HtmlToText C Reference Documentation

HtmlToText

Current Version: 9.5.0.97

HTML to plain-text conversion component. The internal conversion process is much more sophisticated than can be accomplished with the simple regular-expression freeware codes found in the Internet. This is more than simply removing HTML tags from an HTML document.

Create/Dispose

HCkHtmlToText instance = CkHtmlToText_Create();
// ...
CkHtmlToText_Dispose(instance);
HCkHtmlToText CkHtmlToText_Create(void);

Creates an instance of the HCkHtmlToText object and returns a handle ("void *" pointer). The handle is passed in the 1st argument for the functions listed on this page.

void CkHtmlToText_Dispose(HCkHtmlToText handle);

Objects created by calling CkHtmlToText_Create must be freed by calling this method. A memory leak occurs if a handle is not disposed by calling this function. Also, any handle returned by a Chilkat "C" function must also be freed by the application by calling the appropriate Dispose method, such as CkHtmlToText_Dispose.

Properties

DebugLogFilePath
void CkHtmlToText_getDebugLogFilePath(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkString retval);
void CkHtmlToText_putDebugLogFilePath(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *newVal);
const char *CkHtmlToText_debugLogFilePath(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);

If set to a file path, causes each Chilkat method or property call to automatically append it's LastErrorText to the specified log file. The information is appended such that if a hang or crash occurs, it is possible to see the context in which the problem occurred, as well as a history of all Chilkat calls up to the point of the problem. The VerboseLogging property can be set to provide more detailed information.

This property is typically used for debugging the rare cases where a Chilkat method call hangs or generates an exception that halts program execution (i.e. crashes). A hang or crash should generally never happen. The typical causes of a hang are:

  1. a timeout related property was set to 0 to explicitly indicate that an infinite timeout is desired,
  2. the hang is actually a hang within an event callback (i.e. it is a hang within the application code), or
  3. there is an internal problem (bug) in the Chilkat code that causes the hang.

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DecodeHtmlEntities
BOOL CkHtmlToText_getDecodeHtmlEntities(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putDecodeHtmlEntities(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, BOOL newVal);

If TRUE, then HTML entities are automatically decoded. For example & is automatically decoded to &. If this property is set to FALSE, then HTML entities are not decoded. The default value is TRUE.

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LastErrorHtml
void CkHtmlToText_getLastErrorHtml(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkString retval);
const char *CkHtmlToText_lastErrorHtml(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);

Provides information in HTML format about the last method/property called. If a method call returns a value indicating failure, or behaves unexpectedly, examine this property to get more information.

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LastErrorText
void CkHtmlToText_getLastErrorText(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkString retval);
const char *CkHtmlToText_lastErrorText(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);

Provides information in plain-text format about the last method/property called. If a method call returns a value indicating failure, or behaves unexpectedly, examine this property to get more information.

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LastErrorXml
void CkHtmlToText_getLastErrorXml(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkString retval);
const char *CkHtmlToText_lastErrorXml(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);

Provides information in XML format about the last method/property called. If a method call returns a value indicating failure, or behaves unexpectedly, examine this property to get more information.

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LastMethodSuccess
BOOL CkHtmlToText_getLastMethodSuccess(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putLastMethodSuccess(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, BOOL newVal);

Indicate whether the last method call succeeded or failed. A value of TRUE indicates success, a value of FALSE indicates failure. This property is automatically set for method calls. It is not modified by property accesses. The property is automatically set to indicate success for the following types of method calls:

  • Any method that returns a string.
  • Any method returning a Chilkat object, binary bytes, or a date/time.
  • Any method returning a standard boolean status value where success = TRUE and failure = FALSE.
  • Any method returning an integer where failure is defined by a return value less than zero.

Note: Methods that do not fit the above requirements will always set this property equal to TRUE. For example, a method that returns no value (such as a "void" in C++) will technically always succeed.

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RightMargin
int CkHtmlToText_getRightMargin(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putRightMargin(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, int newVal);

Used to control wrapping of text. The default value is 80. When the text gets close to this margin, the converter will try to break the line at a SPACE character. Set this property to 0 for no right margin.

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SuppressLinks
BOOL CkHtmlToText_getSuppressLinks(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putSuppressLinks(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, BOOL newVal);

If FALSE, then link URL's are preserved inline. For example, the following HTML fragment:

<p><p>Test <a href="https://www.chilkatsoft.com/">chilkat</a></p>
converts to:
Test chilkat <https://www.chilkatsoft.com/>
If this property is TRUE, the above HTML would convert to:
Test chilkat
The default value of this property is TRUE.

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Utf8
BOOL CkHtmlToText_getUtf8(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putUtf8(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, BOOL newVal);

When set to TRUE, all "const char *" arguments are interpreted as utf-8 strings. If set to FALSE (the default), then "const char *" arguments are interpreted as ANSI strings. Also, when set to TRUE, and Chilkat method returning a "const char *" is returning the utf-8 representation. If set to FALSE, all "const char *" return values are ANSI strings.

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VerboseLogging
BOOL CkHtmlToText_getVerboseLogging(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);
void CkHtmlToText_putVerboseLogging(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, BOOL newVal);

If set to TRUE, then the contents of LastErrorText (or LastErrorXml, or LastErrorHtml) may contain more verbose information. The default value is FALSE. Verbose logging should only be used for debugging. The potentially large quantity of logged information may adversely affect peformance.

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Version
void CkHtmlToText_getVersion(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkString retval);
const char *CkHtmlToText_version(HCkHtmlToText cHandle);

Version of the component/library, such as "9.5.0.94"

More Information and Examples
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Methods

ReadFileToString
BOOL CkHtmlToText_ReadFileToString(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *filename, const char *srcCharset, HCkString outStr);
const char *CkHtmlToText_readFileToString(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *filename, const char *srcCharset);

Convenience method for reading a text file into a string. The character encoding of the text file is specified by srcCharset. Valid values, such as "iso-8895-1" or "utf-8" are listed at: List of Charsets.

Returns TRUE for success, FALSE for failure.

More Information and Examples
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ToText
BOOL CkHtmlToText_ToText(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *html, HCkString outStr);
const char *CkHtmlToText_toText(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *html);

Converts HTML to plain-text.

Returns TRUE for success, FALSE for failure.

More Information and Examples
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ToTextSb
BOOL CkHtmlToText_ToTextSb(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, HCkStringBuilder sb);
Introduced in version 9.5.0.97

Converts the HTML in sb to plain-text.

Returns TRUE for success, FALSE for failure.

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WriteStringToFile
BOOL CkHtmlToText_WriteStringToFile(HCkHtmlToText cHandle, const char *stringToWrite, const char *filename, const char *charset);

Convenience method for saving a string to a file. The character encoding of the output text file is specified by charset (the string is converted to this charset when writing). Valid values, such as "iso-8895-1" or "utf-8" are listed at: List of Charsets.

Returns TRUE for success, FALSE for failure.

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