Initializing Printer using PJL commands

rbuser

I have a report that prints 2 copies of an invoice, each copy can be more
than one page. The first copy selects pre-printed paper from bin 1 and the
second copy plain paper from bin 2. I can get this to work using the
OnPageStart event and setting the PrinterSetup.BinName property. Not sure
if this is the best way but could not find an event that is triggered by the
second copy.

The problem that I can't find a way around is the printer I am using has a
feature to staple the two copies together. There is a PJL (Printer Job
Language) command to do this but I don't know how to initialize the printer
using this command. How can I send a control sequence to the printer before
running the report?

Any help much appreciated!

Stephen Bedford

digitalmetaphors

It appears that the old ESCAPE Win API and the 'new' GDI calls are simply
not compatible. The main problem appears to be that, if you are making
real-time ESCAPE calls to the printer and spooled document calls via the
GDI, then the spooled document calls are the only ones which have any
effect - since these are sent after the ESCAPE calls and thus override any
settings made by the ESCAPE calls. We may have a breakthrough at some
point, but that is the status right now.

implementation

uses
Windows;

type

TBuffer = record
Length: Word;
Buffer: array[0..255] of Char;
end;

procedure TForm1.Report1OnStartFirstPass(Sender: TObject);
var
lCanvas: TCanvas;
lsEscapeCode: String;
begin

if not(ppReport1.PrinterDevice <> nil) then
begin
lCanvas := ppReport1.PrinterDevice.Printer.Canvas;
lsEscapeCode:= {your code here}

SendEscapeCode(lCanvas, lsEscapeCode);
end;

end;



procedure SendEscapeCode(aCanvas: TCanvas; aEscapeCode: String);
var
lBuffer: TBuffer;
lPassThrough: Integer;
begin

lPassThrough := PASSTHROUGH;

if (Escape(aCanvas.Handle, QUERYESCSUPPORT, SizeOf(lPassThrough),
@lPassThrough, nil) > 0) then
begin
StrPCopy(lBuffer.Buffer, aPassThroughCode);
lBuffer.Length := StrLen(lBuffer.Buffer);

Escape(aCanvas.Handle, PASSTHROUGH, 0, @lBuffer, nil);
end;

end;


Cheers,

Jim Bennett
Digital Metaphors Corp.