Portable Document Format (PDF), is a format recommended for printing and exports. You can use the PDFRenderingExtension to render your report in this format. With the PDF rendering extension, you can use features such as font linking, digital signatures and end-user defined characters (EUDC). These features are only available in the Professional Edition of ActiveReports.

In order to render your report in PDF, add reference to the following assemblies in the project:

• GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.v10.dll
• GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Extensibility.v10.dll
  

The following steps provide an example of rendering a report in PDF format.

1. In Visual Studio, create a new Windows Forms Application or open an existing one.
2. On the Form.cs or Form.vb that opens, double-click the title bar to create the Form_Load event.
3. Add the following code inside the Form_Load event.

' Provide the page report you want to render.
Dim report As New GrapeCity.ActiveReports.PageReport(New System.IO.FileInfo("C:\Sample_PageReport.rdlx"))
Dim reportDocument As New GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Document.PageDocument(report)

' Create a output directory
Dim outputDirectory As New System.IO.DirectoryInfo("C:\MyPDF")
outputDirectory.Create()

' Provide settings for your rendering output.
Dim pdfSetting As New GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.Settings()
Dim setting As GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Extensibility.Rendering.ISettings = pdfsetting

' Set the rendering extension and render the report.
Dim pdfRenderingExtension As New GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.PdfRenderingExtension()
Dim outputProvider As New GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Rendering.IO.FileStreamProvider(outputDirectory, System.IO.Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(outputDirectory.Name))
reportDocument.Render(pdfRenderingExtension, outputProvider, pdfSetting)

// Provide the page report you want to render.
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.PageReport report = new GrapeCity.ActiveReports.PageReport(new System.IO.FileInfo(@"C:\Sample_PageReport.rdlx"));
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Document.PageDocument reportDocument = new GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Document.PageDocument(report);

// Create a output directory
System.IO.DirectoryInfo outputDirectory = new System.IO.DirectoryInfo(@"C:\MyPDF");
outputDirectory.Create();

 // Provide settings for your rendering output.
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.Settings pdfSetting = new GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.Settings();
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Extensibility.Rendering.ISettings setting = pdfSetting;

 //Set the rendering extension and render the report.
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.PdfRenderingExtension pdfRenderingExtension = new GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Export.Pdf.Page.PdfRenderingExtension();
GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Rendering.IO.FileStreamProvider outputProvider = new GrapeCity.ActiveReports.Rendering.IO.FileStreamProvider(outputDirectory, System.IO.Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(outputDirectory.Name));
reportDocument.Render(pdfRenderingExtension, outputProvider, pdfSetting);

PDF Rendering Properties

ActiveReports offers several options to control how reports render to PDF.

PDF/A Support Limitations

• The NeverEmbedFonts property is ignored, so all fonts of a report are embedded into the PDF document.

• The Security.Encrypt property is ignored and the PDF export behaves as if this property is always set to False.
• The OnlyForPrint property is ignored and the PDF export behaves as if this property is always set to False.
• The DocumentToAddBeforeReport and DocumentToAddAfterReport properties of the PDF Rendering Extension settings are ignored.
• Transparent images lose their transparency when exported to PDF/A-1.
• External hyperlinks are exported as plain text.

Interactivity

PDF is considered as the best format for printing and it also supports interactive features like Document Map, Bookmarks and Hyperlinks. However, in case you have any data hidden (like in a drill-down report) at the time of rendering, it does not show up in the output. Therefore, it is recommended to expand all toggle items prior to rendering.