Converting Excel Workbook to PDF
PDF files are widely used to exchange documents between organizations, government sectors, and individuals. It is a standard document format and software developers are often asked to find a way to convert Microsoft Excel files into PDF documents.
Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET supports converting Excel files to PDF and maintains high visual fidelity in the conversion.
Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET directly writes the information about API and Version Number in output documents. For example, upon rendering Document to PDF, Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET populates PDF Producer field with value, e.g ‘Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET v23.2’.
Please note that you can change this information in output Documents by PdfSaveOptions.producer property.
Direct Conversion
Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET supports conversion from spreadsheets to PDF independently of other software. Simply save an Excel file to PDF using the Workbook class' save method. The save method provides the SaveFormat.PDF enumeration member that converts the native Excel files to PDF format.
Follow the below steps to directly convert the Excel spreadsheets to PDF format:
- Instantiate an object of the Workbook class by calling its empty constructor.
- You may open/load an existing template file or skip this step if you are creating the workbook from scratch.
- Do any work (input data, apply formatting, set formulas, insert pictures or other drawing objects, and so on) on the spreadsheet using Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET' APIs.
- When the spreadsheet code is complete, call the Workbook class' save method to save the spreadsheet.
The file format should be PDF so select PDF (a pre-defined value) from the SaveFormat enumeration to generate the final PDF document.
Advanced Conversion
You may also opt to use the PdfSaveOptions class to set different attributes for the conversion. Setting different properties of the PdfSaveOptions class gives you control over the print, font, security and compression settings for the output PDF. The most important property is PdfSaveOptions.compliance which enables you to save the Excel files to PDF/A compliant PDF files.
Saving Workbook to PDF/A Complied Files
The below-provided code snippet demonstrates how to use the PdfSaveOptions class to save Excel files to PDF/A compliant PDF format.
Set the PDF Creation Time
With the PdfSaveOptions class, you can get or set the PDF creation time. The following code demonstrates the use of PdfSaveOptions.created_time property to set the creation time of the PDF file.
Set ContentCopyForAccessibility option
With the PdfSaveOptions class, you can get or set the PDF PdfSecurityOptions.accessibility_extract_content option to control the content access in the converted PDF.
Export Custom properties to PDF
With the PdfSaveOptions class, you can export the custom properties in the source workbook to the PDF. PdfCustomPropertiesExport enumerator is provided for specifying the way by which properties are exported. These properties can be observed in Adobe Acrobat Reader by clicking on File and then properties option as shown in the following image. Template file “sourceWithCustProps.xlsx” can be downloaded here for testing and output PDF file “outSourceWithCustProps” is available here for analysis.
Conversion Attributes
We work to enhance the conversion features with each new release. Aspose.Cell’s Excel to PDF conversion still has a couple of limitations. MapChart is not supported when converting to PDF format. Also, some drawing objects are not supported well.
The table that follows lists all features that are fully or partially supported when exporting to PDF using Aspose.Cells for Python via .NET. This table is not final and does not cover all the spreadsheet attributes but it does identify those features that are not supported or partially supported for conversion to PDF.
Document Element | Attribute | Supported | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
Alignment | Yes | ||
Background settings | Yes | ||
Border | Color | Yes | |
Border | Line style | Yes | |
Border | Line width | Yes | |
Cell Data | Yes | ||
Comments | Yes | ||
Conditional Formatting | Yes | ||
Document Properties | Yes | ||
Drawing Objects | Partially | Shadow and 3-D effects for drawing objects are not supported well; WordArt and SmartArt are partially supported. | |
Font | Size | Yes | |
Font | Color | Yes | |
Font | Style | Yes | |
Font | Underline | Yes | |
Font | Effects | Yes | |
Images | Yes | ||
Hyperlink | Yes | ||
Charts | Partially | MapChart is not supported. | |
Merged Cells | Yes | ||
Page Break | Yes | ||
Page Setup | Header/Footer | Yes | |
Page Setup | Margins | Yes | |
Page Setup | Page Orientation | Yes | |
Page Setup | Page Size | Yes | |
Page Setup | Print Area | Yes | |
Page Setup | Print Titles | Yes | |
Page Setup | Scaling | Yes | |
Row Height/Column Width | Yes | ||
RTL (Right to Left) Language | Yes |
Advance topics
- Add PDF Bookmarks
- Add PDF Bookmarks with Named Destinations
- Avoid Blank Page in Output PDF when there is Nothing to Print
- Convert XLSX File to PDF Format
- Convert Excel file to PDF format compatible with PDFA-1a
- Convert XLS File with Images or Charts to PDF
- Create PdfBookmarkEntry for Chart Sheet
- Fit All Worksheet Columns on Single PDF Page
- Ignore Errors while Rendering Excel to PDF
- Limit the Number of Pages Generated - Excel to PDF Conversion
- Print Comments while saving to PDF
- Render Office Add-Ins while converting Excel to PDF
- Render One PDF Page Per Excel Worksheet - Excel to PDF Conversion
- Render Unicode Supplementary characters in output PDF by Aspose.Cells
- Resampling Added Images - Excel to PDF Conversion
- Save Each Worksheet to a Different PDF File
- Save Excel into PDF with Standard or Minimum Size
- Save Specified Worksheets to PDF
- Secure PDF Documents
- Specify how to cross string in output PDF and image