Getting started with PDF Plugins

[Adam Retter]

I am using DITA-OT 3.6.1, and I am trying to create a DITA-OT plugin to customise PDF production. I understand that plugins are now the preferred approach.

Ultimately I want two plugins, one for setting basic properties, e.g. Page Size, some formatting options, etc, and then another which may need to override some XSL:FO to do some custom formatting.

To get started, I am trying to very simply to create a PDF plugin  that just sets args.chapter.layout to BASIC.

I am following the example from the docs here - https://www.dita-ot.org/3.6/topics/plugin-set-parameters.html

I have read the DITA-OT docs a few times, but somehow I haven't found a good example with details of actually how to use it in practice.

My plugin.xml looks like:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<?xml-model href="https://www.dita-ot.org/rng/plugin.rnc" type="application/relax-ng-compact-syntax"?>

<plugin id="uk.gov.nationalarchives.omega.dita-ot.pdf-settings">

  <require plugin="org.dita.pdf2"/>

  <transtype name="print-pdf" extends="pdf" desc="PDF on A4 paper"/>

  <feature extension="dita.transtype.print" value="print-pdf"/>

  <feature extension="ant.import" file="integrator.xml"/>

</plugin>

My integrator.xml looks like:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>

<project name="uk.gov.nationalarchives.omega.dita-ot.pdf-settings">

  <target name="dita2draft.pdf.init">

    <!-- Disable the subsection links on the first page of each chapter -->

    <property name="args.chapter.layout" value="BASIC"/>

  </target>

  <target name="dita2draft.pdf" depends="dita2draft.pdf.init, dita2pdf2"/>

</project>

I have placed plugin.xml and integrator.xml into a Zip file and installed them into DITA-OT using:

dita install file:/tmp/uk.gov.nationalarchives.omega.dita-ot.pdf-settings.zip

I see it when I run `dita plugins`:

❯ dita plugins

org.dita.base

org.dita.eclipsehelp

org.dita.html5

org.dita.htmlhelp

org.dita.index

org.dita.normalize

org.dita.pdf2

org.dita.pdf2.axf

org.dita.pdf2.fop

org.dita.pdf2.xep

org.dita.specialization.dita11

org.dita.xhtml

org.lwdita

org.oasis-open.dita.techcomm.v2_0

org.oasis-open.dita.v1_2

org.oasis-open.dita.v1_3

org.oasis-open.dita.v2_0

org.oasis-open.xdita.v0_2_2

uk.gov.nationalarchives.omega.dita-ot.pdf-settings

If I run:

dita --verbose --input=/tmp/ocdm.ditamap --format=pdf --output=/tmp/out

I do get a PDF, but my plugin doesn't appear to have done anything at all.

If I try instead running:

dita --verbose --input=/tmp/ocdm.ditamap --format=print-pdf --output=/tmp/out

I get the errors:

Searching for integrator.xml ...

init:

Error: The following error occurred while executing this line:

Target "dita2print-pdf" does not exist in the project "DOST".

To be honest I am not really sure what I am meant to do, am I meant to define `dita2print-pdf` somewhere and if so, why, and what do I need to put there?

Any help on getting started (in-practice) would be appreciated...

Thanks Adam.

[Radu Coravu]

Welcome Adam,

Maybe you can try Jarno Elovirta's PDF plugin generator page to generate valid DITA OT PDF customization plugins:

https://dita-generator.elovirta.com/

About what you did, you defined a new transformation type named "print-pdf" so indeed you should refer to it "--format=print-pdf " in the command line when building the PDF.

And inside your build file rename the target "dita2draft.pdf" to "dita2print-pdf", basically once you give in the command line the " --format=print-pdf", the DITA OT prefixes it with "dita2" and calls the ANT target with the name "dita2print-pdf" which gets to be defined by you.

Regards,

Radu

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