Bx pdf

Skill ortus-boxlang/skills/boxlang-modules/bx-pdf

BoxLang AI skills repository and Claude Plugin

Install

npx -y skills add ortus-boxlang/skills --skill bx-pdf

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What its author says it does

Copied from the file, not written here

Use this skill when generating PDF documents in BoxLang with the bx-pdf module: bx:document component, headers/footers with bx:documentitem, multi-section PDFs with bx:documentsection, saving to file, capturing PDF as binary variable, encryption, and page settings.

SKILL.md

3.9 KB, 961 tokens by cl100k_base, as published. Nobody here has run it

bx-pdf: PDF Generation

Installation

install-bx-module bx-pdf
# CommandBox
box install bx-pdf

Components

Component	Purpose
`bx:document`	Outer wrapper — generates the PDF
`bx:documentitem`	Header, footer, or page break inside a document
`bx:documentsection`	A named section (gets its own bookmark, headers/footers)

Generate PDF to File

<bx:document format="pdf" filename="/app/output/report.pdf" overwrite="true">
    <h1>My Report</h1>
    <p>Generated on #dateFormat( now(), "YYYY-MM-DD" )#</p>
</bx:document>

Generate PDF to Binary Variable

// Script syntax — capture as variable
bx:document format="pdf" variable="pdfBinary" {
    bx:documentsection name="Summary" {
        writeOutput( "<h1>Executive Summary</h1>" )
        include "/app/views/summary.bxm"
    }
}

// Write to file
fileWrite( "/app/reports/summary.pdf", pdfBinary )

Headers, Footers, and Page Breaks

<bx:document format="pdf" filename="/app/docs/manual.pdf">

    <!-- Global header for all sections -->
    <bx:documentitem type="header">
        <img src="/assets/logo.png" height="40" /> My Company Manual
    </bx:documentitem>

    <!-- Global footer with page numbers -->
    <bx:documentitem type="footer">
        <bx:output>
            Page #bxdocument.currentpagenumber# of #bxdocument.totalpages#
        </bx:output>
    </bx:documentitem>

    <!-- Section 1 -->
    <bx:documentsection name="Introduction">
        <h1>Introduction</h1>
        <p>Welcome to the manual.</p>
    </bx:documentsection>

    <!-- Page break before section 2 -->
    <bx:documentsection name="Chapter 1">
        <h1>Chapter 1</h1>
        <p>Chapter content here.</p>
    </bx:documentsection>

</bx:document>

Include External HTML/Image Sources

<!-- Include from absolute file path -->
<bx:documentsection srcfile="/app/views/chapter1.html">

<!-- Include from URL relative to web root -->
<bx:documentsection src="/views/chapter2.html">

<!-- Include static image -->
<bx:documentsection src="https://example.com/page-to-capture">

Page Layout Options

bx:document
    format="pdf"
    filename="/app/reports/landscape.pdf"
    orientation="landscape"   // "portrait" (default) or "landscape"
    pageType="letter"         // "A4", "letter", "legal", etc.
    marginTop=1
    marginBottom=1
    marginLeft=1.25
    marginRight=1.25
    unit="in"                 // "in" (default) or "cm"
    scale=100                 // percentage scale
    fontEmbed=true
{
    writeOutput( "<h1>Landscape Report</h1>" )
}

Encryption & Password Protection

bx:document
    format="pdf"
    filename="/app/secure/protected.pdf"
    encryption="128-bit"
    openpassword="openme"
    ownerpassword="adminonly"
{
    writeOutput( "<h1>Confidential</h1>" )
}

Serving PDF to Browser (Web Context)

// No filename or variable — streams directly to browser
bx:document format="pdf" saveAsName="invoice-#invoiceId#.pdf" {
    include "/app/views/invoice.bxm"
}

Common Pitfalls

✅ Use overwrite=true when writing to a file, otherwise you'll get an error if the file exists
❌ Streaming to browser (no filename, no variable) only works in a web runtime context
✅ Use bx:documentsection to create bookmarks and control per-section headers/footers
❌ bx:documentitem type="pagebreak" inserts an explicit break — sections already add breaks automatically
✅ Use absolute paths for srcfile — relative paths may not resolve correctly in all contexts
❌ HTML features like JavaScript, CSS animations, and iframes are not rendered in the PDF

Gives 0 of the 12 instructions most pdf office docs skills give in 961 tokens

Counted across 636 of the 690 authors here whose files we hold, read 2026-08-07

extract text using pdfplumberin 89 of 636, across 23 files
create PDFs using reportlabin 83 of 636, across 16 files
read forms.md to fill out pdf formsin 80 of 636, across 13 files
OCR scanned PDFs using pytesseractin 77 of 636, across 10 files
merge or split PDFs using qpdfin 70 of 636, across 3 files
use excel formulas instead of hardcoded calculated valuesin 68 of 636, across 13 files
unpack edit xml and repack existing documentsin 63 of 636, across 8 files
document sources for hardcoded valuesin 61 of 636, across 9 files
write minimal python code without unnecessary commentsin 59 of 636, across 7 files
run the recalculation script after adding or modifying formulasin 59 of 636, across 7 files
fix all identified formula errors and recalculatein 58 of 636, across 6 files
format years as text stringsin 57 of 636, across 5 files

Said here and by no other author read

install the bx-pdf module
wrap content in bx:document
use bx:documentsection for bookmarks
set overwrite to true for files
use absolute paths for srcfile
use bx:documentitem for headers

Grouped from the skills themselves: near-identical wordings counted once, and counted by distinct author, so one author publishing three of these counts once. Length counted with cl100k_base; the agent that loads this file may tokenize it differently.