PDFlib 8 Windows COM/.NET Tutorial

aerobatics. But it is best suited to gliding.
fillcolor, charspacing,
fontsize, fontname
3. C one Head R ocket
This paper arrow can be thrown with big swing. We launched it from
the roof of a hotel. It stayed in the air a long time and covered a
considerable distance.
4. Super Dart
The super dart can fly giant loops with a radius of 4 or 5 meters and
cover very long distances. Its heavy cone point is slightly bowed
upwards to get the lift required for loops.
5. German Bi-Plane
Brand-new and ready for take-off. If you have lessons in the history of
aviation you can show your interest by letting it land on your teacher's
desk.
Fig. 8.13
Formatting
Textflows
A multi-line Textflow can be placed into one or more rectangles (so-called fitboxes)
on one or more pages. The following steps are required for placing a Textflow on the
page:
> The function add_textflow( ) accepts portions of text and corresponding formatting
options, creates a Textflow object, and returns a handle. As an alternative, the function
create_textflow( ) analyzes the complete text in a single call, where the text may
contain inline options for formatting control. These functions do not place any text
on the page.
> The function fit_textflow( ) places all or parts of the Textflow in the supplied fitbox.
To completely place the text, this step must possibly be repeated several times
where each of the function calls provides a new fitbox which may be located on the
same or another page.
> The function delete_textflow( ) deletes the Textflow object after it has been placed in
the document.
The functions add/create_textflow( ) for creating Textflows support a variety of options
for controlling the formatting process. These options can be provided in the function’s
option list, or embedded as inline options in the text when using create_textflow( ). info_
textflow( ) can be used to query formatting results and many other Textflow details. We
will discuss Textflow placement using some common application examples. A complete
list of Textflow options can be found in the PDFlib API Reference.
Many of the options supported by add/create_textflow( ) are identical to those of fit_
textline( ). It is therefore recommended to familiarize yourself with the examples in Section
8.1, »Placing and Fitting Textlines«, page 199. In the below sections we will focus on
options related to multi-line text.
Cookbook Code samples regarding text output issues can be found in the text_output category of the
PDFlib Cookbook.
8.2.1 Placing Textflows in the Fitbox
The fitbox for Textflow is the area where text will be placed. It is defined as the rectangular
area specified with the llx, lly, urx, ury parameters of fit_textflow( ).
Placing text in a single fitbox. Let’s start with an easy example. The following code
fragment uses two calls to add_textflow( ) to assemble a piece of bold text and a piece of
208 Chapter 8: Text and Table Formatting (Edition for COM, .NET, and REALbasic)