Web Page to Image File

Problem/Question/Abstract:

It was asked how one might save a webpage to disk as a image file from IE. I did not see an obvious way to do with with IE below is a way to get the URL from IE and then open it with PBear's THTMLViewer and save it as a image file.

Answer:

This is written in Delphi 5 but with a little modification, most if not all of it could be used in Delphi 3 or higher, Kylix and maybe C++Builder.

First of all, you need Dave Baldwin's PBear THTMLView or THTMLLite.  It is available here:

http://www.pbear.com/htmlviewers.html

Get the Indy demo application since it supports actually downloading web pages and images from the web via http.

Open up the Demo application and add two buttons to the tool bar.  The caption on the first is "DDE URL" and the second is "As Image".  For the click event of the "DDE URL" button should look like this:

procedure THTTPForm.btnDDEURLClick(Sender: TObject);
begin
  UrlComboBox.Text := GetDDEUrl; // get the URL
  GetButtonClick(nil); // Navigate to the URL
end;

GetDDEUrl calls the following function which you will need to above the method:

// using DDE gets the URL from the active browser

function GetDDEUrl: string;
  function GetUrl(sService: string): string;
  var
    Dde: TDdeClientConv;
  begin
    Dde := TDdeClientConv.Create(nil);
    try
      Dde.ConnectMode := ddeManual;
      Dde.SetLink(sService, 'WWW_GetWindowInfo');
      if Dde.OpenLink then
      try
        Result := string(Dde.RequestData('0xFFFFFFFF'));
        if Length(Result) > 0 then
        begin // trim up the results
          Delete(Result, 1, 1);
          Delete(Result, Pos('",', Result), Length(Result));
        end;
      finally
        Dde.CloseLink;
      end;
    finally
      dde.Free;
    end;
  end;
begin
  // try a few browsers until we get one
  Result := GetUrl('Netscape');
  if Result = '' then
    Result := GetUrl('IExplore');
  if Result = '' then
    Result := GetUrl('Opera');
  if Result = '' then
    Result := GetUrl('Mosaic');
end;

The click event of the As Image button should look like this:

procedure THTTPForm.btnSaveImageClick(Sender: TObject);
var
  img: TBitmap;
{$IFDEF GIF}
  gif: TGifImage;
{$ENDIF}
  Jpg: TJPEGImage;
  ext: string;
begin
  if SavePictureDialog.Execute then
  begin
    Img := TBitmap.Create;
    try
      img.Height := FrameBrowser.ClientHeight;
      img.Width := FrameBrowser.ClientWidth;
      img.Canvas.Brush := FrameBrowser.Brush;
      img.Canvas.FillRect(FrameBrowser.ClientRect);
      img.Canvas.Lock;
      FrameBrowser.PaintTo(img.Canvas.Handle, 0, 0);
      img.Canvas.Unlock;
      ext := UpperCase(ExtractFileExt(SavePictureDialog.FileName));
      if SameText(ext, '.JPEG') or SameText(ext, '.JPG') then
      begin
        Jpg := TJPEGImage.Create;
        try
          Jpg.CompressionQuality := 100;
          Jpg.Assign(img);
          Jpg.SaveToFile(SavePictureDialog.FileName);
        finally
          Jpg.Free;
        end;
      end
      else
{$IFDEF GIF}if SameText(ext, '.GIF') then
        begin
          gif := TGIFImage.Create;
          try
            gif.Assign(img);
            gif.SaveToFile(SavePictureDialog.FileName);
          finally
            gif.Free;
          end;
        end
        else
{$ENDIF}
          img.SaveToFile(SavePictureDialog.FileName);
    finally
      img.free;
    end;
  end;
end;

You will need to add "Jpeg, DDEMan, RXGif" to the uses clause of the unit you are in.  If you don't have RXLib ( http://einstein.fet.uni-hannover.de/~od/rxlib/ ) then you will need to use some other GIF library.  If you don't have a Gif library then add the line {$UNDEF GIF} at the top of the unit.  If you do have a gif library then add the line {$DEFINE GIF} at the top of the unit.

You will also need to add a TSavePictureDialog named SavePictureDialog.  Set the DefaultExt property to .JPEG or .BMP.  You may also want to clean up the filter to only show supported image formats.

Now run your program.  Click the "DDE URL" button and it will navigate to the page currently open in your active browser.  Then resize the page for maximum efficency and click "As Image" then name the image and save it.  You could modify this to have no user interaction if you like.