PDF Processing
TX Text Control .NET Server creates, imports and signs PDF documents in your .NET application, with no user interface involved. Starting from an empty console application, .NET developers who are new to TX Text Control get to a first PDF, an imported and changed PDF and a digitally signed PDF.
All pages use the ServerTextControl class, the non-visual document processing component of TX Text Control. You create or load a document with it, change it through its API and save it in the format you need, including PDF.
What TX Text Control Does With PDF
| Task | How it works | Learn more |
|---|---|---|
| Create PDF | Any document you create or load (DOCX, RTF, HTML and more) is saved with StreamType.AdobePDF. | PDF Creation |
| Create PDF/A | The same document is saved with StreamType.AdobePDFA for long-term archiving. | PDF/A |
| Create accessible PDF (PDF/UA) | Exported PDFs contain a tagged, logical structure. You add a document title and descriptive texts for images, tables, form fields and links. | PDF/UA |
| Import PDF | ServerTextControl.Load converts a PDF into an editable document. You can then extract its text or change it and save it again. | Text Extraction |
| Metadata | SaveSettings writes the author, title, subject and keywords. LoadSettings reads them from an imported PDF. | Document Metadata |
| Attachments | Files are embedded in a PDF or PDF/A document and extracted again when a PDF is loaded. | Attachments |
| Form fields | Form fields in a document are exported as interactive AcroForm fields or flattened to plain text. Field values of existing PDF forms are read with Forms.GetAcroFormFields. | PDF Forms |
| Passwords and permissions | SaveSettings.UserPassword, MasterPassword and DocumentAccessPermissions encrypt the PDF and restrict what readers can do with it. | SaveSettings |
| Digital signatures | An X.509 certificate, for example from a PFX file, signs the whole document or individual signature fields when the PDF is saved. | Digital Signatures |
Built Without Third-Party PDF Tools
Text Control builds the PDF export in-house, like its other core components, instead of relying on third-party libraries. You do not need Adobe Acrobat to import a PDF or Microsoft Word to convert a DOCX file to PDF. With the cross-platform Core package (TXTextControl.TextControl.Core.SDK), creating and signing PDF documents works on Windows and Linux.
Pages in This Section
Work through the pages in order if you are new to TX Text Control:
- Create a PDF: create a document or convert an existing one, save it as PDF or PDF/A to a file or a byte array, set document properties, and return the PDF from an ASP.NET Core controller.
- Load and Modify a PDF: learn what happens when a PDF is imported, read its text, metadata, attachments and form field values, add a watermark and save the result as PDF again.
- Digitally Sign a PDF: sign a PDF with a PFX certificate, choose between signing the document and signing signature fields, create a self-signed certificate for testing, and verify the result.
Before You Start
The pages assume that you can already create a .NET application that uses ServerTextControl. If you have not done that yet, start with Create Your First Application. The NuGet packages are installed from the Text Control Private NuGet Feed.
If users only need to view, fill in or sign a document in the browser, see Document Viewer in Getting Started.