iText - Nested Table
In this chapter, we will see how to add a nested table to a table in a PDF document using the iText library.
Adding Nested Tables in a Pdf
You can create an empty PDF Document by instantiating the Document class. While instantiating this class, you need to pass a PdfDocument object as a parameter, to its constructor. Then, to add a table to the document, you need to instantiate the Table class and add this object to the document using the add() method.
To add a table to this table, you need to create another table (nested table), and pass it to the cell object using the add() method of the Cell class.
Following are the steps to insert a table into the cell of a table.
Step 1: Creating a PdfWriter object
The PdfWriter class represents the DocWriter for a PDF. This class belongs to the package com.itextpdf.kernel.pdf. The constructor of this class accepts a string, representing the path of the file where the PDF is to be created.
Instantiate the PdfWriter class by passing a string value (representing the path where you need to create a PDF) to its constructor, as shown below.
// Creating a PdfWriter
String dest = "C:/itextExamples/addingNestedTable.pdf";
PdfWriter writer = new PdfWriter(dest);
When an object of this type is passed to a PdfDocument (class), every element added to this document will be written to the file specified.
Step 2: Creating a PdfDocument object
The PdfDocument class is the class that represents the PDF Document in iText. This class belongs to the package com.itextpdf.kernel.pdf. To instantiate this class (in writing mode), you need to pass an object of the class PdfWriter to its constructor.
Instantiate the PdfDocument class by passing the above created PdfWriter object to its constructor, as shown below.
// Creating a PdfDocument
PdfDocument pdfDoc = new PdfDocument(writer);
Once a PdfDocument object is created, you can add various elements like page, font, file attachment, and event handler using the respective methods provided by its class.
Step 3: Creating the Document object
The Document class of the package com.itextpdf.layout is the root element while creating a self-sufficient PDF. One of the constructors of this class accepts an object of the class PdfDocument.
Instantiate the Document class by passing the object of the class PdfDocument created in the previous steps, as shown below.
// Creating a Document
Document document = new Document(pdfDoc);
Step 4: Creating a Table object
The Table class represents a two-dimensional grid filled with cells, ordered in rows and columns. It belongs to the package com.itextpdf.layout.element.
Instantiate the Table class as shown below.
// Creating a table
float [] pointColumnWidths = {200F, 200F};
Table table = new Table(pointColumnWidths);
Step 5: Creating the cell
Create a cell object by instantiating the Cell class of the package com.itextpdf.layout, as shown below.
// Adding cell to the table
Cell contact = new Cell(); // Creating a cell
Step 6: Creating Nested table
After creating the cell, create a nested table, and populate its cells, as shown below.
// Creating nested table for contact
float [] pointColumnWidths2 = {150f, 150f};
Table nestedTable = new Table(pointColumnWidths2);
// Populating row 1 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested1 = new Cell();
nested1.add("Phone");
nestedTable.addCell(nested1);
Cell nested2 = new Cell();
nested2.add("9848022338");
nestedTable.addCell(nested2);
// Populating row 2 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested3 = new Cell();
nested3.add("email");
nestedTable.addCell(nested3);
Cell nested4 = new Cell();
nested4.add("Raju123@gmail.com");
nestedTable.addCell(nested4);
// Populating row 3 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested5 = new Cell();
nested5.add("Address");
nestedTable.addCell(nested5);
Cell nested6 = new Cell();
nested6.add("Hyderabad");
nestedTable.addCell(nested6);
Step 7: Adding Nested table to the cell
Now, add the above created nested table to the cell of the parent (container) table using the add() method of the Cell class. And, add this cell to the parent table using the addCell() method of the Table class, as shown below.
contact.add(nestedTable);
table.addCell(contact);
Step 8: Adding table to the document
Add the table object created in the previous step using the add() method of the Document class, as shown below.
// Adding list to the document
document.add(table);
Step 9: Closing the Document
Close the document using the close() method of the Document class, as shown below.
// Closing the document
document.close();
Example
The following Java program demonstrates how to add a table to a cell of a table (nested table) in a PDF document using the iText library. It creates a PDF document with the name addingNestedTable.pdf, adds a table to it, inserts another table to one of its cells, and saves it in the path C:/itextExamples/.
Save this code in a file with the name AddNestedTable.java.
import com.itextpdf.kernel.pdf.PdfDocument;
import com.itextpdf.kernel.pdf.PdfWriter;
import com.itextpdf.layout.Document;
import com.itextpdf.layout.element.Cell;
import com.itextpdf.layout.element.Table;
public class a4AddNestedTablesPdf {
public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception {
// Creating a PdfWriter object
String dest = "C:/itextExamples/addingNestedTable.pdf";
PdfWriter writer = new PdfWriter(dest);
// Creating a PdfDocument object
PdfDocument pdfDoc = new PdfDocument(writer);
// Creating a Document object
Document doc = new Document(pdfDoc);
// Creating a table
float [] pointColumnWidths1 = {150f, 150f};
Table table = new Table(pointColumnWidths1);
// Populating row 1 and adding it to the table
Cell cell1 = new Cell();
cell1.add("Name");
table.addCell(cell1);
Cell cell2 = new Cell();
cell2.add("Raju");
table.addCell(cell2);
// Populating row 2 and adding it to the table
Cell cell3 = new Cell();
cell3.add("Id");
table.addCell(cell3);
Cell cell4 = new Cell();
cell4.add("1001");
table.addCell(cell4);
// Populating row 3 and adding it to the table
Cell cell5 = new Cell();
cell5.add("Designation");
table.addCell(cell5);
Cell cell6 = new Cell();
cell6.add("Programmer");
table.addCell(cell6);
// Creating nested table for contact
float [] pointColumnWidths2 = {150f, 150f};
Table nestedTable = new Table(pointColumnWidths2);
// Populating row 1 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested1 = new Cell();
nested1.add("Phone");
nestedTable.addCell(nested1);
Cell nested2 = new Cell();
nested2.add("9848022338");
nestedTable.addCell(nested2);
// Populating row 2 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested3 = new Cell();
nested3.add("email");
nestedTable.addCell(nested3);
Cell nested4 = new Cell();
nested4.add("Raju123@gmail.com");
nestedTable.addCell(nested4);
// Populating row 3 and adding it to the nested table
Cell nested5 = new Cell();
nested5.add("Address");
nestedTable.addCell(nested5);
Cell nested6 = new Cell();
nested6.add("Hyderabad");
nestedTable.addCell(nested6);
// Adding table to the cell
Cell cell7 = new Cell();
cell7.add("Contact");
table.addCell(cell7);
Cell cell8 = new Cell();
cell8.add(nestedTable);
table.addCell(cell8);
// Adding table to the document
doc.add(table);
// Closing the document
doc.close();
System.out.println("Nested Table Added successfully..");
}
}
Compile and execute the saved Java file from the Command prompt using the following commands −
javac AddNestedTable.java
java AddNestedTable
Upon execution, the above program creates a PDF document displaying the following message.
Nested Table Added successfully..
If you verify the specified path, you can find the created PDF document, as shown below.
