htmltopdf

Small service for converting html to pdf.

Description

This service is a unix daemon that provides an API through the methods of the HTTP/1.1 protocol. The daemon uses the fork model to process requests. To convert html to pdf, wkhtmltopdf is used.

Documentation

Detailed API documentation is provided here in the TiddlyWiki format.

Install

The installation is described for Centos 7. There should be no problems in other distributions, you just need to replace the package names.

On the server, actions are performed sequentially on the command line from the root user, unless otherwise specified.

adding an epel repository

yum -y install epel-release

installing dependencies

yum -y install perl wget liberation-serif-fonts ghostscript
yum -y install perl-parent perl-Net-Server perl-Plack \
  perl-Pod-Usage perl-Log-Dispatch perl-Archive-Zip perl-File-Temp perl-Capture-Tiny \
  perl-Image-ExifTool perl-Config-Tiny

installing the wkhtmltopdf package from the official website

yum -y install https://github.com/wkhtmltopdf/packaging/releases/download/0.12.6-1/wkhtmltox-0.12.6-1.centos7.x86_64.rpm

creating a user from whom the API daemon will work

useradd -r -c "api conversion html to pdf" -d /opt/htmltopdf -m -s /sbin/nologin htmltopdf

getting the source code of the daemon (focus on the current release)

wget -O /tmp/htmltopdf_3.3.0.tar.gz https://github.com/krpsh123/htmltopdf/archive/refs/tags/3.3.0.tar.gz

unpacking the source code

tar -xvzf /tmp/htmltopdf_3.3.0.tar.gz --strip=1 -C /opt/htmltopdf

creating a file for storing authorization tokens on our API: /opt/htmltopdf/api/acl.conf

# each token on a separate line
# example:
# bea606df1a111f5eed3d2b88eba30bcb
# 56fe5d5ee5abaf9934227091a6b32ab5
# ...
#
# the token can be obtained by the command:
# echo -n `date '+%a, %d %b %Y %T %z %N'` | md5sum | awk '{print $1}'
#

# Horns and Hooves branch
a02655d46dd0f2160529acaccd4dbf9

setting the file owner

chown -R htmltopdf.htmltopdf /opt/htmltopdf

enabling log rotation

cat /opt/htmltopdf/htmltopdf.logrotate > /etc/logrotate.d/htmltopdf

enabling auto start and launching the daemon

cat /opt/htmltopdf/htmltopdf.service > /etc/systemd/system/htmltopdf.service
systemctl enable htmltopdf && systemctl start htmltopdf

Docker

getting the source code of the daemon (focus on the current release)

wget -O /tmp/htmltopdf_3.3.0.tar.gz https://github.com/krpsh123/htmltopdf/archive/refs/tags/3.3.0.tar.gz

unpacking the source code

tar -xvzf /tmp/htmltopdf_3.3.0.tar.gz -C /tmp

building a docker image

cd /tmp/htmltopdf-3.3.0/docker
docker build -t htmltopdf:3.3.0 .

creating directories for a container

mkdir -p /opt/htmltopdf_docker/{log,unzipping}

creating a file for storing authorization tokens on our API: /opt/htmltopdf_docker/acl.conf

# each token on a separate line
# example:
# bea606df1a111f5eed3d2b88eba30bcb
# 56fe5d5ee5abaf9934227091a6b32ab5
# ...
#
# the token can be obtained by the command:
# echo -n `date '+%a, %d %b %Y %T %z %N'` | md5sum | awk '{print $1}'
#

# Horns and Hooves branch
a02655d46dd0f2160529acaccd4dbf9

enabling log rotation

cat /tmp/htmltopdf-3.3.0/docker/htmltopdf.logrotate > /etc/logrotate.d/htmltopdf_docker

launch

docker run \
  --name htmltopdf \
  --net host \
  --detach \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  --volume /etc/localtime:/etc/localtime:ro \
  --volume /opt/htmltopdf_docker/log:/opt/htmltopdf/api/log \
  --volume /opt/htmltopdf_docker/unzipping:/opt/htmltopdf/api/unzipping \
  --volume /opt/htmltopdf_docker/acl.conf:/opt/htmltopdf/api/acl.conf \
  htmltopdf:3.3.0

Infrastructure as code

The environment variable TF_VAR_htmltopdf_version specifies the htmltopdf version to installed.

creating an AWS instance

cd iac/terraform
terraform init
export TF_VAR_htmltopdf_version=3.3.0 && terraform apply

get the ip address of instance

cd iac/ansible
terraform -chdir=../terraform/ output -raw instance_public_ip_addr

in the inventory file "iac/ansible/hosts" change the variable ansible_host and run playbook

cd iac/ansible
export TF_VAR_htmltopdf_version=3.3.0 && ansible-playbook playbook.yml

after successful installation, the service will be available at the url http://instance_public_ip_addr/htmltopdf