CodeStart – XSL-FOP PDF Service
Dynamically Generate PDF Documents – with flexibility and simplicity
Portable Document Format (PDF) is an open standard for document exchange, and has become today’s de facto standard for printable documents, with good reason:
- PDF documents are software and platform neutral
- The PDF Reader is freely available and widely used as a browser plug-in
- PDF documents will print on any printer, keeping the same format as on the browser
LANSA’s XSL-FO Service for the automation of PDF generation
XSL Formatting Objects, or XSL-FO, is part of W3C technologies designed for the transformation and formatting of XML data. LANSA’s CodeStart offering uses XSL-FO as a means of formatting XML data for output to a PDF. It also gives LANSA developers a visual design capability using the LANSA IDE (Integrated Development Environment).
LANSA developers create the graphical content using the LANSA WAM XSL editor which enables granular control of the document formatting process. An XSLT transformation is then executed to convert the XML into an XSL-FO document. This document describes the layout of the text on various pages, such as what the pages look like and where the various contents go, and at run-time is converted to a PDF.
LANSA’s dynamic XSL-FOP Service CodeStart offering leverages the powerful LANSA Integrator product to provide a professional solution for PDF document generation and distribution. This ever-evolving offering has many features including the ability to:
- Include images, rich text, tables that span pages, or even other static PDFs
- Extract dynamic content from any database on any platform
- Add bar-codes of various formats
- Condition sections of the PDF document to be included, excluded, or modified
- Provide real-time distribution via a browser, email, or simply printed to be included in a mailer
- Implement (optional) password protection, ensuring only your intended audience can open the PDF document
- Support multi-lingual content
About the LANSA CodeStart Program
CodeStart applications, frameworks and modules are licensed on an as-is basis with the source code included. There are no warranty or ongoing software maintenance fees or upgrades for these solutions. However, LANSA Professional Services provides implementation and technical support for the CodeStart applications on a billable time and material basis.
