Code Sample: Print multiple PDF files in a single print job in Java

A Java class that can print multiple PDF documents as a single print job. The class takes a list of PDF documents, creates a PrinterJob and then uses jPDFPrint to print the documents.

This sample basically shows how to merge multiple documents as you are sending them to the printer so they all show under the same printer job. It demonstrates the flexibility of our Java library. This sample was requested by a customer and we’re not sure exactly what was their use case and we can speculate they would need it for any of the following reasons: stapling, , printing multiple PDFs to a single postcript file, sending to a remote printer, keeping track of documents printed from the same account / user….

package jPDFPrintSamples;
 
import java.awt.Graphics;
import java.awt.print.PageFormat;
import java.awt.print.Pageable;
import java.awt.print.Printable;
import java.awt.print.PrinterException;
import java.awt.print.PrinterJob;
import java.net.MalformedURLException;
import java.net.URL;
import java.util.Vector;
 
import com.qoppa.pdf.PDFException;
import com.qoppa.pdfPrint.PDFPrint;
 
/**
 * The class takes a list of PDF documents, creates a PrinterJob and then uses jPDFPrint to print the documents.
 * 
 * @author Qoppa Software
 *
 */
public class MultiPrintPageable implements Pageable, Printable
{
    private Vector m_URLList;
    private Vector m_PDFList;
    private PrinterJob m_PrinterJob;
 
    public static void main (String [] args)
    {
        Vector urlList = new Vector();
        urlList.add ("http://www.qoppa.com/demo/sample01.pdf");
        urlList.add ("http://www.qoppa.com/demo/sample02.pdf");
        urlList.add ("http://www.qoppa.com/demo/sample03.pdf");
        urlList.add ("http://www.qoppa.com/demo/sample04.pdf");
 
        try
        {
            MultiPrintPageable multiPrint = new MultiPrintPageable (urlList);
            multiPrint.printAll();
        }
        catch (Throwable t)
        {
            t.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
    private static class PDFPrintInfo
    {
        public PDFPrint m_PDFPrint;
        public int m_PageOffset;
 
        PDFPrintInfo (PDFPrint pdfPrint, int pageOffset)
        {
            m_PDFPrint = pdfPrint;
            m_PageOffset = pageOffset;
        }
    }
 
    public MultiPrintPageable (Vector urlList)
    {
        m_URLList = urlList;
    }
 
    public void printAll () throws PDFException, MalformedURLException, PrinterException
    {
        // Load the documents
        m_PDFList = new Vector();
        for (int count = 0; count < m_URLList.size(); ++count)
        {
            // Add the next document to the list
            PDFPrint oneDocument = new PDFPrint (new URL ((String)m_URLList.get (count)), null);
            m_PDFList.add (oneDocument);
        }
 
        // Create the printer job and show the print dialog
        m_PrinterJob = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob();
        if (m_PrinterJob.printDialog())
        {
            m_PrinterJob.setPageable(this);
            m_PrinterJob.print();
        }
    }
 
    public int getNumberOfPages()
    {
        int totalPages = 0;
        for (int count = 0; count < m_PDFList.size(); ++count)
        {
            totalPages += ((PDFPrint)m_PDFList.get (count)).getPageCount();
        }
 
        return totalPages;
    }
 
    public PageFormat getPageFormat(int pageIndex) throws IndexOutOfBoundsException
    {
        PDFPrintInfo info = getPDFPrint(pageIndex);
        if (info != null)
        {
            return info.m_PDFPrint.getPageable(m_PrinterJob).getPageFormat(pageIndex - info.m_PageOffset);
        }
 
        return null;
    }
 
    public Printable getPrintable(int pageIndex) throws IndexOutOfBoundsException
    {
        return this;
    }
 
    private PDFPrintInfo getPDFPrint (int pageIndex)
    {
        int pageOffset = 0;
        for (int count = 0; count < m_PDFList.size(); ++count)
        {
            PDFPrint currentPDF = (PDFPrint)m_PDFList.get (count); 
            if (pageIndex < pageOffset + currentPDF.getPageCount())
            {
                return new PDFPrintInfo(currentPDF, pageOffset);                
            }
            pageOffset += currentPDF.getPageCount();
        }
 
        return null;
    }
 
    public int print(Graphics graphics, PageFormat pageFormat, int pageIndex) throws PrinterException
    {
        PDFPrintInfo info = getPDFPrint(pageIndex);
        if (info != null)
        {
            info.m_PDFPrint.print (graphics, pageFormat, pageIndex - info.m_PageOffset);
            return Printable.PAGE_EXISTS;
        }
        else
        {
            return Printable.NO_SUCH_PAGE;
        }
    }
}