How to create a PDF in Swift with Cocoa (Mac)

Question

Xcode 7.3.2, Swift 2, Cocoa (Mac).

My app involves the user entering in some text, which can be exported to a PDF.

In the iOS version of my app, I can creat

Answer 1

Here is a function that will generate a PDF from pure HTML.

func makePDF(markup: String) {
    let directoryURL = NSFileManager.defaultManager().URLsForDirectory(.DocumentDirectory, inDomains: .UserDomainMask)[0]
    let printOpts: [NSPrintInfo.AttributeKey: Any] = [NSPrintInfo.AttributeKey.jobDisposition: NSPrintInfo.JobDisposition.save, NSPrintInfo.AttributeKey.jobSavingURL: directoryURL]
    let printInfo = NSPrintInfo(dictionary: printOpts)
    printInfo.horizontalPagination = NSPrintingPaginationMode.AutoPagination
    printInfo.verticalPagination = NSPrintingPaginationMode.AutoPagination
    printInfo.topMargin = 20.0
    printInfo.leftMargin = 20.0
    printInfo.rightMargin = 20.0
    printInfo.bottomMargin = 20.0

    let view = NSView(frame: NSRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: 570, height: 740))

    if let htmlData = markup.dataUsingEncoding(NSUTF8StringEncoding) {
        if let attrStr = NSAttributedString(HTML: htmlData, options: [NSDocumentTypeDocumentAttribute: NSHTMLTextDocumentType], documentAttributes: nil) {
            let frameRect = NSRect(x: 0, y: 0, width: 570, height: 740)
            let textField = NSTextField(frame: frameRect)
            textField.attributedStringValue = attrStr
            view.addSubview(textField)

            let printOperation = NSPrintOperation(view: view, printInfo: printInfo)
            printOperation.showsPrintPanel = false
            printOperation.showsProgressPanel = false
            printOperation.run()
        }
    }
}

What is happening:

1. Put the HTML into a NSAttributedString.
2. Render the NSAttributedString to a NSTextField.
3. Render the NSTextField to a NSView.
4. Create a NSPrintOperation with that NSView.
5. Set the printing parameters to save as a PDF.
6. Run the print operation (which actually opens a dialog to save the PDF)
7. Everyone is happy.

This is not a perfect solution. Note the hard coded integer values.