

sure I could do an export to PDF and import to RadFixedDocument but since it is not possible to export to PDF from RadDocument with correct Page Numbers this workaround is not an option (See https://feedback.telerik.com/Project/143/Feedback/Details/176518-richtextbox-page-field-in-header-footer-of-document-created-with-mailmergecurren).

Any other workarounds?

Best regards,

Christian

[Polya]

Hi Christian,

Because you are using mail merge, I suggest using the RadWordsProcessing export instead of the RadPdfProcessing export. The steps to export a PDF/A compliant PDF document are as follows:

1. Export the RadRichTextBox document to docx.
2. Import the docx from step 1) with RadWordsProcessing's DocxFormatProvider.
3. Use the proposed approach from our RadWordsProcessing feature request to setup the correct page numbers.
4. Finally, export the document from step 3) to a PDF/A compliant PDF using the RadWordsProcessing's PdfExportSettings as described in this help article.

Hope this helps.

Regards,
Polya
Progress Telerik

[Christian]

Hi Polya,

I've tried this but exporting the RadFlowDocument to PDF breaks the page layout. In my sample Document I have 3 pages with some text. Export to docx works as expected but after exporting the docx to pdf I've only got two pages containing the whole content.

With this approach I've got correct page numbers and a PDF/A document but since the page layout changes it doesn't help.

Best regards,

Christian

[Polya]

Hello Christian,

I will kindly ask you to open a new support thread and attach a sample project with a RadDocument that demonstrates your approach, so we can investigate the cause of this behavior and assist you further. 

Regards,
Polya
Progress Telerik