Convert HTML to PDF file in Amazon ECS with Fargate

6 Nov 20255 minutes to read

The Syncfusion^® HTML to PDF converter is a .NET library for converting webpages, SVG, MHTML, and HTML to PDF using C#. Using this library, convert HTML to PDF document using Blink in Amazon ECS with Fargate.

Steps to convert HTML to PDF using Blink in Amazon ECS with Fargate

Step 1: Create a new C# ASP.NET Core Web Application project.

Step 2: In configuration windows, name your project and select Next.

Step 3: Install the Syncfusion.HtmlToPdfConverter.Net.Linux NuGet package as a reference to your AWS Elastic Beanstalk project from NuGet.org..

Step 4: Include the following commands in the Docker file to install the dependent packages in the docker container.

C#

RUN apt-get update && \
apt-get install -yq --no-install-recommends \ 
libasound2 libatk1.0-0 libc6 libcairo2 libcups2 libdbus-1-3 \ 
libexpat1 libfontconfig1 libgcc1 libgconf-2-4 libgdk-pixbuf2.0-0 libglib2.0-0 libgtk-3-0 libnspr4 \ 
libpango-1.0-0 libpangocairo-1.0-0 libstdc++6 libx11-6 libx11-xcb1 libxcb1 \ 
libxcursor1 libxdamage1 libxext6 libxfixes3 libxi6 libxrandr2 libxrender1 libxss1 libxtst6 \ 
libnss3 libgbm1

Step 5: A default controller named HomeController.cs gets added to create the ASP.NET Core MVC project. Include the following namespaces in that HomeController.cs file.

C#

using Syncfusion.Pdf;
using Syncfusion.HtmlConverter;
using System.IO;

Step 6: Add a new button in index.cshtml as follows.

C#

@{
    Html.BeginForm("BlinkToPDF", "Home", FormMethod.Get);
    {
        <div>
            <input type="submit" value="HTML To PDF" style="width:150px;height:27px" />
            <br />
            <div class="text-danger">
                @ViewBag.Message
            </div>
        </div>
    }
    Html.EndForm();
}

Step 7: Add a new action method named BlinkToPDF in HomeController.cs and include the following code example to convert HTML to PDF document using the Convert method in HtmlToPdfConverter class. The HTML content will be scaled based on the given ViewPortSize property of the BlinkConverterSettings class.

C#

public IActionResult BlinkToPDF()
{
    //Initialize HTML to PDF converter.
    HtmlToPdfConverter htmlConverter = new HtmlToPdfConverter(HtmlRenderingEngine.Blink);
    BlinkConverterSettings settings = new BlinkConverterSettings();
    //Set Blink viewport size.
    settings.ViewPortSize = new Syncfusion.Drawing.Size(1280, 0);
    //Assign Blink settings to the HTML converter.
    htmlConverter.ConverterSettings = settings;
    //Convert URL to PDF document.
    PdfDocument document = htmlConverter.Convert("https://www.syncfusion.com");
    //Create the memory stream.
    MemoryStream stream = new MemoryStream();
    //Save the document to the memory stream.
    document.Save(stream);
    //Close the document
    document.Close(true); 
    return File(stream.ToArray(), System.Net.Mime.MediaTypeNames.Application.Pdf, "BlinkLinuxDockerAWSBeanstalk.pdf");
}

NOTE

Starting from version 29.2.4, it is no longer necessary to manually add the following command-line arguments when using the Blink rendering engine:

settings.CommandLineArguments.Add("--no-sandbox");
settings.CommandLineArguments.Add("--disable-setuid-sandbox");

These arguments are only required when using older versions of the library that depend on Blink in sandbox-restricted environments.

Publish the ASP.NET Core application to Amazon ECS with Fargate using AWS Toolkit.

Step 8: Click the Publish Container to AWS (Legacy)… option by right-clicking the project to
publish the application.

Step 9: Select the AWS account profile and region to use for deployment. Ensure Service on an ECS Cluster is selected as the Deployment Target then click the Next button.

Step 10: Choose Create an empty cluster for the ECS Cluster and provide a name for the cluster and Launch Type should be set to FARGATE in the Launch Configuration window.

Step 11: Choose Create New for the service and provide a name for your service in the service Configuration window.

Step 12: Select the Configure Application Load Balance and Choose Create New in the load balancer drop-down and provide a name for your load balancer from the Application Load Balancer Configuration window.

Step 13: Choose Create New for the task definition and enter a name for the task. Select an Task Role to provide AWS credentials to your application to access AWS services in the Task Definition window and Select Publish.

Step 14: Once the deployment process completed, the toolkit will open a view onto the cluster. Click the Load Balance URL link to launch the application once the Load Balance status changed to Active.

Now, the webpage will open in the browser. Click the button to convert the webpage to a PDF document.

By executing the program, you will get a PDF document as follows.

A complete working sample for converting an HTML to PDF using Blink in Amazon ECS using AWS Fargate can be downloaded from GitHub.

Click here to explore the rich set of Syncfusion Essential PDF features.

An online sample link to convert HTML to PDF document in ASP.NET Core.