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ASL print request

Posted: Fri Nov 24, 2017 4:32 pm
by chris
I'd like to see a standard print requester in ASL.

Currently most software just dumps everything to printer.device:0, which is, quite frankly, a bit rubbish.

A proper print requester that allows the user to select which printer they want to print to, and returns a PrinterData structure with the user-specified values filled in, would be a good initial easy step towards improving the printing system.

Once programs start using the new requester, printing would at least start to look more modern before it eventually gets re-implemented.

I'm not sure if printer.device:0 could be trapped to always pop up a requester and deal with this internally, and printers could be moved onto units 1 and above. If that's feasible then it would give old software an immediate benefit.

Re: ASL print request

Posted: Sat Nov 25, 2017 9:43 am
by gazelle
Youe mean like:

Code: Select all

printer.device/PRD_EDITPREFS                     printer.device/PRD_EDITPREFS

   NAME
	PRD_EDITPREFS - open the driver preferences window (V44)

   FUNCTION
	New drivers can have own preferences. This commands ask the driver
	to open a window to allow the user to change the prefs. Typically
	this is done with an DoIO() call.

	Every application should have a button "Driver Options..." (that
	calls PRD_EDITPREFS) in its printer dialog.
It's up to the application to use it.

Re: ASL print request

Posted: Sat Nov 25, 2017 3:37 pm
by chris
gazelle wrote:Youe mean like:

Code: Select all

printer.device/PRD_EDITPREFS                     printer.device/PRD_EDITPREFS

   NAME
	PRD_EDITPREFS - open the driver preferences window (V44)

   FUNCTION
	New drivers can have own preferences. This commands ask the driver
	to open a window to allow the user to change the prefs. Typically
	this is done with an DoIO() call.

	Every application should have a button "Driver Options..." (that
	calls PRD_EDITPREFS) in its printer dialog.
It's up to the application to use it.
Isn't that for driver-specific preferences only?

Even if not, it's not the same thing as you can't select which print unit you want to print to, which is the main problem. And, yes, I know this can be programmed in, but nobody does, just like nobody writes their own file requesters.