PDFCrowd Blog

Product updates, tips & tricks

New:

Fixes:

  • Python API client: correct handling of custom string classes, e.g. SafeText in Django.
  • Converter: using the 'pdfcrowd-remove' and 'pdfcrowd-hide' CSS classes with the setElementToConvert() method works correctly now.
  • Mobile friendly web.
  • The online conversion form offers more customization settings.
  • Added example integrations of our API with several web frameworks.
  • API client libraries:
    • .NET client is now available on NuGet.
    • Node.js: enhanced error reporting in default handlers.
    • PHP: autodetect availability of file_get_contents and cURL.

Overview

The Pdfcrowd API v2 is the new generation of our API. It is not 100% backward compatible but the changes are mostly syntactic and the migration from API v1 should be straightforward.

If you want to switch your current API v1 plan to API v2, please follow these steps:

  1. Activate the free API v2 trial in your account page.
  2. Follow the instructions below and migrate your API v1 implementation to API v2.
  3. If the API v2 works to your satisfaction, choose from our API v2 plans.
  4. If you no longer need the API v1 implementation, you can cancel the API v1 plan.

After 8 months in Beta, the new Pdfcrowd API is ready for your production workloads. Thanks to everyone who provided feedback!

The API v2 brings a lot of improvements and solves many issues present in the API v1. It introduces minor backward incompatible changes but the migration from the API v1 should be straightforward.

The API v1 will continue to work for accounts that were opened before introducing the API v2. However, it will no longer receive any updates.

What's new in the API v2?

  • Faithful conversions. The API implements the latest HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript specifications.
  • No downtime. The API is highly available with automatic capacity scaling and failover. It is hosted in the Google Cloud Platform.
  • In addition to HTML to PDF, the new API enables these conversions:
    • HTML to Image
    • PDF to PDF
    • Image to PDF
    • Image to Image
  • New features:
    • Linearized PDFs for fast web view.
    • Post-load DOM manipulation via custom JavaScript (remove, add and modify elements).
    • An option to specify a delay to wait before printing if the page loads dynamic content.
    • An option to send session specific information via cookies.
    • An option to print only a part of the HTML document.
    • Multi-page watermarks and backgrounds to allow to fill in scanned PDF forms.
    • Intuitive HTML zoom.
    • Detailed conversion logs that can help with conversion troubleshooting.
    • Exportable conversion statistics.
    • Concurrent conversions.
    • Support for modern JavaScript charting libraries (Google Charts, Highcharts, etc.)
    • Improved remote font support (Google Fonts, Typekit, etc.)
    • CJK languages and complex scripts (Arabic alphabet, Brahmic scripts).