PDFMonkey

This gem is the quickest way to use the PDFMonkey API.

Installation

Add this line to your application’s Gemfile:

gem 'pdfmonkey'

And then execute:

$ bundle

Or install it yourself as:

$ gem install pdfmonkey

Usage

Setting up authentication

Using the default environment variables

PDFMonkey will look for the PDFMONKEY_PRIVATE_KEY environment variable. This variable should contain your private key obtained at https://dashboard.pdfmonkey.io/account.

PDFMONKEY_PRIVATE_KEY=j39ckj4…

Setting credentials manually

You can choose to set up your credentials explicitely in your application:

Pdfmonkey.configure do |config|
  config.private_key = 'j39ckj4…'
end

Generating a document

Once your App is created in the PDFMonkey Dashboard, create a Document Template and add the content you want to use. Every Document Template has a unique identifier (UUID), get your template’s identifier. Your ready to generate a Document.

Synchronous generation

If your want to wait for a Document’s generation before continuing with your workflow, use the generate! method, it will request a document generation and wait for it to succeed or fail before giving you any answer.

template_id = 'b13ebd75-d290-409b-9cac-8f597ae3e785'
data = { name: 'John Doe' }

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate!(template_id, data)

document.status       # => 'success'
document.download_url # => 'https://…'

⚠️ The download URL of a document is only valid for 1 hour. Passed this delay, reload the document to obtain a new one:

document.reload!

Asynchronous generation

PDFMonkey was created with an asynchronous workflow in mind. It provides webhooks to inform you of a Document’s generation success or failure.

To leverage this behavior and continue working while your Document is generated, use the generate method:

template_id = 'b13ebd75-d290-409b-9cac-8f597ae3e785'
data = { name: 'John Doe' }

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate(template_id, data)

document.status # => 'pending'
document.download_url # => nil

If you have a webhook URL set up it will be called with you document once the generation is complete. You can simulate it for testing with the following cURL command:

curl <url of your app> \
  -X POST \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{
        "document": {
          "app_id": "d9ec8249-65ae-4d50-8aee-7c12c1f9683a",
          "checksum": "ac0c2b6bcc77e2b01dc6ca6a9f656b2d",
          "created_at": "2020-01-02T03:04:05.000+01:00",
          "document_template_id": "f7fbe2b4-a57c-46ee-8422-5ae8cc37daac",
          "download_url": "https://example.com/76bebeb9-9eb1-481a-bc3c-faf43dc3ac81.pdf",
          "filename": "76bebeb9-9eb1-481a-bc3c-faf43dc3ac81.pdf",
          "id": "76bebeb9-9eb1-481a-bc3c-faf43dc3ac81",
          "meta": null,
          "payload": "{\"name\": \"John Doe\"}",
          "preview_url": null,
          "status": "success",
          "updated_at": "2020-01-02T03:04:15.000+01:00"
        }
      }'

Attaching meta data to the document

In addition to the Document’s payload you can add meta data when generating a Document.

This can be done by passing a third argument to the generate! and generate methods:

meta = {
  _filename: 'john-doe-contract.pdf',
  client_id: '123xxx123'
}

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate!(template_id, payload, meta)
document.meta
# => '{"_filename":"john-doe-contract.pdf","client_id":"123xxx123"}'

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate(template_id, payload, meta)
document.meta
# => '{"_filename":"john-doe-contract.pdf","client_id":"123xxx123"}'

Error handling

In case of error, be it an HTTP layer error or an API error, document.status will be set to 'error' and document.error will contain the error message.

# Using an unknown template

template_id = 'unknown'
data = { name: 'John Doe' }

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate(template_id, data)

document.status # => 'error'
document.errors # => ["Document template must exist"]

# If your quota is depleted
document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate(template_id, data)

document.status # => 'error'
document.errors # => { "status" => ["You’ve reached your quota for th..."] }

# If the network is down
document = Pdfmonkey::Document.generate(template_id, data)

document.status # => 'error'
document.errors # => ["Failed to open TCP connection to api.pdfmonkey.io:443 (getaddrinfo: nodename nor servname provided, or not known)"]

Fetching a document

You can fetch an existing document using the .fetch method:

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.fetch('76bebeb9-9eb1-481a-bc3c-faf43dc3ac81')

Error handling

In case of error, be it an HTTP layer error or an API error, document.status will be set to 'error' and document.error will contain the error message.

document = Pdfmonkey::Document.fetch('unknown')

document.status # => 'error'
document.errors # => ["We couldn't find any Document with ID \"unknown\"..."]

# If the network is down
document = Pdfmonkey::Document.fetch('95eb0b6e-090b-4195-9b7c-cc3d50099867')

document.status # => 'error'
document.errors # => ["Failed to open TCP connection to api.pdfmonkey.io:443 (getaddrinfo: nodename nor servname provided, or not known)"]

Deleting a document

You can delete an existing document using the .delete method:

Pdfmonkey::Document.delete('76bebeb9-9eb1-481a-bc3c-faf43dc3ac81')
#=> true

Alternatively you can call the #delete! method:

document.delete!
#=> true

Error handling

In case of error, be it an HTTP layer error or an API error, an error Hash will be returned.

document.delete!
#=> true

document.delete!
# {
#   errors: ["We couldn't find any Document with ID \"11111111-2222-3333-4444-555555555555\". If ..."],
#   status: "error"
# }

# If the network is down
document.delete!
# {
#   errors: ["Failed to open TCP connection to api.pdfmonkey.io:443 (getaddrinfo: nodename nor servname provided, or not known)"],
#   status: "error"
# }

Development

After checking out the repo, run bin/setup to install dependencies. You can also run bin/console for an interactive prompt that will allow you to experiment.

To install this gem onto your local machine, run bundle exec rake install. To release a new version, update the version number in version.rb, and then run bundle exec rake release, which will create a git tag for the version, push git commits and tags, and push the .gem file to rubygems.org.

Contributing

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/simonc/pdfmonkey. This project is intended to be a safe, welcoming space for collaboration, and contributors are expected to adhere to the Contributor Covenant code of conduct.

License

The gem is available as open source under the terms of the MIT License.

Code of Conduct

Everyone interacting in the Pdfmonkey project’s codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms and mailing lists is expected to follow the code of conduct.