Convert AFP spooled files to PDF.
SCS2PDF
and SCS2ITEXT,
presented in previous tips, are two simple utilities that allow you to convert
SCS spooled files into PDF. Many readers are now eager to know how to convert
AFP spooled files as well.
But before going any further, I again
suggest trying IBM Infoprint Server, which allows you to transform any iSeries
output format--such as SCS, AFP, IPDS, and OfficeVision/400--into PDF. This
product creates text-based, space-saving, non-image ASCII PDF files, which
preserves document fidelity and provides the ability to navigate through the
document and distribute information via email, Web, or local printing.
Furthermore, the Infoprint Server has been designed for high volumes and
reliable delivery, and the latest version, V5.3, provides new capabilities like
enhanced control over PDF file names and IFS locations, easy deployment and
improved usability, encryption of document (along with password protection),
full-color documents, control over the orientation of a document or report in
the viewer, and miscellaneous enhancements that significantly reduce average PDF
file size; some of these functions are also available in V5R2 as a PTF update.
The product (5722-IP1) is pre-loaded on the OS/400 release CD set and can be
installed for a 70-day free evaluation. To learn more about it, take a look at
the IBM Redpapers "Printing VI" (SG24-6250) and "Printing VII" (REDP-3752-00).
You will find sample programs, tips, application techniques, and performance
considerations.
However, if you don't want to spend any money or you just
want to try an open-source solution, keep on reading this tip. At the end, you
will be able to create your PDF documents from any SCS or AFP report for free.
But first, let me tell you something about Tiff, libtiff, and Host Print
Transform.
Tiff and Libtiff
TIFF (Tag Image File Format) is an extremely common
raster image format that was originally produced by Adobe, and libtiff is a set of
C functions (a library) that support the manipulation of TIFF image files. The
libtiff package, which can be downloaded from the Web, contains the tiff
libraries and associated utilities. Among these utilities, you can find
tiff2pdf, a C program that converts one TIFF file to one PDF file, including
multiple page TIFF files, tiled TIFF files, as well as black and white and color
TIFF files.
Host Print Transform
The Host Print Transform (HPT) API QWPZHPTR allows
you to convert an AFPDS data stream to a TIFF file. (For more information, see
the API
Reference.) To generate a TIFF file, this API requires the IBM-supplied
QWPTIFFG4 WSCST object, which can be found in QSYS. However, you can create your
own Work Station Customization Object (WSCST) by running the CRTWSCST
command against these instructions:
:WSCST DEVCLASS=TRANSFORM.
:TRNSFRMTBL.
:PRTDTASTRM DATASTREAM=TIFF_G4.
:INITPRT DATA ='4D4D002A'X.
:RESETPRT DATA ='00000000'X.
.EWSCST.
The AFP2PDF Utility
Let's put things together so you can build your
utility that first converts spooled files into TIFF and then TIFF into PDF.
The HPT API creates a TIFF file that contains single-strip CCIT G4
compressed information (it's like a black and white scan) that is written
directly to PDF from the tiff2pdf program without transcoding, thus making this
final step very fast. The HPT API in this utility has been designed to convert
spooled files one at a time; however, if you require heavier usage, you will
dramatically reduce the CPU usage (and the conversion time) by initializing the
HPT engine at the beginning of the job and terminating when all processing is
complete. You can find detailed information in the QWPZHPTR
API reference. The intermediate TIFF can also be re-sampled in order to achieve
the best quality at the lowest PDF size, but this will be discussed in a future
issue.
To see this utility in action, first create in your iSeries a
subdirectory called libtiff-3.7.2 under the pdf directory you created in Part Two of
this series and a source file called QAFP2PDF. Download
the content of the libtiff-3.7.2, and move the source files into your iSeries
subdirectory. Then download
the other source files into the QAFP2PDF. Because you won't use the entire
libtiff source library, you will find only the modules needed by this
implementation and an iSeries version of the unix.c and tiff2pdf.c modules, but
you can download the entire library here. Finally,
run all five MAKE REXX files in the correct sequence in order to create the CLE
program TIFF2PDF, and compile all the RPG, CMD, and CLLE as usual.
Try It
If you already produce AFP reports, just run the
AFP2PDF command to put the PDF in the specified IFS directory. But if you never
created an AFP report, follow these steps to test the utility:
1. Create a
printer driver on a PC that has Client Access Express: Control Panel>Add
Printer>Local Printer>Print to File>IBM AFP240. 2. Design the overlay
using a PC application like Microsoft Word. 3. Print it to the AFP printer
that you just created; make sure the Output Type is Overlay. You will be
prompted for the directory and name where the overlay should be put. 4. Open
iSeries Navigator, and in the left panel, expand AFPmanager and Resources.
Right-click Overlay and Import your overlay. 5. Override your print file with
DEVTYPE(*AFPDS) and FRONTOVL(library/overlay). 6. Create your AFP report.
Enjoy creating your PDF directly from this spooled
file!
Re:TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Feb 15 2008 22:43:18
We have been using the AFP2PDF command for some time. It is now causes problems with the latest version of Adobe Professional. The PDF files that AFP2PDF creates are PDF Version 1.1, which I am told is extremely out of date. I considered trying to update the libtiff and zlib directories but am reluctant to tinker with anything I do not fully understand.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Mar 16 2007 21:03:00
Seems I did not have QFNTCPL on my system. I am now getting the pdf, but it seems that I am getting "bad magic number 6950" on spool files that are generated with an overlay/form using iForm. Any ideas on what my cause this?
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Oct 19 2006 09:49:00
I am trying AFP2PDF, bur it resoults with the following error can you explain me how to resolve it' <BR>
Thanks in advance <BR>
Pietro Battisti <BR>
-------- <BR>
ID messaggio . . . . . : CPF9898 <BR>
Data di invio . . . . : 19/10/06 Ora di invio . . . . . : 14:45:10 <p>Messaggio . . . : TIFFReadDirectory: /conversioni/GOCA15P.tiff: Can not read <BR>
TIFF directory count.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Sep 20 2006 00:06:00
Hi, <BR>
Thank you for wonderful utility. recently we started using AFP2PDF utility to convert spool files to PDF then merge them to single PDF. we send it as email. we are getting this message Intermittently. we added monitor message for it. on the next successful conversion we are getting merged PDF file with spool files that had this error. How can we stop this. How can we handle resource busy message. our OS/400 version is V5R3.I have attached joblog Please let me know if you need additional information. <p>thanks for your advice, <p>sayi. <p><!--mccodelink_begin--> <BR>
<!-- do not remove --> <BR>
<hr width=50 align=left><small><a href='http://www.mcpressonline.com/mc/showcode@@.6b240d1c/24' target='_blank'>Code</a></small> <BR>
<!--mccodelink_end-->
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four May 11 2006 03:49:00
You can create only the pdf: move the overlay position in the dds in order to get a perfet alignment. Then you print the pdf directly. There are many ways to do it, for example: QIMGCVTI (if you have infoprint), "pdfp.exe" if you can runrmtcmd, Ghostscript if you like the Pase adventure, and more freeware tools that "listen" to a folder and print the pdf as soon as it arrive .... and forget the spooled file. <BR>
My utility relies on a IBM API. If the resulting image is already misaligned, just ask IBM to fix.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four May 11 2006 01:09:00
I am trying to transform AFP files now and have a very similar alignment problem. I have tried using *A4 and *Letter, they change my results but don't fix the problem. I don't see any relevant PTFs for the transformation API. Did you find a solution to the problem? <p>Thanks <BR>
Colin <p>And thanks to Costagliola for a great tool - if I can get IBM's part working.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Aug 15 2005 19:17:00
All of my problems were related to compiling at V5R1. <BR>
The corrections mentioned above to the "+=" operations were the correct ones. <BR>
The fields that were not defined were added in the V5R2 version of the QWPZHPTR (QwpzHostPrintTransform) API. I had to: <BR>
1) Remove (comment out) them from the end of the associated prototype definition (QSPOPNSP) <BR>
2) Change the call to QSPOPNSP to have only 8 parameters (drop the last three). <BR>
3) Remove (comment out) the use of the fields when ProcessOption = 20 <BR>
After the above changes, the program worked fine. <p>Thanks, this will fill our needs.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Aug 12 2005 18:21:00
When I try to compile at V5R1 I get the following errors: <BR>
InfBuffer += QSPLBI; // Length Buffer Info <BR>
QWPNBRCP -= 1; // Number Complete Pages <BR>
QWPNBRCP += 1; // Number Complete Pages <BR>
(Expecting an assignment operator) <p>Which I changed to: <BR>
InfBuffer = InfBuffer + QSPLBI; // Length Buffer Info <BR>
QWPNBRCP = QWPNBRCP - 1; // Number Complete Pages <BR>
QWPNBRCP = QWPNBRCP + 1; // Number Complete Pages <p>Also, the following fields are undefined: <BR>
QWPJSN, QWPSCD, and QWPSCT <p>Can you guide me as to what I can do to correct the undefined issues? <p>Thanks, <p>Mike
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Aug 10 2005 15:11:00
We have two forms, one created by Microsoft Word and the other by Microsoft Publisher. When we send the forms through the AFP2PDF routine, both the Microsoft version and the Publisher version comes out fine if the user profile has security officer level clearance. If the user profile is less then a security officer level, however, only the PDF derived from Miscrosoft Word version works. The PDF derived from the Publisher version turns out junk that is not recognized as a tiff by the tiff2pdf program. Any ideas as to why this is happening? <p>P.S. I have included the two forms(overlays) in the attached save files if you need to take a look.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Aug 03 2005 11:49:00
When you print your spool, the printer uses resident fonts or mapped according to the printer specific wscst. <p>When you convert to tiff there are no resident fonts. <p>In practice a dds that contains: <BR>
A TEXT 30 FONT(4407 (*POINTSIZE 12)) <BR>
probably will print fine on a afp printer but won't properly convert to tiff. <p>while <BR>
A TEXT 80 FNTCHRSET(C0H200B0 T1001144) <BR>
should convert to tiff.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Aug 03 2005 11:04:00
We are having problems with the fonts from an AFP report being converted correctly. To illustrate the point we wrote an AFP report prints out all the different fonts on our iSeries. I have added three Attachements: <p>1. The first attachment is what the report looks like when we release the spool file directly to the printer. (I printed the page out and then scanned it into a JPG file.) <p>2. The second attachment is the spool file converted to tiff by the programs presented in your fourth article on PDF conversion. <p>3. The third attachment is the pdf that gets converted from the tiff. <p>You will notice that the fonts in the printed spool file do not match those fonts in the tiff and pdf. Do you have any ideas as to why this is happening?
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Jul 08 2005 16:18:00
The problem is not with anything that you are doing on the AS400, but rather with excel. <p>Format the column as <u>custom</u> and specify 0000000 for the mask. <p>Dave
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Jul 08 2005 15:25:00
I copied a database to IFS using cpytoimpf command and it was perfect. CPYTOIMPF FROMFILE(MYLIB/KMRLBL) TOSTMF('QDLS/MYIFS/KMRITM.CSV') MBROPT( <li>REPLACE) STMFCODPAG(*PCASCII) RCDDLM(*CRLF). But when I send it to my email, the leading zeros has been truncated for a character field. How to fixed this problem. When I looked at the record in IFS the leading zeros are there but when I open the attachment in excel the leading zeros are truncated although its character field. TIA Tiki
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Jul 08 2005 11:57:00
If the PDF opens fine before being e-mailed I'm quite sure that it is corrupted by SNDDST but I never used that command. You can search internet for a free mail program to use instead of SNDDST
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Jul 07 2005 11:29:00
Let me begin by saying that this set of programs has been a joy in our shop since I installed it. In our process we generate the spool file and then produce the PDF which is sent via e-mail to our customers. The problem that I am experiencing is that occasionally without any pattern that I can identify we get e-mail documents that show the raw output instead of the neatly packaged PDF file. Is there something that I should be looking at?
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Apr 21 2005 04:33:00
AFP2PDF in intended to create a PDF for a A4 or Letter spool with graphics (invoices, account statements, etc). <BR>
Other text spool can be converted to pdf with SCS2xxx. <BR>
In any case we rely on HPT IBM Api. To further investigate, don't delete the intermediate TIFF and examine it with a windows tiff viewer. If it is bad there there is nothing that we can do. TIFF2PDF allows custom pagesizes but if converts the tiff as is.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Apr 11 2005 05:02:00
In any case try to put different values into QWPPS1 and QWPPS2 Api parameters. In some cases *MFRTYPMDL is the best choice, but sometimes you get a better overlaying wit *A4 or *LETTER.
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Apr 08 2005 16:27:00
Hi Costagliola, <p>I looked at the tiff file and the tiff is identical to the PDF and the unalignment is present there too. So, I assume that I missed some PTF on my AS400. <p>Thanks, Guy
TechTip: Spooled Files and PDF, Part Four Apr 08 2005 15:05:00
Thanks for great article. Do you know if the API converts a color data into proper colors in TIFF and subsequently in PDF? <p>Thanks, <BR>
Dmitriy Kuznetsov
#118366
There are too many comments to list them all here. See the forum for the full discussion.
