http://www.international-presence.com/images/nodes/dataformatter.png
To create a PDF document create a new custom data formatter in your task. Be sure to select 'PDF Document' as the 'Type of document to produce'.
This will then create the template for your PDF instructions.
http://www.international-presence.com/images/docs/pdf/dataformatterscreen.png
As usual if you enter < then the helper will appear with a list of options and permitteed tags for the PDF.
Note it is actually the saving option that tells presence to send these instructions through the PDF formatter to generate the file.
To create a PDF file you need to set the 'Write Output' option to 'Into PDF File'
If you were to select 'To File' then the instructions themselves will be saved as pure text. This is useful if you need to send the instructions to us for debugging purposes, as we can then put the file into a task and run it through the PDF formatter to see what is happening.
http://www.international-presence.com/images/docs/pdf/dataformattersave.png
A PDF file can be created using a well structured html. Each tag should be terminated with an associated closing tag.
At present only basic formatting is supported, so no style sheets or inline formatting is allowed.
Contents
Acceptable tags
Denotes the start of the PDF
document
Describes the document properties and can have the following attributes
userpassword ownerpassword allowprinting allowcopy pagenumbers landscape header document header document footer pagesize a1 a2 a3 a4 ledger legal letter note 22,33 marginleft marginright margintop marginbottom
p
As in html this describes a new paragraph
table
Similar to html, allows you to create a new table and can have the following attributes
width % cellpadding cellspacing border positionabs align bgcolor title caption
As in html to define a new row in the table use <tr> and to define a new cell <td> or <th> which is a header cell and so will be at the top of each page when the table carries over onto the next page.
Cell attributes
colspan width % bgcolor align valign
example <table border="1" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" align="center" width="80%"> <tr><th align="center" colspan="2" bgcolor="blue"><b><font color="white">Results Table</font></b></th></tr> <tr><th width="80%">Name</th><th width="20%" align="center" >Standing</th></tr> <tr><td><small><font color="black">Graham</font></small></td><td align="center">1</td></tr> </table>
page
Denotes a new page
landscape header page header footer page footer pagesize marginleft marginright margintop marginbottom thispageonly
align ol ul li pre
font
font-weight: face type courier helvetica times align left center right justify valign top middle bottom baseline color size + - positionabs bold font-size x-small small
border-width: border-"+strDirection+"-width: border-"+strDirection+"-style: none medium thin px
u strong small big b br
input
type checkbox
img
src align scaleabs scalefit image tag left middle right watermark positionabs i h1 h2 h3 h4 h5 h6 hr
color
Colors can be defined as one of several labels or by hex as in html if you want more control.
For instance green could be specified as either '#00FF00','green'
Presence recognises the following labels as colors:-
black blue cyan darkgray gray green lightgray magenta orange pink red white yellow
example <font color="#00FF00">I am green text</font> <td color="blue">This cell will have a blue background</td>'''
Formatting
< < > > "","\""); &","&"); \n"," "); \t"," "); replaceAll("[ ]+"," "); replaceAll(" "," ");
intelligent formatting
table headers carried over to next page
  nowrap
Absolute positioning
Sometimes you need to be specific when positioning text (for instance if the document is going to be scanned by an ocr reader, or if you wish to position an address so that it appears in the right position in a windowed evelope, or if you want to place text in the border).
<font positionabs="575,822">O</font> <table positionabs="0,0"><tr><td>FF</td></tr></table>
In these instances it can be useful to use absolute positioning.
It's worth noting that an A4 page is 595 units across by 842 units down.
Also depending on the table width the table will be pushed left so that it is not hanging off the right hand side of the page. For instance, if the table width was 50% then the positionabs="500,200" would actually be positioned at 298,200.