====== Generating PDF within django using wkhtmltopdf ======

I need to generate some PDF reports within django. I have been looking for library for pdf printing but did not find open source (free) one with features I needed. AS I already have view which generates html I was looking for tool which can transform html to pdf. So I decide to use [[http://code.google.com/p/wkhtmltopdf/|wkhtmltopdf]] tool which miss one required feature (repeating table header at every new page) but have good looking generated documents. For installation of wkhtmltopdf please see official instructions. I have used static version (it is bigger but has better features).

In django I have used following code for generating pdf. This could give you idea how to do it yourself.

<code python>
    #my functions to get data and to render html
    data = get_offer_data(id)
    html = offer_html(request, data)
    #preparing wkhtmltopdf command to run using pipes
    #WKHTML2PDF_COMMAND is string set in project settings
    #    an looks like /path/to/command
    #Popen has little confusing way to accept command arguments
    #Last two "-" are importnat as this is the way to tell
    #wkhtmltopdf to use pipes for input and output
    #This is how this command will look in shell
    # >wkhtmltopdf --footer-right [page]/[toPage] --print-media-type --encoding UTF-8 - - 
    wkhtml2pdf = subprocess.Popen((WKHTML2PDF_COMMAND,
                                   "--footer-right",
                                   "[page]/[toPage]",
                                   "--print-media-type",
                                   "--encoding",
                                   "UTF-8",
                                   "-",
                                   "-"),
                                  stdin=subprocess.PIPE,
                                  stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
    wkdata = wkhtml2pdf.communicate(html.encode('utf8'))
    pdf = wkdata[0];
    
    response = HttpResponse(mimetype='application/pdf')
    response['Content-Disposition'] = 'attachment; filename=Offer_' + data['offer'].number + '.pdf'
    response.write(pdf)
    return response
</code>

:!: If you have long tables (which are extending over more pages) be careful as they will probably be broken between pages.