ITextsharp Base64 Embedded Image In Header Not Parsing/showing

Background: I have an editor where I can edit the header and footer of a document in HTML and then merge them into the main document. Base64 Embedded images work perfectly within t

Solution 1:

So i figured out the answer to this. Pipeline processing for the main document did not apply to the writers that built the headers and footers.

I had to setup the tagprocessors, cssresolvers, fonts and pipelines within the pageevent as well. Once this was done, the images were processed and bytes of the processed images were applied to the main document on every pageevent (or pageend)

so my code became

If Me.UsesHeader Then
            headerElements = New ElementList() 'XMLWorkerHelper.ParseToElementList(Me.HeaderHTML, Nothing)
            headerTable = SetTable(headerElements, Me.HeaderHTML)
            CalculatedHeaderHeight = headerTable.Rows(0).MaxHeights
        End If

        If Me.UsesFooter Then
            footerElements = New ElementList() 'XMLWorkerHelper.ParseToElementList(Me.HeaderHTML, Nothing)
            footerTable = SetTable(footerElements, Me.FooterHTML)
            CalculatedFooterHeight = footerTable.Rows(0).MaxHeights
        End If

where footerElements and headerElements are of type ElementList and the SetTable function is :

Public Function SetTable(ByVal elements As ElementList, ByVal htmlcode As String) As PdfPTable

        Dim tagProcessors As DefaultTagProcessorFactory = CType(Tags.GetHtmlTagProcessorFactory(), DefaultTagProcessorFactory)
        tagProcessors.RemoveProcessor(HTML.Tag.IMG) ' remove the default processor
        tagProcessors.AddProcessor(HTML.Tag.IMG, New CustomImageTagProcessor()) ' use our new processor

        Dim cssResolver As ICSSResolver = XMLWorkerHelper.GetInstance().GetDefaultCssResolver(True)
        cssResolver.AddCssFile(Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "assets/css/pdf.css"), True)

        'Setup Fonts
        Dim xmlFontProvider As XMLWorkerFontProvider = New XMLWorkerFontProvider(XMLWorkerFontProvider.DONTLOOKFORFONTS)
        xmlFontProvider.RegisterDirectory(Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "assets/fonts/"))

        Dim cssAppliers As CssAppliers = New CssAppliersImpl(xmlFontProvider)

        Dim htmlContext As HtmlPipelineContext = New HtmlPipelineContext(cssAppliers)
        htmlContext.SetAcceptUnknown(True)
        htmlContext.SetTagFactory(tagProcessors)

        Dim pdf As ElementHandlerPipeline = New ElementHandlerPipeline(elements, Nothing)
        Dim htmlp As HtmlPipeline = New HtmlPipeline(htmlContext, pdf)
        Dim css As CssResolverPipeline = New CssResolverPipeline(cssResolver, htmlp)

        Dim worker As XMLWorker = New XMLWorker(css, True)
        Dim p As XMLParser = New XMLParser(worker)

        'Dim holderTable As New PdfPTable({1})
        Dim holderTable As PdfPTable = New PdfPTable({1})

        holderTable.HorizontalAlignment = Element.ALIGN_LEFT

        Dim holderCell As New PdfPCell()
        holderCell.Padding = 0
        holderCell.UseBorderPadding = False
        holderCell.Border = 0

        p.Parse(New MemoryStream(System.Text.Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(htmlcode)))

        For Each el As IElement In elements
            holderCell.AddElement(el)
        Next

        Dim holderRow As New PdfPRow({holderCell})
        holderTable.Rows.Add(holderRow)
        holderTable.WidthPercentage = 100

        Return holderTable

    End Function

And this solved my problem