WebEngine Widgets Html2Pdf Example▲
Html2Pdf demonstrates how to use Qt WebEngine to implement a command-line application for converting web pages into PDF documents.
Running the Example▲
To run the example from Qt Creator, open the Welcome mode and select the example from Examples. For more information, visit Building and Running an Example.
The Conversion Process▲
In order to convert a web page into a PDF document we need to:
-
Create a QWebEngineView.
-
Tell the QWebEngineView to begin loading the target URL and wait for it to finish.
-
Tell the QWebEngineView to begin converting the loaded page into a PDF file and again wait for it to finish.
-
Once the conversion is finished, exit the program.
This process is encapsulated in the Html2PdfConverter class:
#include <QApplication>
#include <QCommandLineParser>
#include <QFile>
#include <QTextStream>
#include <QWebEngineView>
#include <functional>
using
namespace
std;
using
namespace
std::
placeholders;
class
Html2PdfConverter : public
QObject
{
Q_OBJECT
public
:
explicit
Html2PdfConverter(QString inputPath, QString outputPath);
int
run();
private
slots:
void
loadFinished(bool
ok);
void
pdfPrintingFinished(const
QString &
amp;filePath, bool
success);
private
:
QString m_inputPath;
QString m_outputPath;
QScopedPointer&
lt;QWebEngineView&
gt; m_view;
}
;
In the constructor we create the QWebEngineView and connect to its QWebEngineView::loadFinished and QWebEngineView::pdfPrintingFinished signals:
Html2PdfConverter::
Html2PdfConverter(QString inputPath, QString outputPath)
:
m_inputPath(move(inputPath))
, m_outputPath(move(outputPath))
, m_view(new
QWebEngineView)
{
connect(m_view.data(), &
amp;QWebEngineView::
loadFinished,
this
, &
amp;Html2PdfConverter::
loadFinished);
connect(m_view.data(), &
amp;QWebEngineView::
pdfPrintingFinished,
this
, &
amp;Html2PdfConverter::
pdfPrintingFinished);
}
The run() method will trigger the conversion process by asking QWebEnginePage to start loading the target URL. We then enter the main event loop:
int
Html2PdfConverter::
run()
{
m_view-&
gt;load(QUrl::
fromUserInput(m_inputPath));
return
QApplication::
exec();
}
After the loading is finished we begin PDF generation. We ask the QWebEnginePage::printToPdf method to write the output directly to disk:
void
Html2PdfConverter::
loadFinished(bool
ok)
{
if
(!
ok) {
QTextStream(stderr)
&
lt;&
lt; tr("failed to load URL '%1'"
).arg(m_inputPath) &
lt;&
lt; "
\n
"
;
QCoreApplication::
exit(1
);
return
;
}
m_view-&
gt;printToPdf(m_outputPath);
}
Once we receive the signal that the PDF conversion has finished, all that remains is to report potential errors and exit the program:
void
Html2PdfConverter::
pdfPrintingFinished(const
QString &
amp;filePath, bool
success)
{
if
(!
success) {
QTextStream(stderr)
&
lt;&
lt; tr("failed to print to output file '%1'"
).arg(filePath) &
lt;&
lt; "
\n
"
;
QCoreApplication::
exit(1
);
}
else
{
QCoreApplication::
quit();
}
}
The Main Function▲
Our main function is responsible for setting up a QApplication and parsing command line arguments:
int
main(int
argc, char
*
argv[])
{
QApplication app(argc, argv);
QCoreApplication::
setOrganizationName("QtExamples"
);
QCoreApplication::
setApplicationName("html2pdf"
);
QCoreApplication::
setApplicationVersion(QT_VERSION_STR);
QCommandLineParser parser;
parser.setApplicationDescription(
QCoreApplication::
translate("main"
, "Converts the web page INPUT into the PDF file OUTPUT."
));
parser.addHelpOption();
parser.addVersionOption();
parser.addPositionalArgument(
QCoreApplication::
translate("main"
, "INPUT"
),
QCoreApplication::
translate("main"
, "Input URL for PDF conversion."
));
parser.addPositionalArgument(
QCoreApplication::
translate("main"
, "OUTPUT"
),
QCoreApplication::
translate("main"
, "Output file name for PDF conversion."
));
parser.process(QCoreApplication::
arguments());
const
QStringList requiredArguments =
parser.positionalArguments();
if
(requiredArguments.size() !=
2
)
parser.showHelp(1
);
Html2PdfConverter converter(requiredArguments.at(0
), requiredArguments.at(1
));
return
converter.run();
}
Note that to use Qt WebEngine Widgets we need to create a QApplication and not a QCoreApplication, even though this is a command line application.