PDFKit doesn't work with ESM

[laszlo1337]

Bug Report

Description of the problem

In modern projects that rely on ES modules PDFKit cannot work due to missing __dirname global variable.
During development of my SvelteKit app I could use PDFKit library, but once in production mode the app will crash with:

ReferenceError: __dirname is not defined
    at Object.Helvetica (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:89564:37)      
    at new StandardFont (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:89609:56)      
    at Function.open (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:89997:18)         
    at PDFDocument.font (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:90071:33)      
    at PDFDocument.initFonts (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:90034:12) 
    at new PDFDocument (file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:93049:11)       
    at file:///xxx/app/build/server/chunks/_server-9e0bc332.js:93533:17  

Code sample

import PDFDocument from 'pdfkit'

export async function POST({ request, locals }) {
// endpoint code
		const pdf = new PDFDocument({ size: [totalSize, totalSize] })

		pdf.moveTo(0, 0)
// rest of the code
}

Your environment

• pdfkit version: 0.14.0
• Node version: 18.12.0
• Browser version (if applicable): none
• Operating System: Windows 10

[lramos15]

I recommend just downloading a font from somewhere and passing it to the constructor.

  const doc = new PDFDocument({
    font: path.join('./app/fonts/Satoshi-Black.ttf')
  });

This allowed me to at least be unblocked on using this library since there's not really any other good options.

[laszlo1337]

I just switched to pdf-lib. It works.

[manuel-en-arg]

I recommend just downloading a font from somewhere and passing it to the constructor.

  const doc = new PDFDocument({
    font: path.join('./app/fonts/Satoshi-Black.ttf')
  });

This allowed me to at least be unblocked on using this library since there's not really any other good options.

This "hack" from @lramos15 worked for me. Its not the best solution but way better than no solution. I was already getting crazy with this problem. Thank you very much for this! Hope this library gets a support or workaround for ESM someday..

[lramos15]

I settled on https://pdfme.com/ in case people are looking for other suggestions too. It's more of a template filler than a full blown pdf kit but works decently well and is updated

[blikblum]

For node, currently it does not work with esm.

[joao-vitor-felix]

I just switched to pdf-lib. It works.

Thank you, it solved my problem hahaha