What intent would open a pdf from a url?

Question

I am trying to create an intent that would open a pdf file on the web (a url) in a pdf reader. It seems to only work if the file is local.

I know this is going to depend on whether or not any of the installed apps can handle urls, but since I have several pdf readers installed (some of them claim they can read pdfs on the web) and none of them are responding I wanted to see if there was something wrong with my intent.

Here is what I am currently using:

Intent intent = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_VIEW);
intent.setDataAndType(Uri.parse(url), "application/pdf");

Thanks

Have a look at [this](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2883355/how-to-render-pdf-in-android/) post. — Abhinav Manchanda, Jan 12 '11 at 02:30

score 28 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 17 '11 at 16:50

28

Build a url to the pdf using google docs viewer. This ends up loading much faster as they don't have to download the file in its entirety before you can display it.

private static final String googleDocsUrl = "http://docs.google.com/viewer?url=";

Intent intent = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_VIEW);
intent.setDataAndType(Uri.parse(googleDocsUrl + url), "text/html");

We recently did something similar except we used our own activity with an embedded webview to display the pdf rather than going to the browser.

answered Mar 17 '11 at 16:50

matheeeny

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What do I pass to "url"? Do I have to upload my document? Does it not work on local (without Internet)? – emeraldhieu Apr 26 '12 at 06:41
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Emerald, it won't work without Internet connection. Additionaly your resource has to be somewhere in the Internet. – pawel.urban Feb 20 '13 at 21:46
Does not work. I get a message saying: Apologies. There is no preview available – user2260040 Nov 26 '14 at 23:07
@user2260040 I guess you are asking google to load a document that is private to your network. That won't happen. – Synesso Feb 25 '15 at 06:00
This loads a web page that is not optimized for mobile. Are there URL parameters we can set to fix that? – Maarten Mar 15 '15 at 01:50

score 15 · Answer 2 · edited Apr 23 '15 at 15:43

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You can simply load the following URL in the Webview

webView.loadUrl("https://drive.google.com/viewerng/viewer?embedded=true&url=" + url);

Google docs will take care to load the PDF URL.

edited Apr 23 '15 at 15:43

Leandro Glossman

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answered Mar 02 '12 at 06:50

Durai

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That is exactly what I suggested last year. – matheeeny Mar 02 '12 at 19:04
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Not really - the prefix is different, and it's showing us how to load it into a WebView instead of via Intent. This isn't quite what littleFluffyKitty was asking, but it's not really worthy of downvotes, and if it works, could be useful to others visiting this question. No? – SilithCrowe Dec 01 '12 at 19:57

What intent would open a pdf from a url?

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