🚀 go-pugleaf

I missed the first part of this thread, but I have been trying to get to
the printer ports (parallel) myself for some time, and they are getting
harder and harder to get to.

I work with a multi-user Point of Sale system, and we need to be able to
detect problems with printers automatically and re-route the printout to
another printer when there is a problem.  I managed to do this by
building my own spooler for serial printers, but with the print manager
taking over things, I cannot get to the parallel printers.  Printing a
line at a time to LPT1 is not even supported in NT anymore, so that's
out.

Yeah, I spent a few days with those API's, but never found one that
could tell (from VB, mind you) that the printer jammed, or went off-line
in the middle of a printout, then let me handle things by re-routing to
the next printer on my user's pre-defined list.  Some crusty old
seasoned programmers have told me that it is impossible.

I have no words of wisdom, but you do have my sympathy - and please do
let me (or the group) know if you find something handy....

JC
Giles Thurston wrote:
> 
> I know that normally you wouldn't want ot do this but this application will
> be printing files sent to it via a modem.  The PC and Printer in question
> has to be able to run automatically without any user input and create
> confirmations to be picked up via the Modem at a later date.  If the Printer
> is OFF Line then the Confirmation files must relate this so that an engineer
> can be sent in to fix the problem (Don't ask, It wasn't my idea!)
> 
> Anyway, I repeat there will be no user input to check if the printer on line
> and the system must automatically detect this
> 
> Anyway solutions would be appreciated
> 
> regards
> 
> Giles
> 
> Charles Kincaid wrote in message
> <8D9C9305Fckincaidatkcdotnet@msnews.microsoft.com>...
> >Stop!
> >
> >You are not supposed to do that. Windows applications write printer data
> >to the windows print spooler. The spooler takes care of checking the
> >status of the printer. What if the printer is a network printer? The
> >INTERNAL drivers for network printing don't even provide a means of
> >asking for the remote printer status. What if "print to file" is checked?
> >That driver could only be "not ready" if the disk is full.
> >
> >Just pop up a message box reminding the user to put the printer on-line
> >and print away!
> >
> >>Giles Thurston <GilesT@mentor.co.uk> wrote in
> >><7e073e$t3e$1@uranium.btinternet.com>: