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What is an efficient way to generate PDF for data frames in Pandas?

Martin Thoma
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b8con
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6 Answers6

33

First plot table with matplotlib then generate pdf 

import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib.backends.backend_pdf import PdfPages

df = pd.DataFrame(np.random.random((10,3)), columns = ("col 1", "col 2", "col 3"))

#https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32137396/how-do-i-plot-only-a-table-in-matplotlib
fig, ax =plt.subplots(figsize=(12,4))
ax.axis('tight')
ax.axis('off')
the_table = ax.table(cellText=df.values,colLabels=df.columns,loc='center')

#https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4042192/reduce-left-and-right-margins-in-matplotlib-plot
pp = PdfPages("foo.pdf")
pp.savefig(fig, bbox_inches='tight')
pp.close()

reference:

How do I plot only a table in Matplotlib?

Reduce left and right margins in matplotlib plot

user3226167
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    These tables via matplotlib dont look so great, compared to LaTeX or troff for that matter. – Merlin Mar 12 '21 at 22:15
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    @Merlin, Can `df.to_latex` output pdf? What is the process/requirements? – Gathide Sep 17 '21 at 05:42
  • To improve the look of this (e.g. with alternating colors for the rows), see the answer below https://stackoverflow.com/a/72957628/3645038 – Lak Jul 12 '22 at 19:46
  • The column headers don't come bold. All fonts look the same. I have multiple dataframes to write into a single excel file. eg one dataframe just contains header info (vendor name, address). another contains actual data, 3rd is a footer, which I write to one Excel file using the startrow & startcolumn param in df.to_excel. So I have an excel file which has a structure. Is it possible in Python to export that Excel to pdf? – user76170 May 30 '23 at 08:29
17

Here is how I do it from sqlite database using sqlite3, pandas and pdfkit

import pandas as pd
import pdfkit as pdf
import sqlite3

con=sqlite3.connect("baza.db")

df=pd.read_sql_query("select * from dobit", con)
df.to_html('/home/linux/izvestaj.html')
nazivFajla='/home/linux/pdfPrintOut.pdf'
pdf.from_file('/home/linux/izvestaj.html', nazivFajla)
Dalibor
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10

Well one way is to use markdown. You can use df.to_html(). This converts the dataframe into a html table. From there you can put the generated html into a markdown file (.md) (see http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/basics). From there, there are utilities to convert markdown into a pdf (https://www.npmjs.com/package/markdown-pdf).

One all-in-one tool for this method is to use Atom text editor (https://atom.io/). There you can use an extension, search "markdown to pdf", which will make the conversion for you.

Note: When using to_html() recently I had to remove extra '\n' characters for some reason. I chose to use Atom -> Find -> '\n' -> Replace "".

Overall this should do the trick!

wgwz
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  • I think a solution with intermediate steps into HTML and then markdown (which doesn't even have a standard spec), then to pdf, is not a good way. – Merlin Mar 12 '21 at 22:14
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    You can now use [.to_markdown()](https://pandas.pydata.org/pandas-docs/stable/reference/api/pandas.DataFrame.to_markdown.html) to avoid HTML entirely. – Duncan MacIntyre May 11 '21 at 00:12
8

With reference to these two examples that I found useful:

The simple CSS code saved in same folder as ipynb:

/* includes alternating gray and white with on-hover color */

.mystyle {
    font-size: 11pt; 
    font-family: Arial;
    border-collapse: collapse; 
    border: 1px solid silver;

}

.mystyle td, th {
    padding: 5px;
}

.mystyle tr:nth-child(even) {
    background: #E0E0E0;
}

.mystyle tr:hover {
    background: silver;
    cursor: pointer;
}

The python code:

pdf_filepath = os.path.join(folder,file_pdf)
demo_df = pd.DataFrame(np.random.random((10,3)), columns = ("col 1", "col 2", "col 3"))

table=demo_df.to_html(classes='mystyle')

html_string = f'''
<html>
  <head><title>HTML Pandas Dataframe with CSS</title></head>
  <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="df_style.css"/>
  <body>
    {table}
  </body>
</html>
'''

HTML(string=html_string).write_pdf(pdf_filepath, stylesheets=["df_style.css"])

Resulting PDF example

R_100
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5

This is a solution with an intermediate pdf file.

The table is pretty printed with some minimal css.

The pdf conversion is done with weasyprint. You need to pip install weasyprint. 

# Create a pandas dataframe with demo data:
import pandas as pd
demodata_csv = 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mwaskom/seaborn-data/master/iris.csv'
df = pd.read_csv(demodata_csv)

# Pretty print the dataframe as an html table to a file
intermediate_html = '/tmp/intermediate.html'
to_html_pretty(df,intermediate_html,'Iris Data')
# if you do not want pretty printing, just use pandas:
# df.to_html(intermediate_html)

# Convert the html file to a pdf file using weasyprint
import weasyprint
out_pdf= '/tmp/demo.pdf'
weasyprint.HTML(intermediate_html).write_pdf(out_pdf)

# This is the table pretty printer used above:

def to_html_pretty(df, filename='/tmp/out.html', title=''):
    '''
    Write an entire dataframe to an HTML file
    with nice formatting.
    Thanks to @stackoverflowuser2010 for the
    pretty printer see https://stackoverflow.com/a/47723330/362951
    '''
    ht = ''
    if title != '':
        ht += '<h2> %s </h2>\n' % title
    ht += df.to_html(classes='wide', escape=False)

    with open(filename, 'w') as f:
         f.write(HTML_TEMPLATE1 + ht + HTML_TEMPLATE2)

HTML_TEMPLATE1 = '''
<html>
<head>
<style>
  h2 {
    text-align: center;
    font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
  }
  table { 
    margin-left: auto;
    margin-right: auto;
  }
  table, th, td {
    border: 1px solid black;
    border-collapse: collapse;
  }
  th, td {
    padding: 5px;
    text-align: center;
    font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
    font-size: 90%;
  }
  table tbody tr:hover {
    background-color: #dddddd;
  }
  .wide {
    width: 90%; 
  }
</style>
</head>
<body>
'''

HTML_TEMPLATE2 = '''
</body>
</html>
'''

Thanks to @stackoverflowuser2010 for the pretty printer, see stackoverflowuser2010's answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/47723330/362951

I did not use pdfkit, because I had some problems with it on a headless machine. But weasyprint is great.

mit
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    Do you know how I can force a page break? Say I have several table slices of a pandas dataframe and I want each table to start on a new page. Is that possible and at what point should I edit the html code? – TheDude Jul 01 '20 at 17:07
  • thanks! how to make it print with landscape orientation / different page size? – Nikhil VJ Aug 04 '20 at 12:20
1

when using Matplotlib, here's how to get a prettier table with alternating colors for the rows, etc. as well as to optionally paginate the PDF:

import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib.backends.backend_pdf import PdfPages

def _draw_as_table(df, pagesize):
    alternating_colors = [['white'] * len(df.columns), ['lightgray'] * len(df.columns)] * len(df)
    alternating_colors = alternating_colors[:len(df)]
    fig, ax = plt.subplots(figsize=pagesize)
    ax.axis('tight')
    ax.axis('off')
    the_table = ax.table(cellText=df.values,
                        rowLabels=df.index,
                        colLabels=df.columns,
                        rowColours=['lightblue']*len(df),
                        colColours=['lightblue']*len(df.columns),
                        cellColours=alternating_colors,
                        loc='center')
    return fig
  

def dataframe_to_pdf(df, filename, numpages=(1, 1), pagesize=(11, 8.5)):
  with PdfPages(filename) as pdf:
    nh, nv = numpages
    rows_per_page = len(df) // nh
    cols_per_page = len(df.columns) // nv
    for i in range(0, nh):
        for j in range(0, nv):
            page = df.iloc[(i*rows_per_page):min((i+1)*rows_per_page, len(df)),
                           (j*cols_per_page):min((j+1)*cols_per_page, len(df.columns))]
            fig = _draw_as_table(page, pagesize)
            if nh > 1 or nv > 1:
                # Add a part/page number at bottom-center of page
                fig.text(0.5, 0.5/pagesize[0],
                         "Part-{}x{}: Page-{}".format(i+1, j+1, i*nv + j + 1),
                         ha='center', fontsize=8)
            pdf.savefig(fig, bbox_inches='tight')
            
            plt.close()

Use it as follows:

dataframe_to_pdf(df, 'test_1.pdf')
dataframe_to_pdf(df, 'test_6.pdf', numpages=(3, 2))

Explanation of the code is here: https://levelup.gitconnected.com/how-to-write-a-pandas-dataframe-as-a-pdf-5cdf7d525488

enter image description here

Lak
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