[RESOLVED] Help me with printing, client side.

[flushfire]

I made some sort of clearance system for my school, where the professors would be able to clear their students online, and then some operator prints the clearance forms. The current process is the student gets a clearance form (paper) then they have their professors sign that. Anyway, the only thing I have unfinished right now is the printing part. I want to send data directly to the printer and have the printer print the clearance forms. I don't want to output to a webpage then print that page as there will be hundreds of clearance forms to print, that outputting each to a webpage then printing just isn't implementable.

Any suggestions on how I might do this? The clearance form itself is fairly simple, just two tables, one for the student details and another for the clearance fields. Thanks for any help/advice on how i might do this. 🙂

[zabmilenko]

Is the web server with php installed able to access the print server?

[flushfire]

im not sure i get the question but yes i think. every pc has access to the printers.

[zabmilenko]

Take a look at the php printer functions.

You could set up a [server side] php script that feeds documents to a network printer share. Just call the page from a form button. Remember not to hang the browser for too long so make sure you are spooling well.

I think output buffering will help you with capturing the clearance forms, or your implementation may allow that already. I don't know what your code looks like.

EDIT: I found this page which has some spiffy tools for converting html to other formats. I see three in there mention postscript.

[flushfire]

Ill read up on those thanks. Looks complicated. T_T

[zabmilenko]

It's an interesting problem. Read up and we'll go from there. :-)

[oncovet]

I had problems getting printer to work. I was using PHP 4., 5. is easier.

Code which I have running is:

//select printer, "" for default printer
$handle = printer_open("printer name");

printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_MODE, "text");

//set paper size: this is for labels, see PHP Manual for set options
printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_PAPER_FORMAT, PRINTER_FORMAT_CUSTOM);
printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_PAPER_LENGTH, 100);
printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_PAPER_WIDTH, 75);

//Set position on page
printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_TEXT_ALIGN, PRINTER_TA_LEFT);
printer_set_option($handle, PRINTER_TEXT_ALIGN, PRINTER_TA_TOP);

//Begin
printer_start_doc($handle);
printer_start_page($handle);

//Set font
$font=printer_create_font ("Arial",20, 10, PRINTER_FW_NORMAL, false, false, false, 0);
printer_select_font($handle, $font);

//This works in PHP 4.*: check PHP manual for details of printer_write() which does not!

printer_draw_text($handle, $atext[$y], 5, $y*30);

//finish

printer_delete_font($font);

printer_end_page($handle);
printer_end_doc($handle);
printer_close($handle);

[Horizon88]

So is this resolved, then?

[flushfire]

Thanks for the code sample oncovet, will try that.

Horizon88 sorry for not marking the thread as resolved yet, I have't tried anything yet as i just got back from work.

Is there a program or somesuch that can do the layouting/drawing of the page automatically for me? It's a pain trying to draw everything manually... T__T

[zabmilenko]

See html to postscript and printer_set_option(). As I said earlier, capture your html (which you already know how to write), convert it, and dump it directly to the printer.

EDIT: After a bunch of googling, converting to PDF and printing using a pdfprint alternative may be easier...

[flushfire]

Thanks, with a bit of reading that should work quite well.

Thanks for all the help, I should mark the thread resolved now. 🙂