wordpress content PHP/html to PDF(domPDF). I need assistance

Question

I was just given the order of "Make a button that when clicked, creates a pdf out of the page the user is currently seeing. This is a rug company and they want a PDF button that when clicked, will create a pdf with page title/rug/rug desciption etc.

To be clear, this is all in Wordpress with dynamic data. I havent found a plugin that will do what i want so, im trying manually.

Overall, this is what I've tried:

The way ive gone about doing this is as follows: - For one I am using DOMPDF. With this below, it creates the pdf. This lives in a file called "createpdf.php"

$htmlToPdf = //MY HTML HERE\\ ;

$dompdf = new DOMPDF(); 
$dompdf->load_html( $htmlToPdf );
$dompdf->render();
$dompdf->stream("sample.pdf");

The part that reads $htmlToPdf = //MY HTML HERE\\ ; is where my HTML will go.

Now since this is WordPress, i am generating the page content via simple WP loop like so:

<!-- post starts here -->
        <?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
        <div class="post">
            <h2 class="post-title"><?php the_title(); ?></h2>
            <span class="meta"><?php _e('Published'); ?> <?php the_time('F j, Y'); ?> <?php _e('in'); ?> <?php the_category(', ') ?></span>
            <div class="entry">
                <?php the_content(); ?>
            </div><!-- end entry -->
        </div><!-- end post -->
        <?php endwhile; endif;?>
<!-- post ends here -->

Now, what i want to do is take the parts that matter from the page which is the content wrapper(loop included) and stick it into a PHP variable called(as shown above) $htmlToPdf = //MY HTML HERE\\ ; Then echo out that variable onto the page (single.php). This way, the page shows like normal to a user BUT with the added benefit that that the content is now in a variable so that when a user clicks the "create pdf button", it will take that pages current content and send it to "createpdf.php" via something like button

etc. Then i can do:

$htmlToPdf = $_GET['maketopdf']; 

and push $htmlToPdf fowards towards the pdf creation.

im getting so confused lol....

So i put the content in a variable like so:

 <?php 
$htmlToPdf = '
<!-- post starts here -->

        <?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
        <div class="post">
            <h2 class="post-title"><?php the_title(); ?></h2>

            <div class="entry">
                <?php the_content(); ?>
            </div><!-- end entry -->
        </div><!-- end post -->
        <?php endwhile; endif;?>
<!-- post ends here --> ';

echo $htmlToPdf;
?>

Problem now is that, no i don't get on page errors but nothing shows on the content column either. The page loads fine but where the content is supposed to be, it comes out empty.

How can i get this to show normally on single.php? whilst still using the methods im trying above.

Hope this isn't too confusing. Any help is GREATLY appreciated. Thanks in advanced.

Answer 1

There's always this ugly workaround ...

<?php
$htmlToPdf = '';
if (have_posts()){
    while (have_posts()){
        the_post(); 
        $htmlToPdf .= '<div class="post">';
        $htmlToPdf .= '<h2 class="post-title">'.the_title().'</h2>';
        $htmlToPdf .= '<div class="entry">';
        $htmlToPdf .= the_content();
        $htmlToPdf .= '</div><!-- end entry -->';
        $htmlToPdf .= '</div><!-- end post -->';
    }
}
echo $htmlToPdf;
?>

Answer 2

I'll use JS/jQuery to get the current page source and send it to your php script (the one who generates PDF) :

$('.yourButton').click(function(e){
   e.preventDefault();
   var dataToSend = document.documentElement.outerHTML;
   $.post('/path/to/your/DOMPDFfile.php', {data: dataToSend});
   window.open('path/to/the/generated.pdf');
});

Then your DOMPDF file :

$htmlToPdf = $_POST['data']; ;

$dompdf = new DOMPDF(); 
$dompdf->load_html( $htmlToPdf );
$dompdf->render();
$dompdf->stream("sample.pdf");

Note that it use a jQuery AJAX method.