Rails, Prawn - PDF show up in browser & etc

Question

I'm trying to understand the Prawn pdf gem.

I was able to make it generate a pdf. Every gem in the gemfile included:

gem 'mysql', '~> 2.8.1'
gem 'prawn', '~> 0.12.0'
gem 'pdf-reader', '~> 0.10.0'
gem 'Ascii85', '~> 1.0.1'

In the config/application.rb:

config.autoload_paths << "#{Rails.root}/app/reports"

Then in the controller:

 require 'prawn'

 def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text "Hello World"
  pdf.render_file "x.pdf"
 end

Than I call the index function. A PDF named x.pdf is created in the root of my application. Amongst the gemfile, rakefile and config.ru.

Question:

How can I force prawn to generate the file in the app/report (or any other selected) folder?
How can I make the action to generate the file in the browser window and don't save it?
How can I make it to save and show up in the browser window?

score 34 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 03 '11 at 12:37

How can I force prawn to generate the file in the app/report (or any other selected) folder?

def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text "Hello World"
  pdf.render_file File.join(Rails.root, "app/report", "x.pdf")
end

How can I make the action to generate the file in the browser window and don't save it?

def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text "Hello World"
  send_data pdf.render, :filename => "x.pdf", :type => "application/pdf"
end

How can I make it to save and show up in the browser window?

def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text "Hello World"
  filename = File.join(Rails.root, "app/report", "x.pdf")
  pdf.render_file filename
  send_file filename, :filename => "x.pdf", :type => "application/pdf"
end

Hi, for me its not going to save in that folder. but it goes there to find that is that pdf is there or not? any solution to store pdf in public folder? — SSR, Sep 09 '13 at 12:59
in the send_data you should add the option :disposition => 'inline' — sissy, Feb 21 '14 at 17:29

Justin Tanner · Answer 2 · 2018-04-05T15:32:41.007

20

Answering Question 3: "How can I make it to save and show up in the browser window?"

def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text 'Hello World'
  send_data pdf.render, filename: 'x.pdf', type: 'application/pdf', disposition: 'inline'
end

disposition: 'inline' will force the browser ( if it can ) to display your PDF inside the current browser window

edited Apr 05 '18 at 15:32

answered Jun 08 '12 at 01:43

Justin Tanner

14,062
17
82
103

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 03 '11 at 12:14

Try this:

 def index
  pdf = Prawn::Document.new
  pdf.text "Hello World"
  send_data pdf.render, :filename => "x.pdf", :type => "application/pdf"
 end

That said, for anything but a trivial PDF you will probably want to generate it outside the controller somewhere.

Rails, Prawn - PDF show up in browser & etc

3 Answers3

Linked