[Error: Non 0 exit code from pdftk spawn: 1] about fill-pdf

[ScottONeal]

Can you try running that ghost script command in isolation?

gs -dNOCACHE -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -sOutputFile=/tmp/116419-18385-13yaogd.pdf -dbatch -dNOPAUSE -dQUIET  /tmp/116419-18385-1c8wdss.pdf  -c quit

My guess is maybe the file path doesn't exist that it is trying to use. Which distro are you using?

[happilymarrieddad]

@ScottONeal ubuntu 14.4 .... amazon EC2... the weird part is it works perfectly on one of our servers and not at all on the other two. since we're clustered they all are running the same system but the other two were added later so I think perhaps I missed one of the libraries or something. I did apt-get install the two libraries on the site along with this

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade -y && sudo apt-get update -y && sudo apt-get upgrade -y 
    sudo apt-get install git zsh emacs htop mysql-server g++ build-essential libcairo2-dev libjpeg-dev libgif-dev pdftk ghostscript phantomjs
    wget -qO- https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_5.x | sudo bash - && sudo apt-get install --yes nodejs && sudo npm install pm2 -g && sudo npm install [email protected] -g && sudo npm install [email protected] -g && sudo npm install gulp -g && sudo npm install socketcluster -g

[ScottONeal]

Looks like you are running on Node 5.0 (which is great!) I know there are issues with this library running on Node 4.0 and greater (has to do with a dependency for iconv). Are your other servers running on 5 as well?

FYI, I wouldn't install node modules or run applications as root.

[happilymarrieddad]

@ScottONeal socketcluster runs in SSL which requires root to bind to port 443. It's standard for that framework. I fixed the iconv dependency which was a pain and it works perfectly on one of our other servers so I'm thinking that I'm missing a library or something. All of our servers are running Node 5.11.1 and one is running beautifully and the other two work great until I try to generate a PDF and it just hangs. That's the weird part is it doesnt crash or anything it just hangs and the function never returns. (generatePdf)

[ScottONeal]

First, looks like there is a bug in the spawn to pdftk, we should add at return to https://github.com/dommmel/fill-pdf/blob/master/index.js#L82

return callback(new Error('Non 0 exit code from pdftk spawn: ' + code));

So, that ghostscript doesn't execute when pdftk returns with a non 0 code. That might cause some weird behaviours, since the ghost script call relies on the pdftk spawn working.

Can you try to add that return and see if you get any other information? This makes me think that there is something wrong with the pdftk installation

[happilymarrieddad]

@ScottONeal while I'm doing that can you send me a link for a better pdftk installation and any dependencies it has? I just did apt-get install pdftk.

[ScottONeal]

Installing via apt-get should be sufficient. Can you verify your pdftk versions are the same on your working instances?

I would also try to manually run the pdftk command in bash, get the command by adding console.log(processArgs) on https://github.com/dommmel/fill-pdf/blob/master/index.js#L75 and see if you get any extended information.

On the other non related :443 note. I would run a reverse proxy like nginx on 443 which talks to your node app from webapp user.

[happilymarrieddad]

@ScottONeal
they are both running pdftk v2.01.
ghostscript 9.10

Hey man I just wanted to say first off thanks for taking the time to work this out with me. I'm completely lost lol

I inserted that line at 82 and commented the other line and now I get

[Error: Non 0 exit code from pdftk spawn: 1]

I edited line 75 and added console.log(processArgs) and got this

gulp-0 [Error: Non 0 exit code from pdftk spawn: 1]
gulp-0 1463951396228 - Origin: Worker (PID 12154)
gulp-0    [Error] ReferenceError: processArgs is not defined
gulp-0   at /var/www/fusion/node_modules/fill-pdf/index.js:74:15
gulp-0   at ChildProcess.exithandler (child_process.js:209:5)
gulp-0   at emitTwo (events.js:100:13)
gulp-0   at ChildProcess.emit (events.js:185:7)
gulp-0   at maybeClose (internal/child_process.js:850:16)
gulp-0   at Process.ChildProcess._handle.onexit (internal/child_process.js:215:5)
gulp-0 1463951396232 - Worker 3 exited - Exit code: 1
gulp-0    >> Worker PID: 12280
gulp-0 1463951397075 - Worker 3 was respawned
gulp-0 Client Fwj2SLbdnHu28nJvAAAA connected to worker

Everything runs through my loadbalancer before it hits the application servers and they are only accessible from the internal IP. The application servers are not accessible from the internet.

[ScottONeal]

I'm thinking this going back and forth is going to take more effort than it is worth! Send me an email and maybe we can work this out over skype or something?

[ScottONeal]

Also, if you can isolate this issue into a script, instead of having an event trigger it (ie: click a button in an application), that would be helpful.

Essentially, pdftk is failing to add the field data to your pdf, however we are not getting any valuable information as to why. The goal is to run pdftk outside of node, with the same command, to see what happens.

processArgs should def be defined, I'm guessing you put it above the variable declaration.

try:

// line 74
var processArgs = [pdfPath, "fill_form", "-", "output", tempName].concat(extendArgs);
console.log(processArgs);
console.log(exports.generateFdf(data));

[happilymarrieddad]

I'm thinking that I'm looking in the wrong place??? Here is what my file looks like

[happilymarrieddad]

I must be tired because now it's working on all my servers except one... so weird... lol I spun up an (exact copy) and it failed the first time I tried it which is weird but now it keeps working.. well I say failed but what I mean is it hung for a really long time and then timed out... never getting out of the generatePdf function. It has to be a library thing or something because the exact copy works great.

[ScottONeal]

Ahh, looks liking your fill-pdf version is older. That is my fault for not publishing the latest version to npm. Should be updated properly on npm. However, I don't think that is going to fix your issue.

You can try my additions now, and see if that prints anything out. Thanks

[ScottONeal]

marking as resolved.

[happilymarrieddad]

thanks