ToString

ToString(SaveFormat)

Exports the content of the node into a string in the specified format.

public string ToString(SaveFormat saveFormat)

Return Value

The content of the node in the specified format.

Examples

Shows the difference between calling the GetText and ToString methods on a node.

Document doc = new Document();

DocumentBuilder builder = new DocumentBuilder(doc);
builder.InsertField("MERGEFIELD Field");

// GetText will retrieve the visible text as well as field codes and special characters.
Assert.AreEqual("\u0013MERGEFIELD Field\u0014«Field»\u0015", doc.GetText().Trim());

// ToString will give us the document's appearance if saved to a passed save format.
Assert.AreEqual("«Field»", doc.ToString(SaveFormat.Text).Trim());

Exports the content of a node to String in HTML format.

Document doc = new Document(MyDir + "Document.docx");

Node node = doc.LastSection.Body.LastParagraph;

// When we call the ToString method using the html SaveFormat overload,
// it converts the node's contents to their raw html representation.
Assert.AreEqual("<p style=\"margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:8pt; line-height:108%; font-size:12pt\">" +
                "<span style=\"font-family:'Times New Roman'\">Hello World!</span>" +
                "</p>", node.ToString(SaveFormat.Html));

// We can also modify the result of this conversion using a SaveOptions object.
HtmlSaveOptions saveOptions = new HtmlSaveOptions();
saveOptions.ExportRelativeFontSize = true;

Assert.AreEqual("<p style=\"margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:8pt; line-height:108%\">" +
                "<span style=\"font-family:'Times New Roman'\">Hello World!</span>" +
                "</p>", node.ToString(saveOptions));

Shows how to extract the list labels of all paragraphs that are list items.

Document doc = new Document(MyDir + "Rendering.docx");
doc.UpdateListLabels();

NodeCollection paras = doc.GetChildNodes(NodeType.Paragraph, true);

// Find if we have the paragraph list. In our document, our list uses plain Arabic numbers,
// which start at three and ends at six.
foreach (Paragraph paragraph in paras.OfType<Paragraph>().Where(p => p.ListFormat.IsListItem))
{
    Console.WriteLine($"List item paragraph #{paras.IndexOf(paragraph)}");

    // This is the text we get when getting when we output this node to text format.
    // This text output will omit list labels. Trim any paragraph formatting characters. 
    string paragraphText = paragraph.ToString(SaveFormat.Text).Trim();
    Console.WriteLine($"\tExported Text: {paragraphText}");

    ListLabel label = paragraph.ListLabel;

    // This gets the position of the paragraph in the current level of the list. If we have a list with multiple levels,
    // this will tell us what position it is on that level.
    Console.WriteLine($"\tNumerical Id: {label.LabelValue}");

    // Combine them together to include the list label with the text in the output.
    Console.WriteLine($"\tList label combined with text: {label.LabelString} {paragraphText}");
}

See Also

ToString(SaveOptions)

Exports the content of the node into a string using the specified save options.

public string ToString(SaveOptions saveOptions)
ParameterTypeDescription
saveOptionsSaveOptionsSpecifies the options that control how the node is saved.

Return Value

The content of the node in the specified format.

Examples

Exports the content of a node to String in HTML format.

Document doc = new Document(MyDir + "Document.docx");

Node node = doc.LastSection.Body.LastParagraph;

// When we call the ToString method using the html SaveFormat overload,
// it converts the node's contents to their raw html representation.
Assert.AreEqual("<p style=\"margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:8pt; line-height:108%; font-size:12pt\">" +
                "<span style=\"font-family:'Times New Roman'\">Hello World!</span>" +
                "</p>", node.ToString(SaveFormat.Html));

// We can also modify the result of this conversion using a SaveOptions object.
HtmlSaveOptions saveOptions = new HtmlSaveOptions();
saveOptions.ExportRelativeFontSize = true;

Assert.AreEqual("<p style=\"margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:8pt; line-height:108%\">" +
                "<span style=\"font-family:'Times New Roman'\">Hello World!</span>" +
                "</p>", node.ToString(saveOptions));

See Also

Node.Remove Node.NodeTypeToString