[.NET 3.5+] RtfBuilder (Build Custom RTF Strings Similar To StringBuilder)

[ForumAccount]

The picture and code should be pretty self-explanatory. For this to work you will need to add a reference to the .dll that gets compiled from the attached project. The .dll namespace is "System.Text.Rtf" and all the types are contained in there. I am OCD about namespaces and how references appear in the IDE so I try to always extend an existing Windows namespace so it looks nice .

I will not help you if you post that it simply "doesn't work".

This is the code that produces the example:

Imports System.Text.Rtf

Public Class Form1

    Private Sub demoButton_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
                                 ByVal e As System.EventArgs) _
                                 Handles demoButton.Click

        Using builder = New RtfBuilder(MyBase.Font, MyBase.ForeColor)

            With builder
                .Append("This class can help you build ")

                '//new font gets added automatically
                .Append("basic RTF strings.", FontStyle.Bold Or _
                                              FontStyle.Underline Or _
                                              FontStyle.Italic)
                .AppendLine(2)
                .AppendLine("This class has been fully documented and is" & _
                            " built using the StringBuilder as a template.")
                .AppendLine()

                '//new font and color gets added automatically
                .AppendLine("*Notes*", FontStyle.Italic, Color.Blue)

                .AppendLine("   1) the builder does not take references to " & _
                                   "any fonts you add, instead it creates a copy of them")
                .Append("   2) because of this, you should take care to " & _
                                   "always call ")
                .Append("Dispose", FontStyle.Underline, Color.Blue)
                .Append(" or use a ")
                .Append("Using", FontStyle.Underline, Color.Blue)
                .AppendLine(" block.")
                .Append("   3) currently functionality is limited to ")
                .Append("fonts, ", FontStyle.Bold Or FontStyle.Italic Or FontStyle.Underline)
                .Append(" t", Color.Red)
                .Append("e", Color.Orange)
                .Append("x", Color.Yellow)
                .Append("t ", Color.Green)
                .Append("c", Color.Blue)
                .Append("o", Color.Indigo)
                .Append("l", Color.Violet)
                .Append("o", Color.Brown)
                .Append("r", Color.Gray)
                .Append(", and ")
                .Append("text highlighting", FontStyle.Regular, SystemColors.ControlText, _
                        Color.White, Color.Yellow)
                .AppendLine(".")
                .AppendLine(2)
                .AppendLine("Some of the methods include:")

                Dim blue = .Header.Colors.IndexOf(Color.Blue)

                '//if you know a bit about how RTF works, you can add specific RTF
                .AppendRtf("    \ul\cf{0}Append\par\ulnone", blue)
                .AppendRtf("    \ul\cf{0}AppendFormat\par\ulnone", blue)
                .AppendRtf("    \ul\cf{0}AppendLine\par\ulnone", blue)
                .AppendRtf("    \ul\cf{0}AppendRtf\par\ulnone", blue)

                .AppendLine()
                .Append("Obviously, these are not the ")
                .Append("only", FontStyle.Bold)
                .Append(" available methods.")
            End With

            Me.RichTextBox1.Rtf = builder.ToString()
        End Using

    End Sub

End Class

Any decent RTF parser should be able to convert the outputted RTF to the same as the above. All of the code is fully documented. The builder is designed to use the Western European code page and uses the ANSI specification. If you want to learn about RTF and how the document and control words work, look here.

If you want to append specific RTF use the AppendRtf method, otherwise, the other methods will escape the special characters.

Any problems let me know.

[formlesstree4]

...whoa...it looks like you've been busy! Great little codebank addition!

[ForumAccount]

...whoa...it looks like you've been busy! Great little codebank addition!

Thanks!

[NickThissen]

This looks very useful! I don't have any use for it at the moment but I'll keep it in mind if I ever do need to use RTF
Good coding too, kept to common coding standards, very easy to read, useful XML comments and a LOT of overloads for all of the Append methods, great job!

[minitech]

That looks great! Nice work, and I especially like the namespace

(I'll definitely rate you for it when I can.)