Question

How can I print a field to a specific page location?
For instance, I have a printed form and I want to print data in those specific/delimited spaces.

I’ve seen some examples, but they do not apply to my need.

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/10180/How-to-print-text-in-C

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/7703274/how-to-create-page-with-text-in-specific-location

The last one if wasn’t closed I think it’d have the answer.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

Answer 1

If you have a paper form, you can scan it in, and convert it to a PDF form with a program like CutePDF. Next, create the fields you want to be able to fill in (by dragging rectangles), name them, and save the form. iTextSharp is a C# library that lets you fill in the form fields in a programmatic way.

Example:

//Replace with path to the form
var pdfFormLocation = "C:\\pdfForm.pdf"; 

//Adjust below path to a temp location
var pdfPath = String.Format("C:\\temp\\{0}", Guid.NewGuid().ToString());
File.Copy(pdfFormLocation, pdfPath, true);

var reader = new PdfReader(pdfPath);
var output = new FileStream();
var stamper = new PdfStamper(reader, output);

//the form field names can be a little hairy
stamper.AcroFields.SetField("topmostSubform[0].Page1[0].f1_01_0_[0]", "Your Name");

//make the form no longer editable
stamper.FormFlattening = true;

stamper.Close();
reader.Close();
//now you can go print this file from pdfPath

Links:
iTextSharp
CutePDF