Hi Bill, No, you didn't miss the point. I just didn't explain it very well.
Yes, our customers also use their laser printers as network printers for other print jobs (eg. from Word, Excel, etc.) which do require the use of the manufacturer's printer driver. What I failed to explain is that the same physical printer can be installed as more than one Windows (logical) printer on the same printer port under more than one logical printer name - eg. "HPLJ6P" using the HPLJ6P printer driver and "HPLJ6PTEXT" using the generic printer driver (or whatever you want to name them). The HPLJ6P logical Windows printer can then be used for non-Universe printing, and the HPLJ6PTEXT logical Windows printer can be used for Universe printing. The print jobs sent to both logical Windows printers will be printed on the same physical printer, but the non-Universe print jobs (eg. from Word, Excel, etc.) will use the HPLJ6P printer driver whereas the Universe print jobs will use the generic printer driver. This way, you have control of the laser printer from within your print programs with no interference whatsoever from the manufacturer's printer driver. Universe, however, may format your printed output, even if you use the NFMT option in the SETPTR command. The Universe documentation states that the NFMT option in SETPTR "Specifies that the application controls pagination and formatting instead of Universe". That statement is not true. IBM support stated that "The 'SPOOL' command always uses printer settings from unit zero." Stated more fully, the 'SPOOL' command always uses the printer settings for Page Width, Page Depth, Top Margin and Bottom Margin as defined in Unit Number 0 on the line on which the 'SPOOL' command is run. This means, for example, that you can configure your Universe logical printer with top and bottom margins of 0 lines and still have top and bottom margins printed because the Unit 0 settings contain the Universe default settings of 3 and 3 for top and bottom margins. You must redefine these print settings for Unit 0 on the line on which you are printing, regardless of which which Windows printer you are printing to, if you use the SPOOL command. I believe that creating a second logical printer under a separate name and installing it with the generic/text printer driver will solve the printing problem you face today and many others you will face tomorrow. I'll be interested in your final solution. Best Wishes, Dave Dave Taylor President Sysmark Information Systems, Inc. 49 Aspen Way Rolling Hills Estates, CA 90274 800-SYSMARK (800-797-6275) (O) 310-544-1974 (C) 310-561-5200 (P) 800-339-1497 (F) 310-377-3550 Your Source for Integrated EDI Translation and DataSync Integration www.sysmarkinfo.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Bill Haskett" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2006 10:35 AM Subject: RE: [U2] PCL extra page > Dave: > > Now I may be reading too much between the lines. :-) > > Our clients use printers from multiple applications; there are no MV only > printers. So all printers have the appropriate Windows drivers installed. > I've not seen where a print stream sent from an MV application gets altered > by these Windows print drivers. > > What I was talking about was the reaction of the printer to this MV > generated print stream. I've sent the same stream of text (a simple A/R > customer report wrapped in PCL) to both HP, Canon, and Kyocera printers (all > printers were PCL5 compatible). The string looked like: > > peqs '1' size = 7372 > 01 [EMAIL PROTECTED] ENTER LANGUAGE = > PCL..[E[&l1o&l1e41F[&a3l105M[(s0p13h0s3b4099T...T/R 4.2.1 > CUSTOMER NAME & INFORMATION FOR LAKEWOOD VIEW TWNHOME ASSN (450) THRU 30 > Jan 05 PAGE 1 > 02 > . > . > 44 > 45 (C) Copyright 09:59:59 07 Mar 2006, Advantos Systems, Inc. All Rights > Reserved. > 46 .T/R 4.2.1 CUSTOMER NAME & INFORMATION FOR LAKEWOOD VIEW > TWNHOME > ASSN (605) THRU 30 Nov 04 PAGE 2 > 47 > . > . > 70 ..................................... > 71 (C) Copyright 09:59:59 07 Mar 2006, Advantos Systems, Inc. All Rights > Reserved. > 72 .[E[%-12345X > > ...where '[' equals escape and the 1st '.' before each MV generated heading > is a form feed generated by the MV AQL "HEADING" statement. > > What appears to happen is the Canon and Kyocera recognize the print buffer > is empty (ignores the PCL code) and ignores this 1st form feed; which makes > sense. The HP, on the other hand, simply kicks a page when it finds the 1st > form feed. The [Esc]E doesn't kick the page on either the HP, Canon, or > Kyocera. > > In order for us to solve this problem, we had to move the form feed from the > 1st character of each mvDbms created heading to the end of each "...All > Rights Reserved." part of the string. To do this, we were able to turn off > the D3 created form feed completely (via TERM setting of formfeed delays to > 0) and add a form feed to the end of the copyright text. > > Hopefully, I haven't missed the point completely. :-) > > Bill Haskett > Advantos Systems, Inc. > www.advantos.net > (760)944-5570 (CA) > (360)923-4838 (WA) > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Dave Taylor [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2006 9:21 AM > > To: Bill Haskett; [email protected] > > Subject: Re: [U2] PCL extra page > > > > Bill, > > > > I may be reading too much between the lines here, but the following > > statement: > > > > --------------------------------------------------- > > Then, when this string is sent to the printer, HP interprets > > "Pcl commands" > > as text, so doesn't suppress the leading form feed...other > > printers often > > do. > > -------------------------------------------------- > > > > suggests to me that the printer was installed using the manufacturer's > > printer driver for that printer and that the printer driver > > is performing > > its usual tasks and, in addition, is not passing the ESC > > sequences thru to > > the printer: > > > > I didn't notice what platform you're running on, but on a > > Windows platform, > > we always install all Windows printers to be used by Universe > > using the > > Generic/Text driver found in the Generic Manufacturer's list > > of printer > > drivers. > > > > The Generic/Text driver performs no functions whatsoever, but > > passes thru to > > the printer all characters received by it, including ESC > > sequences which the > > printer interprets and reacts to correctly. > > > > I may be able to find a generic/text printer driver for > > Windows to send you > > if you don't have one. > > > > hth, > > > > Dave > [snipped] > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "Bill Haskett" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > To: <[email protected]> > > Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2006 7:00 AM > > Subject: RE: [U2] PCL extra page > > > > > > > Steve: > > > > > > This is almost always limited to HP printers. > > > > > > What normally happens is that a print job always begins > > with a form feed. > > > When PCL preceeds this print job you get a string that looks like: > > > > > > Pcl commands : FF : Print job > > > > > > Then, when this string is sent to the printer, HP interprets "Pcl > > commands" > > > as text, so doesn't suppress the leading form feed...other > > printers often > > > do. > > <snip> > ------- > u2-users mailing list > [email protected] > To unsubscribe please visit http://listserver.u2ug.org/ ------- u2-users mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe please visit http://listserver.u2ug.org/
