DeckTape

DeckTape is a high-quality PDF exporter for HTML5 presentation frameworks. It supports all the features that you would expect from a PDF exporter like font embedding, selectable text, hyperlinks, SVG graphics objects, file compression.

DeckTape is built on top of PhantomJS which relies on Qt WebKit for laying out and rendering Web pages and provides a headless WebKit scriptable with a JavaScript API.

DeckTape currently supports the CSSS, deck.js, DZSlides, flowtime.js, HTML Slidy, impress.js, remark.js, reveal.js and Shower presentation frameworks out-of-the-box. Besides, DeckTape provides a generic command that emulates the end-user interaction and that can be used to convert presentations from virtually any kind of frameworks. That is particularly useful to support HTML presentation frameworks that don't expose any API nor accessible state, like Bespoke.js for example.

DeckTape's plugin-based architecture exposes an extension API so that it is possible to add support for other frameworks or tailored existing plugins to your specific needs.

DeckTape can optionally be used to capture screenshots of your slide decks in various resolutions, similarly to pageres. That can be useful to make sure your presentations are responsive or to create handouts for them.

You can browse some slide deck examples below that have been exported with DeckTape.

Install

1. Clone DeckTape Git repository:

    git clone https://github.com/astefanutti/decktape.git
   

2. Change into the decktape directory:

    cd decktape
   

3. Download PhantomJS executable: DeckTape currently depends on a forked version of PhantomJS. You can get the corresponding binaries for the platforms above:

    # Windows (MSVC 2013), 64-bit, for Windows Vista or later, bundles VC++ Runtime 2013
    curl -L http://astefanutti.github.io/decktape/downloads/phantomjs-msvc2013-win64.exe -o bin\phantomjs.exe
   
    # Mac OS X (Cocoa), 64-bit, for OS X 10.6 or later
    curl -L http://astefanutti.github.io/decktape/downloads/phantomjs-osx-cocoa-x86-64 -o bin/phantomjs
    chmod +x bin/phantomjs
   

   If the executable isn't available for your target platform, see the Build section and follow the instructions.

Usage

Into DeckTape install directory:

bin/phantomjs decktape.js -h

Usage: phantomjs decktape.js [command] <url> <filename> [options]

command      one of: automatic, csss, deck, dzslides, flowtime, generic, impress,
             remark, reveal, shower, slidy
url          URL of the slides deck
filename     Filename of the output PDF file

Options:
   --size                    Size of the slides deck viewport: <width>x<height>  [1280x720]
   --pause                   Duration in milliseconds before each slide is exported  [1000]
   --screenshots             Capture each slide as an image  [false]
   --screenshots-directory   Screenshots output directory  [screenshots]
   --screenshots-size        Screenshots resolution, can be repeated  [--size]
   --screenshots-format      Screenshots image format, one of [jpg, png]  [png]

Iterates over the available plugins, picks the compatible one for presentation
at the specified <url> and uses it to export and write the PDF into the specified <filename>.

Commands

automatic

Iterates over the available plugins, picks the compatible one for presentation at the specified url and uses it to export and write the PDF into the specified filename.

generic

Emulates the end-user interaction by pressing the key with the specified keycode and iterates over the presentation as long as any change to the DOM is detected by observing mutation events to the body element and its subtree. The keycode value must be one of the PhantomJS page event keys and defaults to Right.

Options:
   --keycode                 Key code pressed to navigate to next slide  [Right]

Options

--screenshots

Captures each slide as an image at the screenshots-size resolution, exports it to the screenshots-format image format and writes the output into the screenshots-directory directory. The screenshots-size option can be set multiple times, e.g.:

phantomjs decktape.js --screenshots --screenshots-size=400x300 --screenshots-size=800x600

Build

To build the forked version of PhantomJS whose DeckTape relies on, you have to execute the following commands from the DeckTape install directory:

1. Initialize and check out the phantomjs submodule:

    git submodule update --init
   

2. Change into the phantomjs directory:

    cd phantomjs
   

3. Launch the build script:

    build
   

More information can be found in Compiling PhantomJS from source and in Building Qt 5 from Git.

Plugins

✏️

Examples

The following slide deck examples have been exported using DeckTape:

HTML5 Presentation	Framework	Exported PDF
Beyond Rectangles in Web Design	reveal.js 2.6.2	fowd-nyc-2014.pdf (14MB)
Getting Involved in Open Source	reveal.js 3.0.0	opensource-getting-involved.pdf (0.8MB)
Going Further with CDI	Asciidoctor + DZSlides	going-further-with-cdi.pdf (1.8MB)
Transactions for the REST of us	impress.js 0.5.3	soa-cloud-rest-tcc.pdf (10MB)
Deck.js Modern HTML Presentations	deck.js 1.1.0	deck-js-presentation.pdf (1.1MB)
Flowtime.js Presentation Framework	flowtime.js	flowtime-js-presentation.pdf (7.5MB)
The Official Remark Slideshow	remark.js 0.11.0	remark-js-slideshow.pdf (0.7MB)
HTML Slidy: Slide Shows in HTML and XHTML	HTML Slidy	html-slidy-presentation.pdf (0.5MB)
CSSS: CSS-based SlideShow System	CSSS	csss-sample-slideshow.pdf (13.5MB)
Shower Presentation Engine	Shower	shower-presentation-engine.pdf (0.4MB)
Welcome our new ES5 Overloards	Bespoke.js	new-es5-overloards.pdf (0.1MB)