Is printing PDF to a dot matrix printer is possible?

[Danish_DJ]

hi,

Im working on any possibility to print the PDF files to a Dot matrix printer.

We have a limitation to use 4 fold paper(for invoicing) which is not achieveable through normal laser jet.

Any one have a clue on this. Would be greatfull to receive a response.

Thanks

Danish

danish.jawed@shell.com

[Test Screen Name]

It's unlikely to work well, or at all. The resolution of a dot matrix is fine for text setting at carefully chosen sizes, but in a PDF everything is printed as graphics and there just isn't the resolution for that.

There are continuous feed laser printers (if that's what you mean by 4 fold), designed for industrial scale printing. PDF isn't ideal for these either because they are optimized for very high speed flows with specialist software, but some of them can do PDF.

[Danish_DJ]

Thanks for your reply.

4 folded mean 4 carbonized copies of a single page.

These prints are directly comming from GSAP environment where Laser jet can not ensure the barcodes and settings properly.

The only way to explore is if we can make some settings to just make this image a  bit more clearer by enlarging fonts etc.

By the way , the prints are like 80 % okand visible. Just need to take this upto 10 % more.

Thanks

DJ

[Dov Isaacs]

Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat can print to any print device on Windows or Macintosh for which a standard print driver is available. That having been said, depending upon the number of pins on the print head, their effective resolution, and the ability of the print driver to address the pins individually, the output may or may not be particularly useful.

Have you actually tried this or is this a hypothetical question?

          - Dov

[Danish_DJ]

Thanks Dov for your feed back. Yes Ive tied it actually on my Epson 9000 and with some settings, able to get a better print but still it needs some improvement. The Microsoft Word allows it to print pretty clear on dot matrix being in a text format but do you have any idea if we can convert this PDF into a txt format so that it could be printed as desired ?

Thank you.

DJ

[Steve Werner]

In Acrobat Pro, File > Save As or File > Save As Other, and then select the options for saving as text.

[Danish_DJ]

Thank but im sure it will miss the formats, boxes etc. Will it ? I mean converting to Word keeps the format alive.

Just to confirm if the output will be txt or doc ?

[Steve Werner]

You can also save as Microsoft Word or RTF format which will save some formatting.

[Dov Isaacs]

The challenge is as follows:

Acrobat and Reader attempt to maintain the visual and graphics integrity of the PDF file which means putting a device such as yours into a graphics mode, which isn't too good given the relatively low resolution of the device. Text may be difficult to read.

Microsoft Word and similar programs emphasize the text and not the visual integrity and for your printer, that might mean using a font resident in the printer which may actually lead to major, unexpected formatting changes.

To complicate this, saving to Word or RTF might yield really cruddy results when the document does relayout for this printer. Saving to a plain text file looses much of the formatting and spacing.

You almost have a choice of either a headache or an upset stomach here.

          - Dov

[David W. Goodrich]

A terminological point, in US jargon these are called "multi-part forms," while the pros who print them often refer to them as "NCR forms."

My wife recently worked for an administration where the powers that be wanted to sign purchase orders just once.  That is to say, if she submitted 4 copies on different colored sheets (to imitate the standard colors for an NCR form) it would be refused out of hand.  The usual workaround was to peel apart the NCR form, print each sheet separately on a laser, and then staple them together again; note when the laser heats the NCR forms the fumes they give off are said to be toxic.  She managed to get a dot-matrix printer for her office, but getting it to work (under WinXP?) wasn't point-and-click -- in part because dot-matrix printers have certain "peculiarities".

I used to print on NCR forms all the time, primarily FedEx labels: it took a while to get the spacing right on a template, but with that in hand I could fill in the address details and dump it to the printer from the DOS prompt (with "copy mylabel.txt/b lpt1").  I could even use Chinese, having written a routine (in Turbo Pascal) for converting a 24x24 bitmap Chinese font to Epson LQ graphics commands.  Surely barcodes would be simpler.  I haven't checked all my archives, but the latest label I could find quickly dates from 1996.

Yes, Win7 still comes with a driver for EpsonLQ-compatible dot-matrix machines, and the latter can achieve 360 dpi when all the pins are working.  But I'm not sure this would work reliably on a barcode, especially if scaling is involved: relative thickness matters, and what happens when one of the thinner bars falls on a pixel/pin boundary?  Unless you go pretty big, the safest route might be to convert images of the barcodes to EpsonLQ yourself.  All so you can get a barcode that you can scan back into a computer?

I suspect coming up with a process incorporating dot-matrix printers will not be easy or inexpensive.  And how long will it be before your invoicing goes all-electronic?

Good luck,

David