Hello Andrea,

I am fairly a newb at using PDF::API2 -- I took a crack at trying to figure it out a few weeks ago, but decided it was more trouble than it was worth for what I needed -- but I saw your lonely post, and felt inclined to offer what help I could, being a lover of Unicode and Greek characters especially.

To your questions:

-- According to the PDF::API2::Resource::Font::CoreFont manpage, the core fonts they list (Times Roman, Verdana, etc.) *ought* to support UTF8, and the standard Greek characters.

-- According to the PDF::API2 manpage, you should be able to import standard TrueType fonts.

-- PDF::API seems to be the best interface for PDF that I've found. But I am, as I said, a newb.

I just followed what appeared to be the procedure for assigning a Unicode font with PDF/API2/Resource/UniFont.pm. But it doesn't seem to be working. I can why you are frustrated! I need to get to class, but my interest is now piqued, and I'll try to work more on this later today. For what it's worth, and for anyone else who comes along to help, here's what I'm working with:

#/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings 'all';

use PDF::API2;
use PDF::API2::Resource::UniFont

my $test = 'test.pdf';

# Create a blank PDF file
my $pdf = PDF::API2->new();

# Add a blank page
my $page = $pdf->page();

# Add a built-in font to the PDF
my $font = $pdf->corefont('Times-Roman');

# Register a Unicode font
my $ufont = PDF::API2::Resource::UniFont->new($pdf, {font => $font});

# Create a Unicode string (Greek)
my @uhex = qw(03a7 03b1 03b9 03c1 03b5 0021);
my @uchars = map (hex, @uhex);
my $ustring = pack("U*", @uchars);

# Add some text to the page
my $text = $page->text();

$text->font($ufont, 20);
$text->translate(80, 710);
$text->text($ustring);

# Save the PDF
$pdf->saveas('test.pdf');

[download]

All it puts on the page, presently, is the ASCII, non-Unicode exclamation point.

In reply to Re: PDF::API2 / unicode characters by LonelyPilgrim
in thread PDF::API2 / unicode characters by PerlSci

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