Provided by: libmsoffice-word-html-writer-perl_1.02-1_all bug

NAME

       MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer - Writing documents for MsWord in HTML format

SYNOPSIS

         use MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer;
         my $doc = MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer->new(
           title        => "My new doc",
           WordDocument => {View => 'Print'},
         );

         $doc->write("<p>hello, world</p>",
                     $doc->page_break,
                     "<p>hello from another page</p>");

         $doc->create_section(
           page => {size         => "21.0cm 29.7cm",
                    margin       => "1.2cm 2.4cm 2.3cm 2.4cm",
                    page_numbers => 50, # initial page number within this section
                   },
           header => sprintf("Section 2, page %s of %s",
                                         $doc->field('PAGE'),
                                         $doc->field('NUMPAGES')),
           footer => sprintf("printed at %s",
                                         $doc->field('PRINTDATE')),
           new_page => 1, # or 'left', or 'right'
         );
         $doc->write("this is the second section, look at header/footer");

         $doc->attach("my_image.gif", $path_to_my_image);
         $doc->write("<img src='files/my_image.gif'>");

         $doc->save_as("/path/to/some/file");

DESCRIPTION

   Goal
       The present module is one way to programatically generate documents targeted for Microsoft
       Word (MsWord). It doesn't need MsWord to be installed, and doesn't even require a Win32
       machine (which is why it is not in the "Win32" namespace).

   MsWord and HTML
       MsWord can read documents encoded in old native binary format, in Rich Text Format (RTF),
       in XML (either ODF or OOXML), or -- maybe this is less known -- in HTML, with some special
       markup for pagination and other MsWord-specific features. Such HTML documents are often in
       several parts, because attachments like images or headers/footers need to be in separate
       files; however, since it is more convenient to carry all data in a single file, MsWord
       also supports the "MHTML" format (or "MHT" for short), i.e. an encapsulation of a whole
       HTML tree into a single file encoded in MIME multipart format. This format can be
       generated interactively from MsWord by calling the "SaveAs" menu and choosing the .mht
       extension.

       Documents saved with a .mht extension will not directly reopen in MsWord : when clicking
       on such documents, Windows chooses Internet Explorer as the default display program.
       However, these documents can be simply renamed with a .doc extension, and will then open
       directly in MsWord.  By the way, the same can be done with XML or RTF documents.  That is
       to say, MsWord is able to recognize the internal format of a file, without any dependency
       on the filename.

   Features of the module
       "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer" helps you to programatically generate MsWord documents in
       MHT format. The advantage of this technique is that one can rely on standard HTML
       mechanisms for layout control, such as styles, tables, divs, etc. Of course this markup
       can be produced using your favorite HTML templating module; the added value of
       "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer" is to help building the MIME multipart file, and provide
       some abstractions for representing MsWord-specific features (headers, footers, fields,
       etc.).

   Advantages of MHT format
       The MHT format is probably the most convenient way for programmatic document generation,
       because

       •   unlike Excel, MsWord native binary format (used in versions up to 2003) is unpublished
           and therefore cannot be generated without the MsWord executable.

       •   remote control of the MsWord program through an OLE connection, as in
           Win32::Word::Writer, requires a local installation of Microsoft Office, and is not
           well suited for server-side generation because the MsWord program might hang or might
           open dialog boxes that require user input.

       •   generation of documents in RTF is possible, but authoring the models requires deep
           knowledge of the RTF structure --- see RTF::Writer.

       •   authoring models in XML also requires deep knowledge of the XML structure.

           Instead of working directly at the XML level, one could use the OpenOffice::OODoc
           distribution on CPAN, which provides programmatic access to the "ODF" XML format used
           by OpenOffice. MsWord is able to read and produce such ODF files, but this is not
           fully satisfactory because in that mode many MsWord features are disabled or
           restricted.

           The XML format used by MsWord is called "OOXML"; to my knowledge, there is no CPAN
           module providing an API to this format.

       By contrast, "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer" allows you to produce documents even with
       little knowledge of MsWord.  Besides, since the content is in HTML, it can be assembled
       with any HTML tool, and therefore also requires little knowledge of Perl.

       One word of warning, however : opening MHT documents in MsWord is a bit slower than native
       binary or RTF documents, because MsWord needs to parse the HTML, compute the layout and
       convert it into its internal representation.  Therefore MHT format is not recommended for
       very large documents.

   Usage
       "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer" is used in production at Geneva courts of law, for
       generating thousands of documents per day, from hundreds of models, with an architecture
       of reusable document parts implemented by Template Toolkit mechanisms (macros, blocks and
       views).

METHODS

       General convention : method names that start with a verb may change the internal state of
       the writer object (for example "write", "create_section"); method names that are nouns
       return data without modifying the internal state (for example "field", "content",
       page_break).

   new
           my $doc = MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer->new(%params);

       Creates a new writer object. Optional parameters are :

       title
           document title

       head
           any HTML declarations you may want to include in the "head" part of the generated
           document (for example inline CSS styles or links to attached stylesheets).

       hf_head
           any HTML declarations you may want to include in the "head" part of the headers and
           footers HTML document (MsWord requires headers and footers to be specified as "div"s
           in a separate HTML document).

       WordDocument
           a hashref of options to include as an XML island in the HTML "head", corresponding to
           various options in the MsWord "Tools/Options" panel. These will be included in a XML
           element named "<w:WordDocument>", and all children elements will be automatically
           prefixed by "w:". The hashref may contain nested hashrefs, such as

             WordDocument => { View => 'Print',
                               Compatibility => {DoNotExpandShiftReturn => "",
                                                 BreakWrappedTables     => ""} }

           Names and values of options must be found from the Microsoft documentation, or from
           reverse engineering of HTML files generated by MsWord.

       Parameters may also be passed as a hashref instead of a hash.

   write
         $doc->write("<p>hello, world</p>");

       Adds some HTML into the document body.

   attach
         $doc->attach($localname, $filename);
         $doc->attach($localname, "<", \$content);
         $doc->attach($localname, "<&", $filehandle);

       Adds an attachment into the document; the attachment will be encoded as a MIME part and
       will be accessible under "files/$localname".

       The remaining arguments to "attach" specify the source of the attachment; they are
       directly passed to "open" in perlfunc and therefore have the same API flexibility : you
       can specify a filename, a reference to a memory variable, a reference to another
       filehandle, etc.

   create_section
         $doc->create_section(
           page => {size   => "21.0cm 29.7cm",
                    margin => "1.2cm 2.4cm 2.3cm 2.4cm"},
           header => sprintf("Section 2, page %s of %s",
                                         $doc->field('PAGE'),
                                         $doc->field('NUMPAGES')),
           footer => sprintf("printed at %s",
                                         $doc->field('PRINTDATE')),
           new_page => 1, # or 'left', or 'right'
         );

       Opens a new section within the document (or, if this is called before any "write", setups
       pagination parameters for the first section).  Subsequent calls to the "write" method will
       add content to that section, until the next "create_section" call.

       Pagination parameters are all optional and may be given either as a hash or as a hashref;
       accepted parameters are :

       page
           Hashref of CSS page styles, such as :

           size
               Paper size (for example "21cm 29.7cm")

           margin
               Margins (top right bottom left).

           header_margin
               Margin for header

           footer_margin
               Margin for footer

           page_numbers
               Initial value for page numbers within this section

           paper_source
               Parameters for paper source within this section (values for these parameters must
               be reverse engineered from MsWord HTML output)

       header
           Header content (in HTML)

       first_header
           Header content for the first page of that section.

       footer
           Footer content (in HTML).

       first_footer
           Footer content for the first page.

       new_page
           If true, a page break will be inserted before the new section.  If the argument is the
           word 'left' or 'right', one or two page breaks will be inserted so that the next page
           is formatted as a left (right) page.

   save_as
         $doc->save_as("/path/to/some/file");

       Generates the MIME document and saves it at the given location.  If no extension is
       present, file extension .doc will be added by default to the filename.

   content
       Returns the whole MIME-encoded document as a single string; this is used internally by the
       "save_as" method.  Direct call is useful if you don't want to save the document into a
       file, but want to do something else like embedding it in a message or a ZIP file, or
       returning it as an HTTP response.

   page_break
         my $html = $doc->page_break;
         my $html = $doc->page_break('left');
         my $html = $doc->page_break('right');

       Returns HTML markup for encoding a page break.  If an argument 'left' or 'right' is given,
       one or two page breaks will be inserted so that the next page is formatted as a left
       (right) page.

   tab
         my $html = $doc->tab($n_tabs);

       Returns HTML markup for encoding one or several tabs. If $n_tab is omitted, it defaults to
       1.

   field
         my $html = $doc->field($fieldname, $args, $content);

       Returns HTML markup for a MsWord field.

       Optional $args is a string with arguments or flags for the field. See MsWord help
       documentation for the list of field names and their associated arguments or flags.

       Optional $content is the initial displayed content for the field (because unfortunately
       MsWord does not immediately compute the field content when opening the document; users
       will have to explicitly request to update all fields, by selecting the whole document and
       then hitting the F9 key).

       Here are some examples :

         my $header = sprintf "%s of %s", $doc->field('PAGE'),
                                          $doc->field('NUMPAGES');
         my $footer = sprintf "created at %s, printed at %s",
                        doc->field(CREATEDATE => '\\@ "d MM yyyy"'),
                        doc->field(PRINTDATE  => '\\@ "dddd d MMMM yyyy" \\* Upper');
         my $quoted = $doc->field('QUOTE', '"hello, world"', 'hello, world');

   quote
         my $html = $doc->quote($text);

       Shortcut to produce a QUOTE field (see last field example just above).

AUTHORING MHT DOCUMENTS

   HTML for MsWord
       MsWord does not support the full HTML and CSS standard, so authoring MHT documents
       requires some trial and error.  Basic divs, spans, paragraphs and tables, are reasonably
       supported, together with their common CSS properties; but fancier features  like floats,
       absolute positioning, etc. may yield some surprises.

       To specify widths and heights, you will get better results by using CSS properties rather
       than attributes of the HTML table model.

       In case of difficulties for implementing specific features, try to see what MsWord does
       with that feature when saving a document in HTML format (plain HTM, not MHT!).  The
       generated HTML is quite verbose, but after eliminating unnecessary tags one can sometimes
       figure out which are the key tags (they start with "o:"  or "w:") or the key attributes
       (they start with "mso-") which correspond to the desired functionality.

   Collaboration with the Template Toolkit
       The Template Toolkit (TT for short) is a very helpful tool for generating the HTML.  Below
       are some hints about collaboration between the two modules.

       Client code calls both TT and Word::HTML::Writer

       The first mode is to use the Template Toolkit for generating various document parts, and
       then assemble them into "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer".

         use Template;
         my $tmpl_app = Template->new(%options);
         $tmpl_app->process("doctmpl/html_head.tt", \%data, \my $html_head);
         $tmpl_app->process("doctmpl/body.tt",      \%data, \my $body);
         $tmpl_app->process("doctmpl/header.tt",    \%data, \my $header);
         $tmpl_app->process("doctmpl/footer.tt",    \%data, \my $footer);

         use MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer;
         my $doc = MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer->new(
           title  => $data{title},
           head   => $html_head,
         );
         $doc->create_section(
           header => $header,
           footer => $footer,
         );
         $doc->write($body);
         $doc->save_as("/path/to/some/file");

       This architecture is straightforward, but various document parts are split into several
       templates, which might be inconvenient when maintaining a large body of document
       templates.

       HTML parts as blocks in a single template

       Document parts might also be encoded as blocks within one single template :

         [% BLOCK html_head %]
         <style>...CSS...</style>
         [% END; # BLOCK html_head %]

         [% BLOCK body %]
           Hello, world
         [% END; # BLOCK body %]

         etc.

       Then the client code calls each block in turn to gather the various parts :

         use Template::Context;
         my $tmpl_ctxt = Template::Context->new(%options);
         my $tmpl      = $tmpl_ctxt->template("doctmpl/all_blocks.tt");
         my $html_head = $tmpl_ctxt->process($tmpl->blocks->{html_head}, \%data);
         my $body      = $tmpl_ctxt->process($tmpl->blocks->{body},      \%data);
         my $header    = $tmpl_ctxt->process($tmpl->blocks->{header},    \%data);
         my $footer    = $tmpl_ctxt->process($tmpl->blocks->{footer},    \%data);

         # assemble into MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer, same as before

       Template toolkit calls MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer

       Now let's look at a different architecture: the client code calls the Template toolkit,
       which in turn calls "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer".

       The most common way to call modules from TT is to use a TT plugin; but since there is
       currently no TT plugin for "MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer", we will just tell TT that
       templates can load regular Perl modules, by turning on the "LOAD_PERL" option.

       The client code looks like any other TT application; but the output of the process method
       is a fully-fledged MHT document, instead of plain HTML.

         use Template;
         my $tmpl_app = Template->new(LOAD_PERL => 1, %other_options);
         $tmpl_app->process("doc_template.tt", \%data, \my $msword_doc);

       Within "doc_template.tt", we have

         [% # main entry point

            # gather various parts
            SET html_head = PROCESS html_head;
            SET header    = PROCESS header;
            SET footer    = PROCESS footer;
            SET body      = PROCESS body;

            # create Word::HTML::Writer object
            USE msword = MsOffice.Word.HTML.Writer(head=html_head);

            # setup section format
            CALL msword.create_section(
               page => {size          => "21.0cm 29.7cm",
                        margin        => "1cm 2.5cm 1cm 2.5cm",
                        header_margin => "1cm",
                        footer_margin => "0cm",},
               header => header,
               footer => footer
             );

             # write the body
            CALL msword.write(body);

            # return the MIME-encoded MsWord document
            msword.content();  %]

         [% BLOCK html_head %]
         ...

       Inheritance through TT views

       The above architecture can be refined one step further, by using TT views to encapsulate
       documents. Views have an inheritance mechanism, so it becomes possible to define families
       of document templates, that inherit properties or methods from common ancestors. Let us
       start with generic_letter.tt2, a generic letter template :

         [% VIEW generic_letter
               title="Generic letter template";

              BLOCK main;
                USE msword = MsOffice.Word.HTML.Writer(
                   title => view.title,
                   head  => view.html_head(),
                );
                view.write_body();
                msword.content();
              END; # BLOCK main

              BLOCK write_body;
                CALL msword.create_section(
                   page   => {size          => "21.0cm 29.7cm",
                              margin        => "1cm 2.5cm 1cm 2.5cm"},
                   header => view.header(),
                   footer => view.footer()
                );
                CALL msword.write(view.body());
              END; # BLOCK write_body

              BLOCK body;
                view.letter_head();
                view.letter_body();
              END; # BLOCK body

              BLOCK letter_body; %]
               Generic letter body; please override BLOCK letter_body in subviews
           [% END; # BLOCK letter_body;

              # ... other blocks for header, footer, letter_head, etc.

            END; # VIEW generic_letter

         [% # call main() method if this templated was loaded directly
            letter.main() UNLESS component.caller %]

       This is quite similar to an object-oriented class : assignments within the view are like
       object attributes (i.e. the "title" variable), and blocks within the view are like
       methods.

       After the end of the view, we call the "main" method, but only if that view was called
       directly from client code.  If the view is inherited, as displayed below, then the call to
       "main" will be from the subview.

       Now we can define a specific letter template that inherits from the generic letter and
       overrides the "letter_body" block :

         [% PROCESS generic_letter.tt2; # loads the parent view

            VIEW advertisement;

              BLOCK letter_body; %]

                <p>Dear [% receiver.name %],</p>
                <p>You have won a wonderful [% article %].
                   Just call us at [% sender.phone %].</p>
                <p>Best regards,</p>
                [% view.signature(name => sender.name ) %]

         [%   END; # BLOCK letter_body
            END; # VIEW advertisement

            advertisement.main() UNLESS component.caller %]

TO DO

       Many features could be added; for example:

         - link same header/footers across several sections
         - multiple columns
         - watermarks (I tried hard to reverse engineer MsWord behaviour,
           but it still doesn't work ... couldn't figure out all details
           of VML markup)

       Contributions welcome!

AUTHOR

       Laurent Dami, "<laurent DOT dami AT etat DOT geneve DOT ch>"

BUGS

       Please report any bugs or feature requests to "bug-win32-word-html-writer at rt.cpan.org",
       or through the web interface at
       <http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/ReportBug.html?Queue=MsOffice-Word-HTML-Writer>.  I will be
       notified, and then you'll automatically be notified of progress on your bug as I make
       changes.

SUPPORT

       You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.

           perldoc MsOffice::Word::HTML::Writer

       You can also look for information at:

       •   AnnoCPAN: Annotated CPAN documentation

           <http://annocpan.org/dist/MsOffice-Word-HTML-Writer>

       •   CPAN Ratings

           <http://cpanratings.perl.org/d/MsOffice-Word-HTML-Writer>

       •   RT: CPAN's request tracker

           <http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/Bugs.html?Dist=MsOffice-Word-HTML-Writer>

       •   Search CPAN

           <http://search.cpan.org/dist/MsOffice-Word-HTML-Writer>

SEE ALSO

       Win32::Word::Writer, RTF::Writer, Spreadsheet::WriteExcel, OpenOffice::OODoc.

COPYRIGHT & LICENSE

       Copyright 2009 Laurent Dami, all rights reserved.

       This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same
       terms as Perl itself.