Tablizer

Convert MediaWiki to PDF Online

Paste a MediaWiki table below, edit it if you need to, and get PDF back. The conversion runs in your browser, so nothing is uploaded, there is no size limit and there is no signup.

From

The only part of this site that uses a server. The address is sent to it so the page can be fetched, because a browser is not allowed to fetch someone else's page itself. Your own files are never involved.

Nothing here is uploaded. The parsing happens on this page.
Edit
Paste or upload something above and it will appear here.
ToDataMarkupDocumentsCodeSchemasImages

The output will appear here once there is a table to convert.

What MediaWiki is

MediaWiki table markup opens with {| and a class, marks headers with an exclamation mark and rows with |-.

Wikipedia editors and anyone running a MediaWiki install.

What PDF is

PDF describes a page: glyphs at coordinates, not rows and columns. A table in a PDF is a visual arrangement, not a data structure.

Reports, invoices, statements and anything sent to be read rather than processed.

What changes when you convert MediaWiki to PDF

Both cell styles are read: one cell per line, and several on a line separated by exclamation marks or double pipes, which is the form most Wikipedia tables use. Cell attributes before a single pipe are dropped, since style="text-align:right" is presentation rather than data. Wiki links come through as their display text, so [[France|the French Republic]] arrives as the French Republic, and reference markers are removed.

The table is drawn into a paginated document with the header repeated on every page, so a long table stays readable past page one. Page size, orientation and font size are all adjustable.

What carries over from MediaWiki to PDF

MediaWiki records 3 things about a table that PDF has no way to hold.

MediaWiki can hold a value that is itself a list or an object. PDF has only flat cells, so nested values are flattened into one cell rather than being spread across columns.

Nothing in PDF records that the first row is a header. It is drawn at the top and looks like one, which is all that is left of the distinction.

PDF is the end of the line for this data. Reading the table back out of it is a separate and much harder problem than writing it, so keep the MediaWiki if you will need the values again.

Questions

How do I convert MediaWiki to PDF?

Paste your MediaWiki into the box above or drop the file onto it. Check the table in the grid, then copy or download the PDF from the output panel. It takes one step and the data never leaves your browser.

Can I get my table back out of the PDF?

Out of one made here, yes, because the text is real text. Out of a scanned document, no. A scan is an image of a page, and pulling data from it needs optical character recognition, which is a different job with a different failure rate.

Can I convert the PDF back to MediaWiki afterwards?

Not mechanically. PDF keeps how the table looks, not what it held, so going back means reading the values off the page again. Keep the MediaWiki if you will need it.

What happens to nested values?

PDF has no nested cell, so a list or object inside a MediaWiki value is flattened into a single cell rather than expanded into extra columns. Split it before converting if the parts need to be separate.

Is there a limit on file size?

No. The work happens on your own machine, so the limit is your machine's memory rather than an upload cap. A file with tens of thousands of rows converts in a second or two.

Is my data uploaded anywhere?

No. The parsing and generating are done by JavaScript running on this page. You can watch the network tab while you convert and see that nothing is sent.

Related conversions