Implementing UWP PDF Viewer (SfPdfViewerControl)

The Syncfusion SfPdfViewerControl is a native UWP control for viewing, annotating, searching, and printing PDF documents. It uses the Windows rendering engine (Windows.Data.Pdf) by default and supports an optional PDFium renderer.

Security Notice ⚠️

When loading PDFs from untrusted or user-provided sources, always validate hyperlinks and content before allowing navigation. PDFs can contain malicious hyperlinks that may direct users to untrusted websites or perform unintended actions. Always implement hyperlink validation using the HyperlinkPointerPressed event to inspect and authorize navigation targets before allowing them. See references/bookmarks-and-hyperlinks.md for validation code examples.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when you need to:

• View and navigate PDF documents in UWP applications
• Load PDFs from streams, StorageFile objects, or byte arrays
• Add and manage annotations (highlight, underline, strikethrough, ink, shapes, free text, popup, stamp)
• Search and select text within PDF documents
• Navigate pages, bookmarks, and hyperlinks (with proper validation for untrusted sources)
• Print PDF documents with custom quality and preview settings
• Create custom toolbars wired to PDF Viewer commands
• Configure zoom, view modes, scrollbar, and progress ring
• Localize the viewer UI
• Export PDF pages as images or use the PDFium custom renderer

Component Overview

SfPdfViewerControl is a comprehensive PDF viewing and management control for UWP with these capabilities:

• Document Management: Load from PdfLoadedDocument, Stream, or StorageFile (sync and async with CancellationToken); save with annotations; unload and dispose
• Annotations: Text markup (highlight, underline, strikethrough), shape (rectangle, ellipse, line), ink with Windows Ink Canvas support, popup (sticky note), free text, free text callout, and custom stamp annotations
• Text Operation: Text selection with color customization, synchronous and asynchronous text search with next/previous navigation
• Navigation & UI: Page navigation commands, bookmarks, hyperlink handling, zoom/view modes, thumbnail view, separate desktop and mobile toolbar layouts, scrollbar and progress ring customization
• Utilities & Advanced: Export pages as images (GetPage, GetPages, ExportAsImage), vertical/horizontal offset access, PDFium custom renderer via IPdfRenderer interface, page number display

Documentation and Navigation Guide

Getting Started & Setup

📄 Read: references/getting-started.md

• Covers required assemblies, NuGet packages, adding the control via XAML or code, ItemsSource binding, and the DocumentLoaded event
• Explains synchronous and asynchronous loading methods, page count access, saving (Save/SaveAsync), unloading, and disposing

Document Operations

📄 Read: references/viewing-pdf.md

• Describes loading PDFs from PdfLoadedDocument, Stream, and StorageFile objects using both sync and async approaches
• Covers CancellationToken support for async loading, saving with annotations, and viewer unload/dispose patterns

Page Navigation & Viewing

📄 Read: references/page-navigation.md

• Explains programmatic page navigation, built-in navigation commands (FirstPage, LastPage, NextPage, PreviousPage), and XAML command binding
• Covers the PageChanged event, page count, page gap, offset collection, and toggling the page number display

Magnification & View Modes

📄 Read: references/magnification.md

• Covers zoom control via ZoomTo, increase/decrease zoom commands, and view mode options (FitWidth, Normal, OnePage)
• Explains MinimumZoomPercentage, thumbnail view toggle, and reading the current zoom value

Text Search

📄 Read: references/text-operations.md

• Explains synchronous and asynchronous text search, forward/backward result navigation, and SearchNextCommand/SearchPreviousCommand
• Covers GetTextCoordinates for retrieving the page positions of all text matches

Text Selection

📄 Read: references/text-operations.md

• Describes enabling text selection, customizing the selection highlight color, and the TextSelectionCompleted event
• Covers copying selected text to the clipboard

Annotations

📄 Read: references/annotations.md

• Covers all supported annotation types: text markup (highlight, underline, strikethrough), shapes (rectangle, ellipse, line), ink with Windows Ink Canvas, popup, free text, free text callout, and custom stamps
• Explains annotation events (Added, Tapped, Selected, Removed, MovedOrResized), deleting annotations, AnnotationCollection, undo/redo, and the IsDocumentEdited property

Printing

📄 Read: references/printing.md

• Explains the Print method, PrintCommand, and async printing with CancellationToken support
• Covers QualityFactor, customizing or disabling the print preview dialog, and setting the document name via PrinterSettings

Bookmarks & Hyperlinks

📄 Read: references/bookmarks-and-hyperlinks.md

• Explains navigating to bookmarks via GoToBookmark and retrieving the bookmark collection from PdfLoadedDocument
• 🔒 REQUIRED - Hyperlinks Validation: Provides essential code examples for inspecting and validating hyperlinks via HyperlinkPointerPressed events. Always validate hyperlink sources from untrusted PDFs before allowing navigation to prevent malicious redirects and injection attacks. See the reference document for secure implementation patterns.

Localization

📄 Read: references/localization.md

• Covers setting the default language in the app manifest and adding .resw resource files for UI string localization
• Explains supported resource file names and changing the context menu language

Gesture Events & Interaction

📄 Read: references/utilities.md

• Covers pointer events on hyperlinks (HyperlinkPointerPressed, HyperlinkPointerMoved) for custom interaction handling
• Explains using the PageChanged and DocumentLoaded events to drive post-navigation and post-load workflows

Utilities & Advanced

📄 Read: references/utilities.md

• Covers exporting PDF pages as BitmapImage objects (GetPage, GetPages) and as image streams (ExportAsImage)
• Explains accessing vertical/horizontal scroll offsets, using the PDFium custom renderer via IPdfRenderer, and the ShowPageNumber and VerticalScrollBarWidth properties