Printing with ReportTextFile Device

rbuser

hi,

i am using Reportbuilder 10.6 and i want to print with the ReportTextFile
Device, i have already read the 107 demo example and i am not sure i have
fully undersatnd the way it was made because the report was developed with a
non standard paper size as far as i know (Width=5100,Height=6600) and the
charactergrid used to emulate the text version of the report was 120
characters per line and 66 lines per page wich i didnt fully understand how
it was determined so i can make my own report with A5 paper size and obtanin
a correct text report translation.

thanks.

nardmoseley

In demo 107....

Report.Units := utPrinterPixels
Report.PrinterSetup.PaperName := 'Letter'

Thus, if your printer has a resolution of 600 pixels per inch, then the
paper dimensions are calculated as follows:

PaperWidth = 600 * 8.5 = 5100
PaperHeight = 600 * 11 = 6600

When I set Report.PrinterSetup.PaperName to 'A5', the paper dimensions are
calculated

PaperWidth := 3496
PaperHeight := 4961

If you do not call the CharacterGrid method, then RB will internally
calculated the grid size. It does this by measuring the font text height and
width and the page size. (In the demo, that should really be 80 chars per
line and 66 lines per page).




--
Nard Moseley
Digital Metaphors
www.digital-metaphors.com

rbuser

hi Nard,

thanks for your fast reply, now i understand how the paper size dimensions
are calculated for each printer resolution, i removed the CharacterGrid
method from the AfterPrint
event to let the ReportTextFile device calculate the grid size like you said
and i can see the resulting text file is generated correctly but when i send
the resulting lines to the printer with this code :

function TFrmMain.DirectToPrinter(S: string; NextLine: Boolean): Boolean;
var
Buff: TPrnBuffRec;
TestInt: Integer;
begin
TestInt := PassThrough;
if Escape(Printer.Handle, QUERYESCSUPPORT, SizeOf(TESTINT), @testint, nil)
begin
if NextLine then S := S + #10;
StrPCopy(Buff.Buff_1, S);
Buff.bufflength := StrLen(Buff.Buff_1);
Escape(Printer.Canvas.Handle, Passthrough, 0, @buff, nil);
Result := True;
end
else
Result := False;
end;


procedure TFrmMain.ppReport1AfterPrint(Sender: TObject);
var fTextFile : TextFile;
sText : string;
begin
if (ppReport1.FileDevice <> nil) then
begin
// Label10.Caption := ppReport1.FileDevice.FileName;

// Memo1.Lines.LoadFromFile(ppReport1.FileDevice.FileName);

// this code works if the printer supports escape commands
// you can get special esc codes from printer's manual

// example:
try
printer.BeginDoc;
AssignFile(fTextFile,'C:\test.txt');
Reset(fTextFile);
while not eof(fTextFile) do
begin
Readln(fTextFile,sText);
directtoprinter(sText,True);
end;
finally
printer.EndDoc;
end;

end;

end;

it feeds the 'A5' paper for one and half a page which i didnt understand
why, am i doing this wrong i mean sending the text file generated to the
printer by direct printing please feel free to point me in the right
direction so i can make it correctly a simple example like the demo 107
printing directly to the dot matrix printer would be great, in the mean time
i will continue my struggling to get it work correctly hope you can help me.

thanks

"MAAZAOUI Imed" a écrit dans le message de

nardmoseley

- Your DirectToPrinter code uses Delphi's global Printer object which is an
instance of the TPrinter class. Try configuring the Printer object with the
desired paper size, prior to calling Printer.BeginDoc.

- The other thing you could try is to use the RB Printer instead. Perhaps
something like this...

myReportLines := TStringList.Create;
myReportLines.LoadFromFile('c:\myReportFile.txt');

myReport.Printer.BegingDoc;

for liIndex := 0 to myReportLines.Count-1 do
begin
lsReportLine := myReportLines[liIndex];

// add code to load the buffer with lsReportLine

Escape(myReport.Printer.Canvas.handle, PassThrough, @Buffer, nil);

end;

myReport.Printer.EndDoc;




--
Nard Moseley
Digital Metaphors
www.digital-metaphors.com