Added a Table of Contents feature to XMLtoPDFBook

By Vasudev Ram

XMLtoPDFBook is a publishing tool I created, that allows you to create simple PDF ebooks from text content in XML files.

I had blogged about XMLtoPDFBook earlier, here:

Create PDF books with XMLtoPDFBook

and here:

XMLtoPDFBook now supports chapter numbers and names

Today I added some support for a Table of Contents feature to XMLtoPDFBook. Here is the updated program:

# XMLtoPDFBook2.py

# A program to convert a book in XML text format to a PDF book.
# Uses xtopdf and ReportLab.

# Author: Vasudev Ram - http://www.dancingbison.com
# Version: v0.2

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

# imports

import sys
import os
import string
import time

from PDFWriter import PDFWriter

try:
    import xml.etree.cElementTree as ET
except ImportError:
    import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

# global variables

sysargv = None

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

def debug(message):
    sys.stderr.write(message + "\n")

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

def get_xml_filename(sysargv):
    return sysargv[1]

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

def get_pdf_filename(sysargv):
    return sysargv[2]

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

def XMLtoPDFBook():

    debug("Entered XMLtoPDFBook()")

    global sysargv

    # Get command-line arguments.
    xml_filename = get_xml_filename(sysargv)
    debug("xml_filename: " + xml_filename)
    pdf_filename = get_pdf_filename(sysargv)
    debug("pdf_filename: " + pdf_filename)

    # Parse the XML file.
    try:
        tree = ET.ElementTree(file=xml_filename)
        debug("tree = " + repr(tree))
    except Exception:
        sys.stderr.write("Error: caught exception in ET.ElementTree(file)")
        sys.exit(1)

    # Get the tree root.
    root = tree.getroot()
    debug("root.tag = " + root.tag)
    if root.tag != "book":
        debug("Error: Root tag is not 'book'")
        sys.exit(1)

    # Initialize the table of contents list.
    toc = []
    # Initialize the chapters list.
    chapters = []

    # Traverse the tree, extracting needed data into variables.
    debug("-" * 60)
    for root_child in root:
        if root_child.tag != "chapter":
            debug("Error: root_child tag is not 'chapter'")
            sys.exit(1)
        chapter = root_child
        #debug(chapter.text)
        chapters.append(chapter.text)
        try:
            chapter_name = chapter.attrib['name']
        except KeyError:
            chapter_name = ""
        toc.append(chapter_name)
        debug("-" * 60)

    # Create and set some fields of a PDFWriter.
    pw = PDFWriter(pdf_filename)
    pw.setFont("Courier", 12)
    pw.setFooter("Generated by XMLtoPDFBook. Copyright 2013 Vasudev Ram")

    # Write the TOC.
    pw.setHeader("Table of Contents")
    chapter_num = 0
    debug("Chapter names")
    for chapter_name in toc:
        debug(chapter_name)
        chapter_num += 1
        pw.writeLine(str(chapter_num) + ": " + chapter_name)
    pw.savePage()

    # Write the chapters.
    chapter_num = 0
    for chapter in chapters:
        chapter_num += 1
        pw.setHeader("Chapter " + str(chapter_num) + ": " + toc[chapter_num - 1])
        lines = chapter.split("\n")
        for line in lines:
            pw.writeLine(line)
        pw.savePage()

    pw.close()

    debug("Exiting XMLtoPDFBook()")

def main():

    debug("Entered main()")

    global sysargv
    sysargv = sys.argv

    # Check for right number of arguments.
    if len(sysargv) != 3:
        sys.exit(1)

    XMLtoPDFBook()

    debug("Exiting main()")

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

if __name__ == "__main__":
    try:
        main()
    except Exception, e:
        sys.stderr.write("Error: caught Exception" + str(e))
        sys.exit(1)

#--------------------------------------------------------------------

You can run it as follows:

python XMLtoPDFBook2.py vi_quickstart2.xml vi_quickstart2.pdf 

where I've used my vi quickstart tutorial, first written for Linux For You magazine, as the input XML file.

Here is a screenshot of the first page of the resulting PDF ebook - the Table of Contents:

And here is a screenshot Chapter 3 of the book:

I've pushed the code (as file XMLtoPDFBook2.py) to my xtopdf project on Bitbucket.

Enjoy.

- Vasudev Ram - Dancing Bison Enterprises

Contact Page

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Create PDF books with XMLtoPDFBook

By Vasudev Ram


XMLtoPDFBook is a program that lets you create simple PDF books from XML text content. It requires Python, ReportLab and my xtopdf toolkit for PDF creation.

(Use ReportLab v1.21, not the 2.x series; though 2.x has more features, xtopdf has not been tested with it; also, those additional features are not required for xtopdf.)

XMLtoPDFBook.py is released as open source software under the BSD license, and I'll be adding it to the tools in my xtopdf toolkit.

Here's how to use XMLtoPDFBook:

In a text editor, create a simple XML template for the book, like this:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<book>
        <chapter>
        Chapter 1 content here.
        </chapter>

        <chapter>
        Chapter 2 content here.
        </chapter>
</book>

Add as many chapter elements as you need.

Then write or paste the text of one chapter inside each chapter element, in sequence.

Now you can convert the book content to PDF using this program, XMLtoPDFBook:

#--------------------------------------------------
# XMLtoPDFBook.py

# A program to convert a book in XML text format to a PDF book.
# Uses xtopdf and ReportLab.

# Author: Vasudev Ram - http://www.dancingbison.com
# Version: v0.1

#--------------------------------------------------

# imports

import sys
import os
import string
import time

from PDFWriter import PDFWriter

try:
    import xml.etree.cElementTree as ET
except ImportError:
    import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET

#--------------------------------------------------

# global variables

sysargv = None

#--------------------------------------------------

def debug(message):
    sys.stderr.write(message + "\n")

#--------------------------------------------------

def get_xml_filename(sysargv):
    return sysargv[1]

#--------------------------------------------------

def get_pdf_filename(sysargv):
    return sysargv[2]

#--------------------------------------------------

def XMLtoPDFBook():

    debug("Entered XMLtoPDFBook()")

    global sysargv

    xml_filename = get_xml_filename(sysargv)
    debug("xml_filename: " + xml_filename)
    pdf_filename = get_pdf_filename(sysargv)
    debug("pdf_filename: " + pdf_filename)

    pw = PDFWriter(pdf_filename)
    pw.setFont("Courier", 12)
    pw.setHeader(xml_filename + " to " + pdf_filename)
    pw.setFooter("Generated by ElementTree and xtopdf")

    tree = ET.ElementTree(file=xml_filename)
    debug("tree = " + repr(tree))

    root = tree.getroot()
    debug("root.tag = " + root.tag)
    if root.tag != "book":
        debug("Error: Root tag is not 'book'")
        sys.exit(2)

    debug("=" * 60)
    for root_child in root:
        if root_child.tag != "chapter":
            debug("Error: root_child tag is not 'chapter'")
            sys.exit(3)
        debug(root_child.text)
        lines = root_child.text.split("\n")
        for line in lines:
            pw.writeLine(line)
        pw.savePage()
        debug("-" * 60)
    debug("=" * 60)
    pw.close()

    debug("Exiting XMLtoPDFBook()")

#--------------------------------------------------

def main():

    debug("Entered main()")

    global sysargv
    sysargv = sys.argv

    # Check for right number of arguments.
    if len(sysargv) != 3:
        sys.exit(1)

    XMLtoPDFBook()

    debug("Exiting main()")

#--------------------------------------------------

if __name__ == "__main__":
    main()

#--------------------------------------------------

Here is an example run of XMLtoPDFBook, using my vi quickstart article earlier published in Linux For You magazine:

python XMLtoPDFBook.py vi_quickstart.xml vi_quickstart.pdf

This results in the contents of the article being published to PDF in the file vi_quickstart.pdf.

- Vasudev Ram - Dancing Bison Enterprises

Contact me

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Google eBooks and eBookStore

By Vasudev Ram

Google had launched an eBookStore which seems roughly similar to the Amazon ebooks service - it both allows you to buy ebooks and download free ebooks, and also syncs your reading across devices and computers. It seems to have launched sometime last year. As of now it is only for the US, but they have plans to extend it to other countries. Many links about it below.

Seen via this tweet from @markupforum:

First Google eBooks Device To Go on Sale at Target This Week

Google Launches Long-Awaited E-Bookstore

Google ebookstore

Google Books Help

Google eBooks: Overview

Google Books: Information for Publishers and Authors

Google Books Tour - Promote Your Books On Google - for free

- Vasudev Ram @ Dancing Bison

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