If you decide to buy this work to use in a Web project, please, pay attention to this part:
“BKeeney Software has introduced the first public beta release of BKS PDF Classes for Xojo. The PDF Classes are 100% native Xojo classes that allow developers to create PDF documents via code in their Xojo applications. The classes work for Mac OS X and Windows. Linux is currently unsupported.”
Version from 2014-08-07
Currently I think the DynaPDF Starter is the better deal for the same price.
I can make a comparison when Bob releases his final version 1.0.
BKS added value for its price: plain Xojo source included.
[quote=118640:@Rick Araujo]If you decide to buy this work to use in a Web project, please, pay attention to this part:
“BKeeney Software has introduced the first public beta release of BKS PDF Classes for Xojo. The PDF Classes are 100% native Xojo classes that allow developers to create PDF documents via code in their Xojo applications. The classes work for Mac OS X and Windows. Linux is currently unsupported.”
Version from 2014-08-07[/quote]
I still have a copy of the old open source code this is based on…
The newer versions have more features for sure. That said, while I’ve never tried it on Windows (I have use it on Mac and Windows in desktop and web apps), In those old classes did not see any code I thought would be an issue on Linux. Maybe Bob can can explain why it does not.
Not working on Linux would be a big issue for the WE.
When I used the old classes in web apps, I never used pictures… I know when the original classes were written there was not a lot of support for graphics and pictures in console apps… but that has changed.
Yet looking at Bob’s site he said something about a PFD picture class not being supported in console apps… is that still not possible with the support for pictures that now exists is console?
This is basically the initial version ported from Asher’s original work and updated to work in Xojo. That was a much bigger challenge that you’d think. Remember that it was originally written in 2006! The issue with Linux is that the code needs to find the font file to get some measurements and for embedding (if enabled). The original code doesn’t deal with Linux (much) so some of that is new code. Windows has some similar issues that we’re working through too. This is a BETA after all.
With that said, I was able to run about half of the demo in Linux.
Honestly, way down on the radar and haven’t looked at it yet. Since console apps do support images this might be possible now.
Thanks for supporting BKeeney Software! The goal is to get this into BKS Shorts as an alternative to the DynaPDF plugin.
That was obviously supposed to be “That said, while I’ve never tried it on Linux!!!”
BTW I never had a problem on Windows, though I never used a lot of different fonts. What I used there just worked for my simple needs.
Not sure if I have recompiled any of those apps since Xojo. I guess I should try and make sure things still work since some of them are in widespread use inhouse where I work!
Bob, back in the day when Asher was first writing those classes, I was looking at the PDF spec and his code because I wanted to enhance his open source stuff, so I appreciate that it would not be as easy as it seems to update that code.
Meant to add that I was not embedding fonts… Does it work OK if you don’t need to embed fonts? I always stick to the basic PDF fonts that all readers are supposed to support.
Currently there is an issue in Windows that if we can’t find the corresponding font file we throw an exception. Obviously not a problem if you are using one of the installed fonts, but currents creates mucho havoc with the standard PDF fonts (which are not part of the standard Windows or Linux install).
Yeah, back in the day he was using the Standard ResourceFork behavior because that was the Mac way at the time. There was old PPC code and numerous other things that had to be tweaked and converted to get it to work. We fixed the image compression issue and a number of other things that have caused no end of issues. Add in we’re not exceptional familiar with the PDF spec and it’s been a joyful (not) learning experience.
Oh, and reading TrueType collections which didn’t exist in 2006.
It seems very interesting… but The Big Question is : Bob promise a lot of things that will come, but never arrived !!! What will happend to PDF Classes ? The same as Shorts ?
I say that because with BKS Shorts, we always wait for PDF, external report definition files, and others…
Maybe this BKS PDF is a part of that famous BKS Shorts PDF report generator ?
Wow, are those classes still around?
We were one of Asher’s customers several years ago but had to ditch them as they could only handle integers for co-ordinates / sizes, had other basic features missing and trying to get hold of Asher for support when there was a problem was impossible.
I commend Bob for taking on the job of bringing them up-to-date as choice is never a bad thing but I do wonder if he has taken on more than he expected (-: PDF can be extremely frustrating at the best of times and some of the tasks that should be simple turn out to be a right bugger to get working correctly. It is also surprising how much work is involved in getting basic things such as text and fonts to work correctly as it is a lot more complicated than most people think.
This was one area we decided was best left to the professionals and went down the DynaPDF route.
Kev.
Asher went to college then went of to work as a rocket scientist (seriously) and hasn’t been easy to get a hold of (even by folks who know him fairly well)
PDF as a spec is daunting
EDIT : gawd I hate auto correct 
I think you mean ‘rocket scientist’. It took me 9 months to finally get hold of him and I had to cash in a number of chips to do so.
That’s an understatement.
well, Bob is working on the PDF, and I have a RDL that works really well with both Shorts and RSreports.
i didn’t think anyone would want such a thing, but if there is call for it, then maybe its worth talking about. fwiw, i have a XOJO ‘reporter program’ that using this RDL can do sections, print ranges, email those sections to the correct recipients etc.
[quote=118652:@Christian Schmitz]Currently I think the DynaPDF Starter is the better deal for the same price.
I can make a comparison when Bob releases his final version 1.0.[/quote]
I think it’s fantastic that Bob is bring more choices of PDF options to the Xojo space.
No offense Christian… but sometimes its nice to have options that do not begin or end with MBS.
Why don’t you turn it off???
On iOS: settings → keyboard
Mac: Turn Off Auto Correct in Mac OS Mojave, MacOS Sierra, OS X Mavericks, Yosemite, etc
[quote=118852:@Markus Winter]Why don’t you turn it off???
On iOS: settings -> keyboard
Mac: http://osxdaily.com/2011/07/28/turn-off-auto-correct-in-mac-os-x-lion/[/quote]
I hate autocorrect, but do appreciate visual hints that spelling maybe wrong. With Auto correct off, still misspelled words are underlined.
[quote=118652:@Christian Schmitz]Currently I think the DynaPDF Starter is the better deal for the same price.
I can make a comparison when Bob releases his final version 1.0.[/quote]
No complaints about a little healthy competition - so keep going Bob.
I would just like to offer a voice of support for MBS DynaPDF family of products that I have been using for a while; it provides a wealth of functionality, and no issues to date (using primarily for web projects hosted on Linux).
One thing important to know : Chistian always do what he announce. We have what we pay for.
With BKS, actually we wait for what they announce, just 2 samples of what I say :
BKS Shorts, very promising report tool : not finished. Function promised never leaved.
Simple Help Editor : since version 5.0.7 (Nov 2012 after PandaSoftware) no more updates…
What will happen to BKS PDF, it is the start of a very interesting project that will never be finished ?