Hi to All
i want to print any document suppose invoice of any party with the help of VB program on dot matrix printer in Character Mode not in Graphical Mode(GUI mode).
now, i m going to differenciate between character mode and graphical mode

Graphical Mode: Default printing on Dot-matrix printer via VB program is GUI Mode but i want to print it in character mode ( dotted character)

but i want to print in dotted format on dot matrix printer by Window programming Language ( Visual Basic)

How can be possible?

Pls. urent reply

Using information here and in your other post (Post one complete message.. not two)..

I don't think you can.

Your using Crystal Reports- that means you have a layout that relies on graphical layout rules, rather than spaces and monospaced fonts (like you would have done in the "olden Days")



Hal Levy
Web Developer, PDI Inc.

NOT a Wiley/Wrox Employee

Oh wait- that said - you CAN print graphics to a dot matrix printer.... it's just slower.


Hal Levy
Web Developer, PDI Inc.

NOT a Wiley/Wrox Employee

You want to get direct control of printer thru VB?. I do not know of a way to control lpt1: directly in VB. You may try the following code which is from the good ol' DOS/QBasic days.

Open "LPT1:" for output as #1
Print #1, chr(65)
Print #1, chr(12)

which would just print "A" followed by a form feed on your printer.

You did mention it's urgent. If the above doesn't work, see if you can get a serial printer or a serial to parallel interface. Then all you need to do is open a com port which VB does allow you to have direct control. Yes you can print graphic file in your own formating this way.

3rd way is for you to write your own device driver. But since you need to drive the "lpt" port not the printer itself I do not know if this is even possible.

Lastly if all you needed to do was print an invoice or fill in the blanks on any pre-printed form, don't see why crystal reports can't help you.

Hi there,

Make sure that you have a dotmatrix printer installed on your system.
This will provide you with a list of fonts like "Draft 10CPI", "Draft 8CPI" and so on...
Select appropraite draft font for your field in report.
I hope it will help you

Zaheer

i have the same problem. even if I use a Draft font printer. it look well in view mode in Crystal report designer, but it dosn't take effect in crystal report form viewer.
any help will be appreciate, thinks