Programmically setting the default printer

rbuser

How can I programically set the default printer? I.e If I have two printers
installed and Printer 1 is the default, how can I programically set Printer
2 as the default?

mbd

digitalmetaphors

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Tech Tip: Controlling the Printer
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The PrinterSetup Class
----------------------

You can control which printer is selected for a report
and its associated properties at either design-time or run-time.
You can also do things like print to two different printers at once or
have a report that consists of multiple section type subreports with each
section going to a different printer.

The Report.PrinterSetup object that contains properties for controlling
the printer. You can set these via the object inspector at design-time or
from the File | PageSetup dialog in the Report Designer.

At run-time you can control the Report.PrinterSetup properties via
code. The PrinterSetup object contains a number of public properties
that can be used to determine the valid values that are available.
PrinterSetup.PrinterNames can be used to determine what printers
are installed on the computer. PrinterSetup.PaperNames and BinNames
can be used to determine the available paper and bin names for the
currently selected printer. (for more info, see the RBuilder.hlp file
topic for TppPrinterSetup.)

Example:

myReport.PrinterSetup.PrinterName := myReport.PrinterSetup.PrinterNames[0];

myReport.device := dvPrinter;
myReport.Print;


Run the demos\reports\demo.dpr application and check out the printer
settings section. There is a demo that displays a tabbed dialog showing
all printer settings - this dialog is manipulating all of the
PrinterSetup properties.


The Printer class
------------------

ReportBuilder has a TppPrinter class. A global ppPrinter object is used
for some tasks, but when a print job is created a TppPrinter is created
for the specific print job. In fact, one of the demos shows a report going
to 2 printers at once.

The TppPrinter.PrinterSetup property is an object of type
TppPrinterSetup as is the Report.PrinterSetup property. You specifiy
settings for
the Report.PrinterSetup object and then they are transferred to
TppPrinter.PrinterSetup at the appropriate time.

If you want to control things more you can instantiate your own
TppPrinter object and show the print dialog by calling
TppPrinter.ShowSetupDialog: Boolean. The TppPrinter will automatically
assign the results to the Printer.PrinterSetup object. You could then
transfer the results to the report:

procedure PageSetupButtonClick(Sender:TObject);
begin
myPrinter := TppPrinter.Create;

if myPrinter.ShowSetupDialog then
Report.PrinterSetup := myPrinter.PrinterSetup;

myPrinter.Free;
end;


Or you can show some other dialog and transfer the results to the
Report.PrinterSetup in some other manner. Run the
RBuilder\Demos\Report\Demo.dpr project and check out the printer
section.


Normally when you want to print to the printer you do something like

Report.Device := dvPrinter;
Report.Print;

But you can also create a TppPrinter object and use the
Report.PrintToDevices to print a report to one or more devices. Again,
see the printer section of the demo.dpr project for an example.

--
Cheers,

Alexander Kramnik
Digital Metaphors