How to set up Reports for a labelprinter with endless Paper rolls?

rbuser

Hi,

i need to design an Report for a Labelprinter (Brother Labelprinter TD-4000)
and i cant figure out how to set up the printer and page breaks...

My Main Report has one Subreport and i need every Subreport on one seperate
Page - but with dynamic Page-Lengths.

the report looks like:


-> Header
-> Detail
-> Subreport
-> Detail line 1
-> Detail line 2
-> Detail line 3
================ Page Break (Labelwriter auto-cut)
-> Subreport
-> Detail line 1
-> Detail line 2
-> Detail line 3
-> Detail line 4
-> Detail line 5
================ Page Break (Labelwriter auto-cut)


How to achieve this?


Thanks,
Erwin

nardmoseley

Here is an rbWiki article with details for printing to continuous paper..

http://www.digital-metaphors.com/rbWiki/Output/Printer/Continuous_Paper



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

rbuser

Yes, i've seen this before - but when im doing this my Labelprinter cuts
after every line...

This is my Subreport:

http://prntscr.com/1xh69i

and i need one Pagebreak in each Group-Footer[0], regardless how much
detailrecords are in there...


Thx,
Erwin

rbuser

Hi Nard,

Is there any way to supress Formfeeds in Title/Header/Details Bands?

Or any way to supress the automatic Pagebreak at all?

I need an solution for dynamic Page-Length, with only ONE Formfeed after
each Report (or Subreport, or by RAP...)

The Report prints on self-adhesive endless Paper Rolls and is used to stick
on a Package.
It contains:

[in Header]
Order-Nr & Package-Nr
Sender
Recipient

[in Group-Header 0]
Order-Position-Text

[in Detail]
amount, Item-Nr and Item-Name


I need one Page-Break in Group-Footer 0 - or in Subreport End...
(just don't based on Paper-Size...)


TIA
Erwin

nardmoseley

Erwin,

The real issue here is that you want to control the paper cut. The solution
is to first configure the printer settings to turn off auto-cut. Then
implement report event-handler code to send a printer escape command to cut
the paper as needed.


1. Configure Printer Settings

From the object inspector set the Report.PrinterSetup.PrinterName to the TD
4000 printer. Locate the PrinterSetup DeviceSettings property and press the
... button to display the printer's properties dialog. Turn off auto-cut.

2. Send Escape command to cut paper

Implement the OnPrinterDeviceStateChange event. This event receives a
StateChange parameter that indicates before/after start/end job, start/end
page etc. For details see TppProducer.OnPrinterDeviceStateChange in the
RBuilder help. The code will look something like this...

uses
ppTypes;

procedure Form1.ppReport1OnPrinterDeviceStateChange(Sender: TObject;
aStateChange: TppDeviceStateChangeType);
begin
if (aStateChange = dsBeforeEndPage) then
if (Need to cut paper)
ppReport1.Printer.SendEscape('escape code here');

end;

3. Here is a doc on escape codes I found for the TD4000 printer...

http://welcome.solutions.brother.com/BSC/public/files/dlf/docp000579/cv_td4000_eng_escp_120.pdf



Best regards,

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

rbuser

Hi Nard,

thanks for your answer.

i will try this tomorrow and i guess it may work in combination with an
(own) RAP-Function that sets the "need to cut" flag.

- Erwin

nardmoseley

Report.Printer.SendEscape can be called from RAP. However, you might want to
implement it inside a built-in RAP function to provide a re-usable function
that can be called from other reports.

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