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Printing ASCII characters

Posted: Sat Dec 05, 2009 3:11 pm
by moneo
I have a calendar printing progam written in Quickbasic.
To make the boxes around each day I use chr$(179), chr$(196) and chr$(205).

The program works fine and prints the calendar to an attached printer, printing directly from the program with LPRINT statements. It also works fine printing the calendar to the screen.

Well, my printer is now broken, and since I hardly do any printing, I haven't bought a new one.

I modified the program to print the calendar to a file using a PRINT #1 for each line. I then gave the file to a friend for printing. All those characters used for printing boxes came out as garbage. I tried with several other friends. Some used WORD and PDF, but the problem was the same.

I would appreciate it if any of you guys have some suggestions for printing this calendar to a printer.

Thanks in advance,
Moneo

Posted: Sat Dec 05, 2009 6:25 pm
by burger2227
Most Windows programs cannot read the ASCII characters correctly. Notepad won't do it either.

Your friend could try setting the USB printer properties/advanced/print processor from LEMF to Text.

There is also a way to send output from the LPT port to a USB printer using the NET VIEW and NET USE. LPRINT will work then using the USB printer settings above.

Or try asking Don Smith. AKA Marine Don at his site:

http://www.smithselfgen.com/QuickBasic/QuickBasic.Htm

He uses a lot of ASCII stuff including calendars. Sometimes he visits the Network54 QB Forum too.

Ted

Posted: Sat Dec 05, 2009 6:53 pm
by moneo
Thanks alot, Ted.

I'll ask my friend to set LEMF to text, like you said.

Best regards,
Moneo

Sooner or later you will need a printer

Posted: Sat Dec 05, 2009 10:12 pm
by burger2227
You can use LPRINT with a USB printer. For info go to this Link:

http://www.network54.com/Forum/171757/m ... n+XP+or+NT

Ted

Posted: Sun Dec 06, 2009 2:16 pm
by moneo
Thanks again, Ted.

My friend doesn't have QB, so I'm going to ask him to try your first suggestion above.

Regards,
Moneo