Software

Generating printable documents or reports containing dynamic data is a common requirement of most business systems. In this post I will show you how to create XPS documents dynamically using WPF templates loaded from the file system and populated with data binding. This technique is especially powerful when the output document needs to be either highly dynamic or has lots of design elements. The example document we will create looks something like this:

The document template

For a fixed format document the <FixedDocument/> is a logical starting point. The template needed to make our document is as follows:

<FixedDocument
   xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
   xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
   xml:lang="en-au">
   <FixedDocument.Resources>
      <BooleanToVisibilityConverter x:Key="visConverter"/>
   </FixedDocument.Resources>
   <PageContent>
      <FixedPage Width="793.76" Height="1122.56">
         <!-- Page 1 Begins Here -->
         <StackPanel Margin="50">
            <Border BorderThickness="5" BorderBrush="Gray" CornerRadius="10"
               Padding="20" Width="690">
               <StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal" Margin="0 0 0 0">
                  <Image Source="truck.jpg" HorizontalAlignment="Left"/>
                  <TextBlock Margin="30 0 0 0" FontSize="50"
                     Text="{Binding Path=Heading}" VerticalAlignment="Center"/>
               </StackPanel>
            </Border>
            <TextBlock Margin="0 30 0 0"
               Text="{Binding Path=CurrentDate, StringFormat='{}{0:d MMMM yyyy}'}"/>
            <TextBlock Margin="0 30 0 0"
               Text="{Binding Path=Name, StringFormat='Dear {0},'}" />
            <ItemsControl Margin="30 20 0 0" ItemsSource="{Binding Path=DotPoints}"
               HorizontalAlignment="Left">
               <ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
                  <DataTemplate>
                     <StackPanel Margin="0,8,0,0" Orientation="Horizontal" >
                        <TextBlock Text="• " />
                        <TextBlock Text="{Binding}" TextWrapping="Wrap" Width="400"/>
                     </StackPanel>
                  </DataTemplate>
               </ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
            </ItemsControl>
            <TextBlock Margin="0 30 0 0"
               Text="Congratulations, you are entitled to a 50% discount!"
               Visibility="{Binding Path=GiveDiscount,
                                        Converter={StaticResource visConverter}}"/>
         </StackPanel>
      </FixedPage>
   </PageContent>
   <PageContent>
      <FixedPage Width="793.76" Height="1122.56">
         <!-- Page 2 Begins Here -->
         <TextBlock Margin="50" Text="Nothing to see here."/>
      </FixedPage>
   </PageContent>
</FixedDocument>

This includes the namespace imports that should be familiar to any WPF developer. One thing of interest in this template is the hard coded width and height of the <FixedPage/>. These values have specified an A4 page in portrait orientation. These have been based on the DPI of WPF (96) and the dimensions of an A4 page.

The XAML template includes standard WPF binding expressions which will be used to populate the document with dynamic data. It also makes use of the BooleanToVisibilityConverter to make easy show/hide functionality through data binding.

Loading the template from the file system

System.Windows.Markup.XamlReader provides an easy way of parsing XAML markup into objects:

public static object LoadTemplate(string templatePath)
{
   object template;

   // get the needed template paths
   string absolutePath = Path.GetFullPath(templatePath);
   string directoryPath = Path.GetDirectoryName(absolutePath);

   using (FileStream inputStream = File.OpenRead(absolutePath))
   {
      var pc = new ParserContext
      {
         // It is critical to have the trailing backslash here
         // will not work without it!
         BaseUri = new Uri(directoryPath + "\\")
      };

      template = XamlReader.Load(inputStream, pc);
   }

   return template;
}

It’s critical here to setup the ParserContext so that resources can be referenced from the XAML. In our example we reference an image, but you can also reference things like fonts and other XAML files.

Injecting data into the document with data binding

For our example we will use basic object data binding. However this technique would work equally well with other WPF binding sources such as XML. The object we will bind to has properties which correspond to the binding expressions in the template:

public class Data
{
   public string Heading { get; set; }
   public DateTime CurrentDate { get; set; }
   public string Name { get; set; }
   public string[] DotPoints { get; set; }
   public bool GiveDiscount { get; set; }
}

public static void InjectData(FixedDocument document, object dataSource)
{
   document.DataContext = dataSource;

   // we need to give the binding infrastructure a push as we
   // are operating outside of the intended use of WPF
   var dispatcher = Dispatcher.CurrentDispatcher;
   dispatcher.Invoke(
      DispatcherPriority.SystemIdle,
      new DispatcherOperationCallback(delegate { return null; }),
      null);
}

In this code we set the DataContext for the FixedDocument to be the object containing the data. The strange thing is the dispatcher code. In a normal WPF application the dispatcher is used to marshal calls from worker threads to the UI thread. It seems that data binding outside of the UI context is not triggered unless the dispatcher is woken from its sleepy state. To do this we give it an arbitrary task.

Save our document to XPS

The ugliest code is left for last.  Below is what is required to convert a FixedDocument to an XPS format file ready to be viewed and printed by the user:

public static void ConvertToXps(FixedDocument fixedDoc, Stream outputStream)
{
   var package = Package.Open(outputStream, FileMode.Create);
   var xpsDoc = new XpsDocument(package, CompressionOption.Normal);
   XpsDocumentWriter xpsWriter = XpsDocument.CreateXpsDocumentWriter(xpsDoc);

   // xps documents are built using fixed document sequences
   var fixedDocSeq = new FixedDocumentSequence();
   var docRef = new DocumentReference();
   docRef.BeginInit();
   docRef.SetDocument(fixedDoc);
   docRef.EndInit();
   ((IAddChild)fixedDocSeq).AddChild(docRef);

   // write out our fixed document to xps
   xpsWriter.Write(fixedDocSeq.DocumentPaginator);

   xpsDoc.Close();
   package.Close();
}

When working with XPS files you will find that you always have to work within a Package. The other interesting part of this code is the cast to IAddChild which is needed to add the DocumentReference as content within the FixedDocumentSequence.

Exception: the calling thread must be STA

WPF controls can only be used in STA threads. This isn’t usually something you have to consider when you are using WPF in a GUI application. However, if you are attempting to use this XPS code deep within some class library then the apartment state of the calling thread cannot be guaranteed. Instead of putting this requirement onto the consumer of your class you can use code like the following:

if (Thread.CurrentThread.GetApartmentState() != ApartmentState.STA)
{
   var t = new Thread(() =>
      {
         // do work here when calling thread is not STA
      });
   t.SetApartmentState(ApartmentState.STA);
   t.IsBackground = false;
   t.Start();
   t.Join();
}
else
{
   // do work here when calling thread is STA
   // this removes the overhead of creating
   // a new thread when it is not necessary
}

Final comments

This XPS generation technique is extremely flexible. Some key strengths:

• Allows for the full power of WPF, enabling attractive documents
• You can use user controls as well as third party components such as charting libraries
• Your own custom ValueConverters in combination with data triggers can be used for almost any dynamic requirement (this is probably worth another post)
• Conversion to PDF is possible with third party libraries

Visual Studio 2008 Solution – XpsDocumentGenerator.zip