Best practices for PDF processing in .NET

This guide explains best practices for working with Nutrient .NET SDK (formerly GdPicture.NET).

Error handling

Most classic GdPicture14 APIs return a member of the GdPictureStatus enum, so you handle errors with status checks.

Some newer SDK layers can throw exceptions, such as argument validation and workflow-specific errors. In production code, combine:

  • Status checks for GdPicture14 operations
  • try/catch for higher-level workflows when needed

The following code converts a PDF to a TIFF image. It checks that the source PDF loads before it continues:

using GdPictureDocumentConverter gdpictureDocumentConverter = new GdPictureDocumentConverter();
GdPictureStatus status = gdpictureDocumentConverter.LoadFromFile(@"C:\temp\source.pdf",
    GdPicture14.DocumentFormat.DocumentFormatPDF);
if (status == GdPictureStatus.OK)
{
    Console.WriteLine("The PDF file has been loaded successfully.");
    status = gdpictureDocumentConverter.SaveAsTIFF(@"C:\temp\output.tif",
        TiffCompression.TiffCompressionAUTO);
    if (status == GdPictureStatus.OK)
        Console.WriteLine("The file has been saved successfully.");
    else
        Console.WriteLine($"The file has failed to save. Status: {status}");
}
else
    Console.WriteLine($"The file has failed to load. Status: {status}");
Used methods

Release used images

After you process an image, release it from memory by passing the image ID to DisposeImage. DisposeImage is a static method on GdPictureDocumentUtilities, so you don’t need to instantiate the class. You can call it for any image, regardless of how you loaded it:

using GdPicturePDF gdpictureSourcePDF = new GdPicturePDF();
using GdPicturePDF gdpictureDestPDF = new GdPicturePDF();


GdPictureStatus status = gdpictureSourcePDF.LoadFromFile(@"C:\temp\source.pdf");
if (status == GdPictureStatus.OK)
{
    status = gdpictureDestPDF.NewPDF();
    if (status == GdPictureStatus.OK)
    {
        int pageCount = gdpictureSourcePDF.GetPageCount();
        if (gdpictureSourcePDF.GetStat() == GdPictureStatus.OK)
        {
            for (int i = 1; i <= pageCount; i++)
            {
                status = gdpictureSourcePDF.SelectPage(i);
                if (status != GdPictureStatus.OK)
                    break;


                int imageCount = gdpictureSourcePDF.GetPageImageCount();
                if (gdpictureSourcePDF.GetStat() != GdPictureStatus.OK)
                    break;


                for (int j = 1; j <= imageCount; j++)
                {
                    int imageID = gdpictureSourcePDF.ExtractPageImage(j);
                    if (gdpictureSourcePDF.GetStat() == GdPictureStatus.OK)
                    {
                        status = gdpictureDestPDF.AddImageFromGdPictureImage(imageID,
                            PdfAdvancedImageCompression.PdfAdvancedImageCompressionMRC);


                        // Release the image from memory in all cases.
                        GdPictureDocumentUtilities.DisposeImage(imageID);


                        if (status != GdPictureStatus.OK)
                            break;
                    }
                }
            }


            gdpictureDestPDF.SaveToFile(@"C:\temp\output.pdf");
        }
    }
}
Used methods