Change Printer when Printing

[PMad]

I have a common dialog box for printing. It does the normal, pops up the box, choose your printer and your settings then you print it.. Only problem is if you bring up the dialog box again to print without restarting the program, then no matter what printer you select, it always prints it on the first printer you selected the first time you printed something. Is there a way to reset something with this so it will print to a different printer if i select another one at a later time before restarting the program?

[jcis]

Can you show the code?

[PMad]

Private Sub PrintNow()
On Error GoTo ErrorHandler
Dim rv As Long
CommonDialog1.ShowPrinter

With Picture2
   .top = Picture1.top
   .left = Picture1.left
   .Width = Picture1.Width
   .Height = Picture1.Height
   .Visible = False
   .BorderStyle = 0
End With
'Paint Picture1 to invisible Picture2
Picture2.AutoRedraw = True
rv = SendMessage(Picture1.hwnd, WM_PAINT, Picture2.hdc, 0)
rv = SendMessage(Picture1.hwnd, WM_PRINT, Picture2.hdc, PRF_CHILDREN + PRF_CLIENT + PRF_OWNED)

'Paint the Flexgrid to invisible Picture2

'Print Picture2
Picture2.Picture = Picture2.Image
Picture2.AutoRedraw = False
Call PrintPictureToFitPage(Printer, Picture2.Picture, 0, 0)
'For the additional Picture3
'Paint Picture3 to invisible Picture4 and set visibility options

With picLogoInvis
   .top = picLogo.top
   .left = picLogo.left
   .Width = picLogo.Width
   .Height = picLogo.Height
   .Visible = False
   .BorderStyle = 1
End With
picLogoInvis.AutoRedraw = True

rv = SendMessage(picLogo.hwnd, WM_PAINT, picLogoInvis.hdc, 0)
rv = SendMessage(picLogo.hwnd, WM_PAINT, picLogoInvis.hdc, PRF_CHILDREN + PRF_CLIENT + PRF_OWNED)

SmallPrnPicWidth = picLogoInvis.Width * PrnPicWidth / Picture1.Width
SmallPrnPicHeight = picLogoInvis.Height * PrnPicHeight / Picture1.Height
SmallPrnPicLeft = picLogoInvis.left * PrnPicWidth / Picture1.Width
SmallPrnPicTop = picLogoInvis.top * PrnPicHeight / Picture1.Height

picLogoInvis.Picture = picLogoInvis.Image
picLogoInvis.AutoRedraw = False
Printer.PaintPicture picLogoInvis, SmallPrnPicLeft, SmallPrnPicTop, SmallPrnPicWidth, SmallPrnPicHeight

Printer.EndDoc
End Sub

[jcis]

ShowPrinter should change the Printer when the user selects another, just to test: run this to see if it changes:

     CommonDialog1.ShowPrinter 
     MsgBox Printer.DeviceName

Run, see the Printer, Run again and select another Printer, DeviceName should change.

[PMad]

Only changes if i cancel the print.. But once ive printed 1 thing, no matter what i do it wont change..

[PMad]

ok im trying something different... Im trying to declare the variable 'OldPrinter As Printer' and then set it as the default printer... Then show the common dialog box to change the printer, print the document, and at the end, set the printer as what the default printer used to be... This is what i have at the beginning of my code:

Dim OldPrinter As Printer
Set OldPrinter = Printer
CommonDialog1.ShowPrinter

And at the end after Printer.EndDoc, i have this:

Set Printer = OldPrinter

But each time it highlights the last line i just showed, and says "Type Mismatch"..... i dont know why, i must be doing something wrong

[PMad]

Anybody have any ideas or any links that could help me fix this issue? I cant find anything in the forums that will solve this issue.

[Al42]

Try this (adapted from the help file)

Dim OldPrinter As String, X As Printer
OldPrinter = Printer.DeviceName
CommonDialog1.ShowPrinter
'do your printing here
For Each X In Printers
  If X.DeviceName = OldPrinter Then
    Set Printer = X
    Exit For
  End If
Next X

[PMad]

ok i stepped through the code all the way... and everything is holding the correct values, but its not setting the printer back to what it originally was... it changes it to the one the user selected and doesnet change it back

[Al42]

You're right. It's a little more complicated. Look at this link - scroll down almost to the bottom and look for Set Default Printer. I know that one works - I just put it into a program I'm using and it switches the Windows default printer nicely. The only problem is that the process is slow if you have a lot of programs running.

[PMad]

You're right. It's a little more complicated. Look at this link - scroll down almost to the bottom and look for Set Default Printer. I know that one works - I just put it into a program I'm using and it switches the Windows default printer nicely. The only problem is that the process is slow if you have a lot of programs running.

ok, basically what im doing now is im using the common dialog box to show the printer list, and since its not working to actually change the printer like its supposed too, im throwing the code in from that site you showed me. But here's the problem.

Private Sub SetDefaultPrinter(ByVal PrinterName As String, _
ByVal DriverName As String, ByVal PrinterPort As String)
Dim DeviceLine As String
Dim r As Long
Dim l As Long
DeviceLine = PrinterName & "," & DriverName & "," & PrinterPort
' Store the new printer information in the [WINDOWS] section of
' the WIN.INI file for the DEVICE= item
r = WriteProfileString("windows", "Device", DeviceLine)
' Cause all applications to reload the INI file:
l = SendMessage(HWND_BROADCAST, WM_WININICHANGE, 0, "windows")
End Sub

The red line returns a type mismatch error. I dont know squat about API so i dont even know where to begin to figure this one out.. Here's how i declare SendMessage:

Declare Function SendMessage Lib "user32" Alias "SendMessageA" (ByVal hwnd As Long, ByVal wMsg As Long, ByVal wParam As Long, lparam As String) As Long

Thats declared exactly the same way as the code i copied. When i put this stuff in a new form the way the code says it works, but when i use it in conjunction with my program i get type mismatch on that line. Once it hits that line, it immediatly goes back to the print sub, all the way to the bottom at the error control. Doesnt goto the end sub line after the SendMessage function. Am i doing something wrong?