Knowledge Base

FIX: Printer.Height May Eject the Wrong Amount of Paper with Some Dot Matrix Printers

Article ID: 257777

Article Last Modified on 8/7/2007

APPLIES TO

Microsoft Visual Basic 5.0 Learning Edition
Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Learning Edition
Microsoft Visual Basic 5.0 Professional Edition
Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Professional Edition
Microsoft Visual Basic 5.0 Enterprise Edition
Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Enterprise Edition

This article was previously published under Q257777

SYMPTOMS

When you are using continuous feed paper (such as pin feed paper), and you assign a value to the Printer.Height property, the amount of paper ejected by the printer may be up to one tenth of one millimeter off the specified height. This small discrepancy may not be visible when printing a single page, but it is cumulative with each page.

CAUSE

Visual Basic incorrectly converts the number assigned to Printer.Height from TWIPS (1440 TWIPS to the inch) to tenths of millimeters, which it uses internally to represent the height.

Prior to Visual Basic 6.0 Service Pack 4, Visual Basic performed the following calculation:

' TMM stands for tenths of millimeters
Const TWIPS_PER_CM = 567
Const TMM_PER_CM = 100

Temp = ValueInTwips * TMM_PER_CM / TWIPS_PER_CM
ValueInTMM = Temp - (Temp - Int(Temp))
' First the wrong conversion factor is used
' and then the result is truncated.

Visual Basic 6.0 Service Pack 4 performs the following calculation:

Const TWIPS_PER_INCH = 1440
Const TMM_PER_INCH = 254
ValueInTMM = Int(ValueInTwips * TMM_PER_INCH / TWIPS_PER_INCH)

RESOLUTION

You can use one of the following techniques to work around the problem:

Compile the application using Visual Basic 6.0 Service Pack 4 or greater.
Do not modify the Printer.Height property. Instead, make it a requirement that the end user set the default height manually from the Printers folder. On Microsoft Windows NT, this requires the addition of new "forms" as described in the "More Information" section.
Set the Printer.Height property to a value that produces the desired result. First, determine the desired value in TWIPS, and then use the following equation to assign that value to Printer.Height:
```
Printer.Height = ((((DesiredHeightInTwips * 254) / 1440) + 0.5) * 567) / 100 + 0.5
                        
```
NOTE: Use this equation to obtain the correct height with versions of Visual Basic prior to Visual Basic 6.0 Service Pack 4. Remove it if the code is later compiled using Visual Basic 6.0 Service Pack 4 or greater.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a bug in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article. This bug was corrected in the latest service pack for Visual Studio 6.0.

For additional information about Visual Studio service packs, click the following article numbers to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

194022 INFO: Visual Studio 6.0 Service Packs, What, Where, Why

194295 HOWTO: Tell That a Visual Studio Service Pack Is Installed

To download the latest Visual Studio service pack, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/Aa718353.aspx

MORE INFORMATION

The printer driver must support custom paper sizes in order to use the Printer object's Height and Width properties.

To determine if a printer driver supports custom paper sizes, open the Printers folder and look at the list of paper sizes for that printer

Under Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Me, select Printer Properties. Under Microsoft Windows NT 4.0, select Document Defaults. Under Microsoft Windows 2000, select Printing Preferences. Look for an entry named "custom" or something similar. When this option is selected you should be able to enter a custom paper height and width. If the printer driver that is used by the end user of your application has this option, then Printer.Height and Printer.Width can be set. If it does not have this option, then the behavior depends on the printer driver. Most drivers select the nearest available size.
Very few printer drivers on Windows NT or Windows 2000 support custom paper sizes

The recommended procedure is to have the end user add a new form of the required size and set it as the default form for that printer. Visual Basic then uses that form.

On Windows NT, highlight the printer icon in the Printers folder and then select Server Properties from the File menu.
Height and Width are stored in tenths of millimeters (TMM)

Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Me store paper size information in TMM. Windows NT and Windows 2000 store "Forms" in thousandths of millimeters. However, the Printer.Height and Printer.Width properties do not use forms and store the data in TMM. If you need a height that does not divide evenly into TMM, then either restrict your users to using "forms" on NT, or add one TMM to the paper size as needed so that it averages out, just as the calendar does on leap year. For example, if you need to eject an extra .25 TMM, then every fourth page, change the height to one TMM more than it was, print one page, and then set it back for three more pages.

NOTE: The paper size cannot be changed in the middle of a document, so the Printer.EndDoc method must be called before the paper size can be changed.
Troubleshooting suggestion

Try to obtain the results you want manually by changing the settings in the Printers folder and then printing from Notepad. If you cannot get the results you desire when printing from Notepad, then the issue is with the printer driver rather than with Visual Basic.

Unit Of Measurement Conversion Function

Because units of measurement (UOM) are critical to using paper size correctly, the following conversion function may prove useful.
Note that this function requires an hDC parameter as provided by the Printer.hDC file. Many laser printers are either 300dpi or 600dpi (dots per inch). On a 600dpi printer, each individual dot, or pixel, is 1/600 of an inch. The hDC parameter is required in order to correctly convert to or from the pixels UOM.

    Public Function ConvertUnits(ByVal hDC As Long, _
       ByVal OriginalLength As Single, _
       ByVal OriginalWidth As Single, _
       ResultLength As Single, _
       ResultWidth As Single, _
       FromUnits As ScaleModeConstants, _
       ToUnits As ScaleModeConstants) As Boolean

        Dim hiHeight As Double   ' tenths of millimeters
        Dim hiWidth  As Double   ' tenths of millimeters
        
        Select Case FromUnits
        Case vbInches
            hiHeight = OriginalLength * TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            hiWidth = OriginalWidth * TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
        Case vbMillimeters
            hiHeight = OriginalLength * 10
            hiWidth = OriginalWidth * 10
        Case vbTwips
            hiHeight = (CDbl(OriginalLength) / TwipsPerInch) * _
                        TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            hiWidth = (CDbl(OriginalWidth) / TwipsPerInch) * _
                       TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
        Case vbPixels
            On Error Resume Next
            hiHeight = (CDbl(OriginalLength) / CDbl(GetDeviceCaps(hDC, _
                        LOGPIXELSY))) * TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            hiWidth = (CDbl(OriginalWidth) / CDbl(GetDeviceCaps(hDC, _
                       LOGPIXELSX))) * TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            If Err.Number <> 0 Then
                ConvertUnits = False
                Exit Function
            End If
            On Error GoTo 0
        Case vbCentimeters
            hiHeight = OriginalLength * 100
            hiWidth = OriginalWidth * 100
        Case vbCharacters
            hiHeight = (CDbl(OriginalLength) / CharactersPerInch) * _
                        TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            hiWidth = (CDbl(OriginalWidth) / CharactersPerInch) * _
                       TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
        Case vbHimetric
            hiHeight = OriginalLength
            hiWidth = OriginalWidth
        Case vbPoints
            hiHeight = (CDbl(OriginalLength) / PointsPerInch) * _
                        TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            hiWidth = (CDbl(OriginalWidth) / PointsPerInch) * _
                       TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
        Case Else
            ConvertUnits = False
            Exit Function
        End Select
        
        Select Case ToUnits
        Case vbInches
            ResultLength = hiHeight / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
            ResultWidth = hiWidth / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch
        Case vbMillimeters
            ResultLength = hiHeight / 10
            ResultWidth = hiWidth / 10
        Case vbTwips
            ResultLength = (hiHeight / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                            TwipsPerInch
            ResultWidth = (hiWidth / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                           TwipsPerInch
        Case vbPixels
            ResultLength = (hiHeight / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                            GetDeviceCaps(hDC, LOGPIXELSY)
            ResultWidth = (hiWidth / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                           GetDeviceCaps(hDC, LOGPIXELSX)
            If Err.Number <> 0 Then
                ConvertUnits = False
                Exit Function
            End If
        Case vbCentimeters
            ResultLength = hiHeight / 100
            ResultWidth = hiWidth / 100
        Case vbCharacters
            ResultLength = hiHeight / (TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                           CharactersPerInch
            ResultWidth = hiWidth / (TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                          CharactersPerInch
        Case vbHimetric
            ResultLength = hiHeight
            ResultWidth = hiWidth
        Case vbPoints
            ResultLength = (hiHeight / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                            PointsPerInch
            ResultWidth = (hiWidth / TenthsOfMillimetersPerInch) * _
                           PointsPerInch
        Case Else
            ConvertUnits = False
            Exit Function
        End Select
        ConvertUnits = True
    End Function  ' ConvertUnits

REFERENCES

For additional information, click the article number below to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

157172 How to Create Custom Forms in Windows NT 4.0

Additional query words: sp4

Keywords: kbbug kbfix kbprint kbvs600sp4fix kbvs600sp5fix KB257777

Microsoft KB Archive/257777

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