Printing field values to a PDF using a template

Question

Hi
I have a set of field values stored in variables, I need to print these fields into a
PDF file. There is a template for this PDF , and each field value should go to a
specific location wrt the template on the new PDF. Could you any one
recommend a 3rd party API that can be used to do this purpose.

Answer 1

I used iText (http://www.lowagie.com/iText/) to do
this.
I created the template as a PDF and used AcroForms to
create named fields within specific formatting within
the PDF.
// Create a BAOS into which to write the
PDF.
ByteArrayOutputStream baos = new
ByteArrayOutputStream();
// Load the PDF template and open the form fields.
InputStream inputStream = new FileInputStream(
"template.pdf" );
PdfReader reader = new PdfReader(  inputStream
PdfStamper stamp = new PdfStamper(reader,
baos);
AcroFields form = stamp.getAcroFields();
o set the text in a field:
     form.setField("field_name", "field value");
     // close the PDF and return the bytestream
     stamp.close();
     return baos;
It looks like that you are loading a PDF template from a file, and straight
away attempting to fill the form by using the name of the field. To do this shouldn�t the
template PDF be formatted in a specific way to access the specific
location of the template where the field is.
Can you tell me if the template PDF file should be formatted in a specific way
to do this using iText. I was thinking of calculating the offsets of each field
and just print the data at that location.
And I very much appreciate your help so far.