MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter

MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter

Improved PDF Exporter for FastReport Open Source using SkiaSharp (Skia PDF backend, SKDocument.CreatePdf) as the rendering engine.

This project aims to improve PDF generation quality and reduce output file size compared to the default PDF exporter shipped with the FastReport Open Source edition.

Note: This project is not intended to replace FastReport’s commercial offerings. If you need advanced or enterprise-grade features, consider the official commercial products.

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Breaking Changes

[!WARNING] Rendering engine switched from PDFsharp to SkiaSharp. Starting from the release following 2027.1.0, this package no longer uses PDFsharp-GDI v6.2.4 and is now built on SkiaSharp 4.153.1 (MIT). PDFsharp versions later than v6.2.4 ship under a different license that mainly affects closed-source and commercial projects. To keep this exporter free to use in any project, the PDFsharp dependency has been replaced.

What changes for consumers:

• The PDFsharp-GDI package is no longer referenced. If your application used PDFsharp types through this package as a transitive dependency, add an explicit reference to PDFsharp yourself, or remove that usage.
• New native dependency: SkiaSharp and SkiaSharp.NativeAssets.Win32 are referenced automatically. The native libSkiaSharp.dll must be deployed with your application (this happens automatically with a standard dotnet publish).
• No font resolver is needed: system fonts are resolved by name, so any PDFsharp GlobalFontSettings / font resolver setup can be removed.
• The output may differ slightly from previous versions (text layout, font embedding/subsetting, gradients). Check critical reports after upgrading.
• The public API (PDFExport) is unchanged.

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Key Features

• Higher-quality, vector PDF rendering compared to the default FastReport Open Source exporter
• Typically smaller PDF output files: embedded TrueType fonts are subset to the glyphs actually used, and images drawn several times (e.g. watermarks) are embedded once
• Rendering based on SkiaSharp, with native support for:
  • transparency (alpha colors, semi-transparent images and watermarks)
  • clipping and transformations (rotated text and images, arbitrary matrices)
  • gradients with multiple stops (FastReport linear gradients, including focus/contrast blends)
  • hatch and texture brushes (approximated path gradients)
  • dashed, custom-dashed and joined strokes
• System fonts are resolved automatically by name (no font resolver to configure)
• Text layout that emulates GDI+ DrawString (word wrap, alignment, line limit, trimming, underline / strikeout)

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Requirements

• .NET 8 or later
• Windows OS (see Platform Support)
• FastReport Open Source (compatible versions: >=2026.1.4)

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Installation

Install via NuGet Package Manager:

dotnet add package MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter

The SkiaSharp native library for Windows (SkiaSharp.NativeAssets.Win32) is referenced automatically.

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Usage

Basic export to file

using MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter;

void ExportReport()
{
    using var report = new Report();
    using var pdfExport = new PDFExport();

    report.Load("Reports/MyReport.frx");
    report.Prepare();

    var outputPath = Path.Combine(Path.GetTempPath(), "Report.pdf");
    report.Export(pdfExport, outputPath);
}

Export to a memory stream (e.g. for ASP.NET Core responses)

using MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter;

byte[] ExportReportToBytes()
{
    using var report = new Report();
    using var pdfExport = new PDFExport();
    using var stream = new MemoryStream();

    report.Load("Reports/MyReport.frx");
    report.Prepare();
    report.Export(pdfExport, stream);

    return stream.ToArray();
}

Export with data source

using MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter;

void ExportReportWithData(IEnumerable<MyRecord> data)
{
    using var report = new Report();
    using var pdfExport = new PDFExport();

    report.Load("Reports/MyReport.frx");
    report.RegisterData(data, "MyDataSource");
    report.Prepare();

    var outputPath = Path.Combine(Path.GetTempPath(), "Report.pdf");
    report.Export(pdfExport, outputPath);
}

The report information (ReportInfo.Name, Author, Description) is written to the PDF metadata (Title, Author, Subject).

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Platform Support (Windows Only)

This exporter is currently Windows-only:

• FastReport Open Source relies on System.Drawing.Common, which Microsoft has restricted to Windows starting with .NET 6 (see docs)
• The package ships only the Windows SkiaSharp native assets (SkiaSharp.NativeAssets.Win32)

It can be used in:

• Windows desktop applications (WinForms, WPF, console)
• ASP.NET Core, as long as it runs on a Windows host

Roadmap: Linux support is planned. The rendering engine (SkiaSharp) is cross-platform and the GDI±specific parts (string measurement, image conversion) are isolated behind interfaces.

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Architecture

Component	Responsibility
PDFExport	FastReport export lifecycle: document, pages, bands, watermarks
PDFGraphicsAdapter	FastReport IGraphics implementation on top of a Skia PDF page canvas
Skia/SkiaPaintFactory + Skia/Brushes/*	GDI+ pens and brushes to Skia paints (one strategy per brush type)
Skia/PathConverter, Skia/SkiaConvert	GDI+ geometry, matrices and enums to Skia
Skia/CanvasStateManager	GDI+ Save / Restore / Transform / ResetClip semantics
Skia/SkiaFontProvider, Skia/GdiImageConverter	Cached fonts and images (document scoped)
Text/TextLayoutEngine, Text/SkiaTextRenderer	GDI+ compatible text layout and drawing
Text/GdiStringMeasurer	GDI+ measurements exposed to FastReport (MeasureString, MeasureCharacterRanges)
Pdf/FontSubsetPostProcessor	TrueType font subsetting of the generated PDF

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Limitations

• Different start and end caps on the same pen are not supported: the start cap is used for both ends. Anchor and arrow caps are drawn as flat caps.
• PathGradientBrush is approximated with a radial gradient from the center color to the first surround color.
• Clipping: CombineMode.Union, Xor and Complement cannot be expressed and leave the current clip unchanged. ResetClip resets the clip to the last saved graphics state.
• Complex text shaping (right-to-left scripts, ligatures) is not performed; characters missing from the selected font are not replaced with a fallback font.
• Ellipsis trimming is applied at character level for every StringTrimming.Ellipsis* mode, and tabs are expanded to spaces.
• Font subsetting applies to TrueType fonts (.ttf); other font formats are embedded as produced by Skia.

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Building and testing

dotnet build -c Release

The tests use xUnit v3 and can be run from Visual Studio or by launching the test executable:

dotnet build MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter.Tests
MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter.Tests\bin\Debug\net10.0-windows\MarcoBellini.FastReport.PDFExporter.Tests.exe

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Dependencies / Related Projects

• FastReport Open Source
• SkiaSharp (MIT) and Skia (BSD-3-Clause)

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Contributing

Contributions, bug reports, and feature requests are welcome! Feel free to open an issue or submit a pull request.

Please make sure to:

• Describe the problem or improvement clearly
• Include a minimal reproducible example if reporting a bug
• Follow the existing code style

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License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details, including the third-party notices.