How To Enable Printer Options Such As Duplex Printing Or Tray Selections For Bitmap Concurrent Programs (Doc ID 394130.1)

Last updated on AUGUST 11, 2024

Applies to:

Goal

Does Pasta or XML Publisher have the ability to enable printer options such as duplex printing or printer tray selection for a bitmap concurrent program? How can printer options such as duplex printing or tray selections for concurrent programs in bitmap format be enabled?

Research:

1.     As per the Pasta User's Guide, Pasta does not perform much action to a concurrent request that is already in Postscript format:

"Pasta also supports “pass-through mode”. Pass-through means that Pasta just bypasses the conversion mechanism and sends input to the preprocess command and then to the printer as it is...There are some formats that Pasta chooses this pass-through mode automatically because of the nature of the formats. PostScript and PDF are such formats. In PostScript and PDF, all the formatting must have been done so Pasta will not do anything but sends the file to preprocess command and then to the print
command."

2.     If the report's output file is an ASCII text file, the printer options can be enabled with embedded PCL escape commands within the Apps driver, see <Note 152285.1> "Building a Printer Initialization String for Oracle Applications". On bitmap output files, PCL escape commands cannot be effectively embedded. The appropriate location to enable printer options is via the Postscript Printer Definition (PPD) file, however. PPD files are third party proprietary files and any changes must be performed manually.

*% Permission is granted for redistribution of this file as
*% long as this copyright notice is intact and the contents
*% of the file is not altered in any way from its original form.
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3.     Oracle does not support or supply Adobe PPD printer driver files. The current drivers are provided as working examples for the intended printer make or model. If the PPD is not working correctly or does not support the options available on your printer, you will have to contact Adobe or your printer vendor for the appropriate PPD for your printer make or model.

4.     Understanding the construct of a PPD requires some basic knowledge of the Postscript language. In fact Adobe publishes a 200+ page document titled "PostScript Printer Description File Format Specification" It breaks down a PPD by its key elements.

5.      The default.ppd is very generic and can work for many printers. If it does not support your printer, you will have to contact the printer vendor or Adobe for a PPD that works with your make and model of printer.

NOTE 1:      Printer options, such as duplex or tray selection, cannot be embedded into a PDF file for the following reasons:

a) A printer is a device and not all devices are the same or unique--they often require different or platform specific drivers.

b) PDF stands for "Portable Document Format". The format does not support the embedding of platform specific device driver information. If it were possible, then the file would not be "Portable".

Unless a third party tool can be located that converts the PDF file to Postscript and embeds the device option by way of the Pasta preprocessing option or an OS print command, printing a PDF file directly from the concurrent manager with certain print device option enabled is not possible at this time, it is a format and technology stack limitation.

Solution

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