How can I add disparate chunks to a PdfPCell using iTextSharp? - pdf-generation

Question

How can I concatenate disparate chunks and add them to a paragraph, the paragraph to a cell, then the cell to a table using iTextSharp (in generating a PDF file)?
I am able to get to a certain "place" in my PDF file generation, so that it looks like so (the right side of the page is blank, as it should be):
This is the code I'm using for that:
using (var ms = new MemoryStream())
{
using (var doc = new Document(PageSize.A4, 50, 50, 25, 25))
{
//Create a writer that's bound to our PDF abstraction and our stream
using (var writer = PdfWriter.GetInstance(doc, ms))
{
//Open the document for writing
doc.Open();
var courierBold11Font = FontFactory.GetFont(FontFactory.COURIER_BOLD, 11, BaseColor.BLACK);
var docTitle = new Paragraph("Mark Twain", courierBold11Font);
doc.Add(docTitle);
var timesRoman9Font = FontFactory.GetFont("Times Roman", 9, BaseColor.BLACK);
var subTitle = new Paragraph("Roughing It", timesRoman9Font);
doc.Add(subTitle);
var courier9RedFont = FontFactory.GetFont("Courier", 9, BaseColor.RED);
var importantNotice = new Paragraph("'All down but nine; set 'em up on the other alley, pard' - Scotty Briggs", courier9RedFont);
importantNotice.Leading = 0;
importantNotice.MultipliedLeading = 0.9F; // reduce the width between lines in the paragraph with these two settings
PdfPTable table = new PdfPTable(1);
PdfPCell cellImportantNote = new PdfPCell(importantNotice);
cellImportantNote.BorderWidth = PdfPCell.NO_BORDER;
table.WidthPercentage = 50;
table.HorizontalAlignment = Element.ALIGN_LEFT;
table.AddCell(cellImportantNote);
doc.Add(table);
doc.Close();
}
var bytes = ms.ToArray();
String PDFTestOutputFileName = String.Format("iTextSharp_{0}.pdf", DateTime.Now.ToShortTimeString());
PDFTestOutputFileName = PDFTestOutputFileName.Replace(":", "_");
var testFile = Path.Combine(Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop), PDFTestOutputFileName);
File.WriteAllBytes(testFile, bytes);
MessageBox.Show(String.Format("{0} written", PDFTestOutputFileName));
}
}
However, I need to break up the red text so that part of it is bolded, parts of it are anchor tags/hrefs, etc.
I thought I could do it this way:
var courier9RedBoldFont = FontFactory.GetFont(FontFactory.COURIER_BOLD, 9, BaseColor.RED);
// Build up chunkified version of "important notice"
Chunk boldpart = new Chunk("All down but nine - set 'em up on the other alley, pard", courier9RedBoldFont);
Chunk attribution = new Chunk("Scotty Briggs", courier9RedFont);
PdfPTable tbl = new PdfPTable(1);
tbl.WidthPercentage = 50;
tbl.HorizontalAlignment = Element.ALIGN_LEFT;
var par = new Paragraph();
par.Chunks.Add(boldpart);
par.Chunks.Add(attribution );
PdfPCell chunky = new PdfPCell(par);
chunky.BorderWidth = PdfPCell.NO_BORDER;
tbl.AddCell(chunky);
doc.Add(tbl);
...but that's not adding anything at all to the PDF file, but why not? Doesn't a cell take a paragraph, and cannot a paragraph be comprised of Chunks?

Answer 1

Instead of para.Chunks.Add() just use par.Add(); The Chunks that are returned from Paragraph actually come from the base class Phrase. If you look at the code for that property you'll see that the collection returned is actually a temporary collection created on the fly so it is effectively read-only.