Anyone ever used PrintJobPlugin?

Andreas Raab andreas.raab at gmx.de
Thu Aug 7 14:17:02 UTC 2003


Hi,

I was looking at implementing PrintJobPlugin but the lack of any comments
whatsoever leaves me really puzzled about what is actually expected by the
plugin. A number of questions:

a) ioPrintPreProcessing and ioPrintGetFirst/LastPageNumber
Is it expected that ioPrintGetFirst/LastPageNumber answer the number of
pages which a user has selected? Does this imply that ioPrintPreProcessing
has to provide a UI for the user to select the range of pages?

b) ioPagePostscript and ioPageForm
The only available comment claims that 
	"you invoke setForm: or setPostscript: to image a form
	 or postscript as many times as needed, then as mentioned
	 pagePostProcessing to close the page".
Does this mean a mix of the PS and Form printing should be allowed? Is it
valid if PS spans multiple pages? Is it valid to embed a 'showpage' in the
PS? Shouldn't this rather be EPS?

Contrary to the above comment, the actual implementation of PrintJob looks
as if there can only be either a single form or ps be passed to the
PrintJob. Is this intentional, or merely due to being a sample
implementation?

c) ioPageForm coordinates
The function specifies a "scale" and some "offset" but it doesn't specify
any resolution for those. How are those values assumed to be interpreted?
How would one (for example) print a form which starts 3 inches from the
top-left of the page and is 2x2 inches wide?

d) Page sizes
The PrintJob plugin does not specify what page size is being used for a
print job. How is any client supposed to do printing without knowing what
the size of the paper is going to be?

Any information on the above would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers,
  - Andreas



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