Handling PDF Files in Next.js 13 using pdf-loader and react-pdf

In this blog post, we’ll explore how to handle PDF files in a Next.js project using the pdf-loader and react-pdf packages. We will demonstrate how to configure Webpack to load PDF files and display them within your application using the react-pdf package.

Prerequisites:

• Basic knowledge of React and Next.js
• A Next.js project set up and running

Step 1: Install pdf-loader and file-loader

First, we need to install pdf-loader and file-loader to handle PDF files in our project. Run the following command in your terminal:

npm install pdf-loader file-loader --save-dev

Step 2: Configure Webpack

Create a next.config.js file in the root of your project (if you don't have one already) and add the following configuration:

// next.config.js
module.exports = {
  webpack: (config, { buildId, dev, isServer, defaultLoaders, webpack }) => {
    config.module.rules.push({
      test: /\.pdf$/,
      use: [
        {
          loader: 'file-loader',
          options: {
            name: '[path][name].[ext]',
          },
        },
        {
          loader: 'pdf-loader',
        },
      ],
    });

    return config;
  },
};

Title: Handling PDF Files in Next.js using pdf-loader and react-pdf

Introduction:

In this blog post, we’ll explore how to handle PDF files in a Next.js project using the pdf-loader and react-pdf packages. We will demonstrate how to configure Webpack to load PDF files and display them within your application using the react-pdf package.

Prerequisites:

• Basic knowledge of React and Next.js
• A Next.js project set up and running

Step 1: Install pdf-loader and file-loader

First, we need to install pdf-loader and file-loader to handle PDF files in our project. Run the following command in your terminal:

npm install pdf-loader file-loader --save-dev

Step 2: Configure Webpack

Create a next.config.js file in the root of your project (if you don't have one already) and add the following configuration:javascrip

// next.config.js
module.exports = {
  webpack: (config, { buildId, dev, isServer, defaultLoaders, webpack }) => {
    config.module.rules.push({
      test: /\.pdf$/,
      use: [
        {
          loader: 'file-loader',
          options: {
            name: '[path][name].[ext]',
          },
        },
        {
          loader: 'pdf-loader',
        },
      ],
    });
return config;
  },
};

Step 3: Import PDF files into your components

Now, you can import PDF files into your Next.js components:

import React from 'react';
import pdfFile from '../path/to/your/file.pdf';

const MyComponent = () => (
  <div>
    <a href={pdfFile} target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">
      Download PDF
    </a>
  </div>
);

export default MyComponent;

Step 4: Display PDF files using react-pdf

To display the PDF files within your application, you can use the react-pdf package. Install it with:

npm install react-pdf

Then use it in your component:

import React from 'react';
import { Document, Page } from 'react-pdf';
import pdfFile from '../path/to/your/file.pdf';

const MyComponent = () => {
  const [numPages, setNumPages] = React.useState(null);

  function onDocumentLoadSuccess({ numPages }) {
    setNumPages(numPages);
  }

  return (
    <div>
      <Document file={pdfFile} onLoadSuccess={onDocumentLoadSuccess}>
        {Array.from(new Array(numPages), (_, index) => (
          <Page key={`page_${index + 1}`} pageNumber={index + 1} />
        ))}
      </Document>
    </div>
  );
};

export default MyComponent;

Step 5: Handling the ‘canvas’ dependency

Since react-pdf has a peer dependency on the canvas package, you might encounter an error related to it. To resolve this, install the required system dependencies and the canvas package itself.

For Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt-get install build-essential libcairo2-dev libpango1.0-dev libjpeg-dev libgif-dev librsvg2-dev

For macOS:

brew install pkg-config cairo pango libpng jpeg giflib librsvg

Then, install the canvas package:

npm install canvas

Step 6: Ignoring the canvas.node file

Webpack might try to parse the canvas.node binary file and throw an error. To fix this, update your next.config.js with the following configuration:

// next.config.js
module.exports = {
  webpack: (config, { buildId, dev, isServer, defaultLoaders, webpack }) => {
    // Add the PDF loader configuration
    config.module.rules.push({
      test: /\.pdf$/,
      use: [
        {
          loader: 'file-loader',
          options: {
            name: '[path][name].[ext]',
          },
        },
        {
          loader: 'pdf-loader',
        },
      ],
    });

    // Ignore the canvas.node file
    config.module.rules.push({
      test: /\.node$/,
      loader: 'ignore-loader',
    });

    return config;
  },
};

If you haven’t installed the ignore-loader package yet, do so by running the following command:

npm install ignore-loader --save-dev

After updating the Webpack configuration and installing the ignore-loader package, the error should be resolved, and you should be able to use react-pdf in your Next.js project without any issues.

Conclusion:

In this blog post, we learned how to handle PDF files in a Next.js project using the pdf-loader and react-pdf packages. By configuring Webpack to handle PDF files and using react-pdf to display them within the application, we can seamlessly work with PDF files in a Next.js project.