How to print a PDF with C#

Question

I´ve trying to solve this problem for nearly 2 days. There are a lot of more or fewer good solutions on the net, but not a single one fits my task perfectly.

Task:

• Print a PDF programmatically
• Do it with a fixed printer
• Don´t let the user do more than one Button_Click
• Do it silent - the more, the better
• Do it client side

First Solutions:

Do it with a Forms.WebBrowser

If we have Adobe Reader installed, there is a plugin to show PDF´s in the webbrowser. With this solution we have a nice preview and with webbrowserControlName.Print() we can trigger the control to print its content.

Problem - we still have a PrintDialog.

---

Start the AcroRd32.exe with start arguments

The following CMD command let us use Adobe Reader to print our PDF.

InsertPathTo..\AcroRd32.exe /t "C:\sample.pdf" "\printerNetwork\printerName"

Problems - we need the absolute path to AcroRd32.exe | there is an Adobe Reader Window opening and it has to be opened until the print task is ready.

---

Use windows presets

Process process = new Process();

process.StartInfo.FileName = pathToPdf; 
process.StartInfo.Verb = "printto";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "\"" + printerName + "\""; 
process.Start();

process.WaitForInputIdle();
process.Kill();

Problem - there is still an Adobe Reader window popping up, but after the printing is done it closes itself usually.

Solution - convince the client to use Foxit Reader (don´t use last two lines of code).

---

Convert PDF pages to Drawing.Image

I´ve no idea how to do it with code, but when I get this to work the rest is just a piece of cake. Printing.PrintDocument can fulfill all demands.

---

Anyone an idea to get some Drawing.Image´s out of those PDF´s or another approach how to do it?

Best Regards, Max

Answer 1

The most flexible, easiest and best performing method I could find was using GhostScript. It can print to windows printers directly by printer name.

"C:\Program Files\gs\gs9.07\bin\gswin64c.exe" -dPrinted -dBATCH -dNOPAUSE -sDEVICE=mswinpr2 -dNoCancel -sOutputFile="%printer%printer name" "pdfdocument.pdf"

Add these switches to shrink the document to an A4 page.

-sPAPERSIZE=a4 -dPDFFitPage

Answer 2

Another approach would to use spooler function in .NET to send the pre-formatted printer data to a printer. But unfortunately you need to work with win32 spooler API

you can look at How to send raw data to a printer by using Visual C# .NET

you only can use this approach when the printer support PDF document natively.

Answer 3

If a commercial library is an option, you can try with Amyuni PDF Creator. Net.

Printing directly with the library:
For opening a PDF file and send it to print directly you can use the method IacDocument.Print. The code in C# will look like this:

// Open PDF document from file<br>
FileStream file1 = new FileStream ("test.pdf", FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read);
IacDocument doc1 = new IacDocument (null);
doc1.Open (file1, "" );
// print document to a specified printer with no prompt
doc1.Print ("My Laser Printer", false);

Exporting to images (then printing if needed):
Choice 1: You can use the method IacDocument.ExportToJPeg for converting all pages in a PDF to JPG images that you can print or display using Drawing.Image

Choice 2: You can draw each page into a bitmap using the method IacDocument.DrawCurrentPage with the method System.Drawing.Graphics.FromImage. The code in C# should look like this:

FileStream myFile = new FileStream ("test.pdf", FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read);
IacDocument doc = new IacDocument(null);
doc.Open(myFile);
doc.CurrentPage = 1;
Image img = new Bitmap(100,100);
Graphics gph = Graphics.FromImage(img);
IntPtr hdc = gph.GetHDC();
doc.DrawCurrentPage(hdc, false);
gph.ReleaseHdc( hdc );

Disclaimer: I work for Amyuni Technologies

Answer 4

You can use ghostscript to convert PDF into image formats.

The following example converts a single PDF into a sequence of PNG-Files:

private static void ExecuteGhostscript(string input, string tempDirectory)
{
    // %d will be replaced by ghostscript with a number for each page
    string filename = Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(input) + "-%d.png";
    string output = Path.Combine(tempDirectory, filename);

    Process ghostscript = new Process();
    ghostscript.StartInfo.FileName = _pathToGhostscript;
    ghostscript.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;

    ghostscript.StartInfo.Arguments = string.Format(
        "-dSAFER -dBATCH -dNOPAUSE -sDEVICE=png16m -r300 -sOutputFile=\"{0}\" \"{1}\"", output, input);

    ghostscript.Start();
    ghostscript.WaitForExit();
}

If you prefer to use Adobe Reader instead you can hide its window:

process.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;

Answer 5

I found a slightly different version of your code that uses the printto verb. I didn't try it, but maybe it helps you:

http://vbcity.com/forums/t/149141.aspx

Answer 6

I know that the tag has Windows Forms; however, due to the general title, some people might be wondering if they may use that namespace with a WPF application -- they may.

Here's code:

var file = File.ReadAllBytes(pdfFilePath);
var printQueue = LocalPrintServer.GetDefaultPrintQueue();

using (var job = printQueue.AddJob())
using (var stream = job.JobStream)
{
    stream.Write(file, 0, file.Length);
}

Now, this namespace must be used with a WPF application. It does not play well with ASP.NET or Windows Service. It should not be used with Windows Forms, as it has System.Drawing.Printing. I don't have a single issue with my PDF printing using the above code.

Note that if your printer does not support Direct Printing for PDF files, this won't work.

Answer 7

I tried many things and the one that worked best for me was launching a SumatraPDF from the command line:

// Launch SumatraPDF Reader to print
String arguments = "-print-to-default -silent \"" + fileName + "\"";
System.Diagnostics.Process.Start("SumatraPDF.exe", arguments);

There are so many advantages to this:

1. SumatraPDF is much much faster than Adobe Acrobat Reader.
2. The UI doesn't load. It just prints.
3. You can use SumatraPDF as a standalone application so you can include it with your application so you can use your own pa. Note that I did not read the license agreement; you should probably check it out yourself.

Answer 8

My company offers Docotic.Pdf library that can render and print PDF documents. The article behind the link contains detailed information about the following topics:

• printing PDFs in Windows Forms or WPF application directly
• printing PDFs via an intermediate image
• rendering PDFs on a Graphics

There are links to sample code, too.

I work for the company, so please read the article and try suggested solutions yourselves.

Answer 9

What about using the PrintDocument class?

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.drawing.printing.printdocument.aspx

You just need to pass the filename of the file you want to print (based on the example).

HTH

Answer 10

        Process proc = new Process();
        proc.StartInfo.FileName = @"C:\Program Files\Adobe\Acrobat 7.0\Reader\AcroRd32.exe";
        proc.StartInfo.Arguments = @"/p /h C:\Documents and Settings\brendal\Desktop\Test.pdf";
        proc.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
        proc.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
        proc.Start();

        for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
        {
            if (!proc.HasExited)
            {
                proc.Refresh();
                Thread.Sleep(2000);
            }
            else
                break;
        }
        if (!proc.HasExited)
        {
            proc.CloseMainWindow();
        }

Answer 11

If you're interested in commercial solutions which do exactly what you require then there are quite a few options. My company provides one of those options in a developer toolkit called Debenu Quick PDF Library.

Here is a code sample (key functions are PrintOptions and PrintDocument):

/* Print a document  */

// Load a local sample file from the input folder

DPL.LoadFromFile("Test.pdf", "");

// Configure print options

iPrintOptions = DPL.PrintOptions(0, 0, "Printing Sample")

// Print the current document to the default 
// printing using the options as configured above.
// You can also specify the specific printer.

DPL.PrintDocument(DPL.GetDefaultPrinterName(), 1, 1, iPrintOptions);

Answer 12

As of July 2018, there is still no answer for the OP. There is no free way to 1) silently print your pdf for a 2) closed source project.

1) You can most certainly use a process i.e. Adobe Acrobat or Foxit Reader

2) Free solutions have a GPL (GNU's General Public License). This means you must open your source code if giving the software, even for free, to anyone outside your company.

As the OP says, if you can get a PDF to Drawing.Image, you can print it with .NET methods. Sadly, software to do this also requires payment or a GPL.