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 Introducing PTWin32 |
Ultimately the job of
printing anything from your computer comes down to the software that controls
your particular printer. When you press a Print button on a PTWin32 window your report is formatted by
whatever Report Writer you are using
and handed to Windows Print Queue. The Print
Queue then hands your printing request to the Printer
Driver associated with the selected printer. The Printer
Driver translates your request into commands your specific printer can
understand and sends the job to the printer. You can install many Printer
Drivers into your copy of Windows and they all behave differently. If you
send a job to one type of printer using a driver for a different type of printer
you are likely to see problems with the output. Usually items on the
report don’t line up properly, or the report is corrupted by a number of
unusual characters printed here and there on the page. Consequently, when
you design a report for PTWin32 it’s a good idea to have the Printer
Driver for the printer that will ultimately print the report installed on
your computer. You can install Printer
Drivers for printers you don’t have attached to your computer without
harming other installed Printer Drivers.
In general Printer
Drivers are made up of three types of files, a configuration or printer
interface file, a data file, and a printer graphics driver file. A configuration or printer interface file
has a filename extension of .DLL. This file displays Properties
and Preferences dialog boxes in Windows when you configure a printer. The data file can have an extension of .DLL,
.PCD, .GPD, or .PPD. These files store information about the capabilities of the
printer like its resolution, or what size paper the printer will accept. The printer graphics driver file also has a
.DLL extension and is responsible for translating Windows’ device driver
interface (DDI) into commands a printer can execute. These three files work together to make
printing possible. Usually a set of Printer Driver files comes with a Help file which can tell you about the capabilities of your printer. Printer
Drivers are often updated so you should regularly check the web sites of
your printer manufacturer. Usually it is a simple process to download and
install a new Printer Driver.
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