Ok, here's the deal:
Can you output from A5 to the printer & bypass the Printer Driver? Or could you set up a "printer" that has NO driver, but just a port location assigned?
Now,
In most cases, the User-input Form & the output format to the printer have no relation except they use the field values from that Input Form.
I have to be able to print on 4-8 different pre-designed forms all of them using some of the Input Form Field values.
What I have done prior to A5 is to design a form that will print in all the right places, including some additional calculations on the form itself (mostly "If..then" or "Case.."),
BUT:
I use the Internal fonts & printer commands of the printer and bypass the Windows driver.
For instance, if the form has to be printed in landscape, the global variable Lscape is sent to the printer. That variable is actually placed in the form design at the top of the form as a calculated "field".
I do this for several reasons:
1. I send it to a particular printer even if it isn't the User's default printer. Just force the right printer among all the user's Windows choices. The printer is nearly always their local unit vs say, a network Laser across the office. BUT, sometimes , if they are still using a local dot matrix & they want their carbon-copies form printed on it, and a "report" printed to the Office's common Laser, I can do that as well.
2. Printing is much faster when only the Printer internal commands are used & not graphical output which the pre-designed form never needs.
3. I can add a great deal of precision by changing line spacing within the form as it prints.
For instance, I can start the form with LPI-6 (vLpi6), and change to LPI-48 (vLpi48), then back to LPI-24 (vLpi24) to hit the exact needed location on the pre-designed form. (I have no control over the form's design, unfortunately. It's done by the state or other vendors.)
3. The user only has to have one Input Screen Form, but I can print a whole variety of output forms with full precision from that one screen. It is only printing the current record's data.
Multi-record printing is to a "report" format with the usual headers, columns, copyright notice, source table notice, time of the output, etc.
As a further point, when the user chooses to print any of those forms, they can choose "To Screen", "# copies to Printer: {enter}=1". BUT I have a special unmentioned key that can be hit, and the system goes directly into form-design-modify for that form. There I can adjust where needed, close it and continue to print with the adjusted output.
Now, there may be a whole new way of doing this in A5 that makes my method obsolete. I don't know.
Any clever ideas are appreciated in advance.
Can you output from A5 to the printer & bypass the Printer Driver? Or could you set up a "printer" that has NO driver, but just a port location assigned?
Now,
In most cases, the User-input Form & the output format to the printer have no relation except they use the field values from that Input Form.
I have to be able to print on 4-8 different pre-designed forms all of them using some of the Input Form Field values.
What I have done prior to A5 is to design a form that will print in all the right places, including some additional calculations on the form itself (mostly "If..then" or "Case.."),
BUT:
I use the Internal fonts & printer commands of the printer and bypass the Windows driver.
For instance, if the form has to be printed in landscape, the global variable Lscape is sent to the printer. That variable is actually placed in the form design at the top of the form as a calculated "field".
I do this for several reasons:
1. I send it to a particular printer even if it isn't the User's default printer. Just force the right printer among all the user's Windows choices. The printer is nearly always their local unit vs say, a network Laser across the office. BUT, sometimes , if they are still using a local dot matrix & they want their carbon-copies form printed on it, and a "report" printed to the Office's common Laser, I can do that as well.
2. Printing is much faster when only the Printer internal commands are used & not graphical output which the pre-designed form never needs.
3. I can add a great deal of precision by changing line spacing within the form as it prints.
For instance, I can start the form with LPI-6 (vLpi6), and change to LPI-48 (vLpi48), then back to LPI-24 (vLpi24) to hit the exact needed location on the pre-designed form. (I have no control over the form's design, unfortunately. It's done by the state or other vendors.)
3. The user only has to have one Input Screen Form, but I can print a whole variety of output forms with full precision from that one screen. It is only printing the current record's data.
Multi-record printing is to a "report" format with the usual headers, columns, copyright notice, source table notice, time of the output, etc.
As a further point, when the user chooses to print any of those forms, they can choose "To Screen", "# copies to Printer: {enter}=1". BUT I have a special unmentioned key that can be hit, and the system goes directly into form-design-modify for that form. There I can adjust where needed, close it and continue to print with the adjusted output.
Now, there may be a whole new way of doing this in A5 that makes my method obsolete. I don't know.
Any clever ideas are appreciated in advance.
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