Question

I am using the FreeTextBox.dll to get user input, and storing that information in HTML format in the database. A samle of the user’s input is the below:

                                                                     133 Peachtree St NE
                                                                     Atlanta,  GA 30303
                                                                     404-652-7777
    
                                                                     Cindy Cooley
                                                                     www.somecompany.com
                                                                     Product Stewardship Mgr
    
                                                                    9/9/2011
Deidre's Company
123 Test St
Atlanta, GA 30303

Test test.
    
 
 

I want the HTMLWorker to perserve the white spaces the users enters, but it strips it out. Is there a way to perserve the user’s white space? Below is an example of how I am creating my PDF document.

Public Shared Sub CreatePreviewPDF(ByVal vsHTML As String, ByVal vsFileName As String)

        Dim output As New MemoryStream()
        Dim oDocument As New Document(PageSize.LETTER)
        Dim writer As PdfWriter = PdfWriter.GetInstance(oDocument, output)
        Dim oFont As New Font(Font.FontFamily.TIMES_ROMAN, 8, Font.NORMAL, BaseColor.BLACK)

        Using output
            Using writer
                Using oDocument
                    oDocument.Open()
                    Using sr As New StringReader(vsHTML)
                        Using worker As New html.simpleparser.HTMLWorker(oDocument)

                            worker.StartDocument()
                            worker.SetInsidePRE(True)
                            worker.Parse(sr)
                            worker.EndDocument()
                            worker.Close()
                            oDocument.Close()

                        End Using
                    End Using

                    HttpContext.Current.Response.ContentType = "application/pdf"
                    HttpContext.Current.Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", String.Format("attachment;filename={0}.pdf", vsFileName))
                    HttpContext.Current.Response.BinaryWrite(output.ToArray())
                    HttpContext.Current.Response.End()

                End Using
            End Using
            output.Close()
        End Using


    End Sub

Answer 1

Thanks for the help everyone. I was able to find a small work around by doing the following:

vsHTML.Replace("  ", "&nbsp;&nbsp;").Replace(Chr(9), "&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;").Replace(Chr(160), "&nbsp;").Replace(vbCrLf, "<br />")

The actual code does not display properly but, the first replace is replacing white spaces with  , Chr(9) with 5  , and Chr(160) with  .