INTRODUCTION

This package provides several classes to handle Rtf data. It has been designed to be able to handle files whose contents are too big to fit into memory. This is why you will see a dichotomy among classes :

• Classes whose name starts with RtfString handle in-memory Rtf contents.
• Classes whose name starts with RtfFile handle file-based Rtf contents.

It is up to you to decide whether you will have to handle big files. If you are sure that your Rtf contents will always fit into memory, use the RtfString classes. If you are sure that your files may be bigger than the available memory, use the RtfFile classes. This will add some overhead due to file IO (this can more than double the execution time if you have low performance IO subsystem, but I noticed some systems where the difference between the in-memory and file versions are only a few tenths of milliseconds).

This package currently implements the following classes :

• RtfStringBeautifier and RtfFileBeautifier : pretty-prints Rtf file contents so that you will be able to compare two Rtf files using utilities such as diff or windiff. You will find some help here : help/README.beautifier.md.
• RtfStringParser and RtfFileParser : a generic parser for Rtf contents. It provides a set of Rtf\Token* classes that map to underlying Rtf token types, along with a minimal intelligence that allows you to track certain control word values depending on the current nesting level, as well as handling picture or binary data contents (help/README.parser.md).
• RtfStringTexter and RtfFileTexter : a class that extracts raw text from Rtf contents, with some basic formatting capabilities (help/README.texter.md).
• RtfStringTemplater and RtfFileTemplater : a class that allows you to process Rtf templates containing macro language constructs to generate final output documents, such as you would do for mailings (help/README.templater.md).
• RtfMerger : a class that allows you to merge multiple Rtf documents into a single one (help/README.merger.md). This is the only Rtf-processing class of this package that does not inherit from RtfDocument.

DEPENDENCIES

All the classes in this package rely on the SearchableFile class (http://www.phpclasses.org/package/9697-PHP-Process-text-files-too-big-to-fit-into-memory.html) that allows to search for contents in files too big to fit into memory. A copy of this class is present in this package for your convenience but note that it may not be the latest release.

All the main class files in this package (RtfBeautifier.phpclass, RtfParser.phpclass and RtfTexter.phpclass) also inherit from the RtfDocument class (RtfDocument.phpclass).

REFERENCES

This package depends on the following package, SearchableFile, which allows you to search text data from files too big to fit into memory :

http://www.phpclasses.org/package/9697-PHP-Process-text-files-too-big-to-fit-into-memory.html

For convenience reasons, the SearchableFile.phpclass file has been included here, but note that this may not be the latest version.

The latest Microsoft Rtf format specifications can be downloaded here :

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=10725

But you can also consult the excellent book "Rtf pocket guide" from Sean M. Burke :

https://books.google.fr/books/about/RTF_Pocket_Guide.html?id=4N_lVcyyhqMC&redir_esc=y

or visit his page :

http://interglacial.com/~sburke/

SUPPORT

If you have problems using one of the RtfTools class, or get strange results, please feel free to contact me at the following address :

christian.vigh@wuthering-bytes.com

Don't hesitate to send me the Rtf documents that caused the failure as attachments in your email ; I will be happy to answer you !