Printers

Printers and Printing

Oracle E-Business Suite offers two printing solutions to handle all your printing requirements. For most printing needs, the Pasta Utility offers quick setup and easy maintenance. For additional flexibility, Oracle E-Business Suite allows you to define your own printer drivers and print styles.

Overview

When you run an Oracle E-Business Suite report, Oracle Reports generates and formats the output. A completed report is sent to the operating system by the concurrent manager, which issues an operating system print command, or calls a custom print program or subroutine that issues an operating system print command.

Oracle Reports and Report Generation

Oracle Reports includes page break, carriage return, line feed, text bold on/off, and text underline on/off instructions within the output file. The values are retrieved from a SQL*ReportWriter (SRW) driver file.

When the report is generated for online viewing, Oracle Reports uses the SRW driver named by the print style in the Print Styles form.

When the report is to be printed, Oracle Reports uses the SRW driver named by the Oracle E-Business Suite printer driver in the Printer Drivers form.

The dimensions of a report are determined by the columns and rows values in the print style, defined using the Print Styles form. These values override the width and height values in an SRW driver file.

Concurrent Manager Issues or Calls a Print Command

When a report program finishes running, the concurrent manager prepends an initialization string, and appends a printer reset string to the output file. Both strings are defined using the Printer Drivers form.

An Oracle E-Business Suite printer driver is invoked by issuing a print command or by calling a print program or subroutine.

When the printer driver method is Command, the concurrent manager can issue an operating system print command and arguments, entered in the Arguments field of the Printer Drivers form.

When the printer driver method is Program, the concurrent manager can call a custom print program, named (along with its path) in the Name field of the Printer Drivers form. Arguments to the program may be entered in the form's Arguments field.

When the printer driver method is Subroutine, the concurrent manager calls a predefined Oracle E-Business Suite subroutine that passes a print command and arguments to the printer via the operating system. The subroutine name is entered in the Program Name field of the Printer Drivers form.

The concurrent manager may provide values for four arguments to an operating system print command or custom print program:

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

The commands that a printer can understand vary from one type of printer to another. A printer type identifies a printer by manufacturer and model.

A print style tells the printer how a printed output should look. A printer driver delivers commands that tell the printer how to output the specified print style.

The ability to print a report in a particular print style depends on the type of printer the report file is sent to.

For each print style that a particular type of printer can print, a printer driver specific to the printer type and the operating system is required.

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Printer Types

The printer type is the printer manufacturer and model. Two examples are a DEC LN03 printer and an HP Laserjet III printer.

Print Styles

A Print style defines the page format for a printer, such as the number of lines per page, the width of each line, and whether a header page should be printed.

Each printer type can have one or more associated print styles.

Print styles allow you to set up report dimensions on a variety of printers. You can tailor your page setups while providing consistent-looking reports from printer to printer.

For example, users may wish to print a menu report with a wider left margin to allow for hole punching the paper. As System Administrator, you register this new style, which users can then access if the printer type supports it.

At report submission time, users select the style in which to output the report.

Printer Drivers

To print in a particular style from a particular printer type, you define a printer driver. A printer driver is the mechanism that delivers a report's output along with its commands to the target printer.

Concurrent managers determine what drivers to use depending on what the print style is and what printer type the report is to be sent to.

You need to define a printer driver for each print style that you want to use with a specific printer type on a specific platform.

Sequence of Printing Events

The concurrent manager associates a print style and a printer driver with the destination printer's printer type. This combination of print style and printer driver is defined in the Printer Types form.

A printer driver tells the destination printer how to interpret the format. An SRW Driver formats text and sets page breaks within an Oracle Reports file.

Sequence of Printing Events - Example

The following is an example of the sequence of printing events.

  1. A user submits a request to run a report from the Run Reports form.

  2. A request to run the report is added to the requests table.

  3. A concurrent manager reads the request.

  4. The concurrent manager calls Oracle Reports to run the report, and passes the SRW Driver name. If Report Copies = 0 and the Printer field is blank, the Print Style's SRW Driver is used. If Report Copies > 0 and Printer is required, then the Printer Driver's SRW Driver is used.

    Note: For concurrent requests running Oracle Report concurrent programs, a printer needs to be identified or associated even when the number of copies is set to 0.

    The concurrent manager passes Print Style information (Columns and Rows) to Oracle Reports (overrides SRW Driver width and height if the report is to be printed).

  5. A report is created using Oracle Reports. The concurrent manager attaches Printer Driver information to the file. It prepends the initialization string and appends the reset string.

    The concurrent manager also passes suppress header option information from the Printer Styles form.

  6. The concurrent manager issues an operating system print command with the arguments Destination Printer, Filename (including path), Number of Copies to print, and Filename for the Title on the banner page.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Setting Character-Mode vs. Bitmap Printing

Setting up Your Printers

Fast-Track Printing with Pasta

Customizing Printing Support in Oracle E-Business Suite

Postscript Printing in UNIX

Setting Character-Mode vs. Bitmap Printing

Running Character mode Oracle Reports Concurrent Programs

Character mode Oracle Reports programs take their page dimensions and orientation from the print style associated with the request to run the program.

Some print styles are predefined, and a System Administrator can define additional styles, if necessary.

After you create an Oracle Reports program, you create a corresponding concurrent program executable with the Oracle Reports execution method.

You then define a concurrent program for that executable, registering any parameters and incompatible programs. You also enter the minimum column and row length, orientation, and print style.

Running Character Mode Oracle Reports Programs

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Running Bitmap Oracle Reports Concurrent Programs

Bitmap Oracle Reports programs are defined similarly in Oracle Reports and in the Concurrent Program Executable form.

To run an Oracle Reports program in bitmap mode, query the concurrent program's definition in the Concurrent Programs form, and choose PostScript in the Format field.

Bitmap Oracle Reports programs take their page dimensions and orientation from the program's definition (note: when printing a bitmap report, a print style is still required).

If you wish to override the program's definitions, you can enter values in the Execution Options field for ORIENTATION and PAGESIZE.

When entering more than one execution option, each option should be separated by a single space. There should be no spaces before or after the options. For example:

 ORIENTATION=LANDSCAPE PAGESIZE=7.5x9

Running Bitmap Oracle Reports Programs

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Notes about PAGESIZE in the Execution Options field

In Oracle Reports, when defining a report the units and size of the report are specified in the menu under Report->Global Properties->Unit of Measurement.

For bitmapped reports, <width>x<height> for PAGESIZE is usually in inches; however, this depends on the particular report definition.

You can enter the PAGESIZE parameter in the Execution Options field of the Concurrent Programs form (for bitmapped reports only) when you want to override the values specified in the report definition. For example:

PAGESIZE=7.5x9  

If the dimensions specified with the PAGESIZE parameter are smaller than what the report was designed for, you will generate a “REP-1212" error.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Setting up Your Printers

Creating Custom Printer Drivers

Printer Drivers field help

Setting Up Your Printers

Oracle E-Business Suite provides you with predefined printer types, print styles, and printer drivers. Use the Printer Types form to query the combinations of print style and printer driver that support each type of printer you have. Customize the predefined components as necessary. See: Customizing Printing Support in Oracle E-Business Suite.

Important: Predefined printing components may have to be modified for different printer types and/or operating platforms.

Forms for Defining Printer Support

You use four forms to define printer support.

Printer Types

You must define any printer types used at your site that are not shipped with Oracle E-Business Suite. It is on this form that you associate the print style with a printer driver for the particular printer type.

Printers

You register a printer so that Oracle E-Business Suite recognizes the printer and can forward to it the output from a report program.

To register a printer you specify the printer's operating system name, which uniquely identifies the printer, and select the printer type. The printer type must already be defined.

For example, if you want users of Oracle E-Business Suite to be able to print to a newly purchased printer, you:

Print Styles

To generate a report, the print style values for columns and rows are passed by the concurrent manager to Oracle Reports. A print style determines the dimensions of your report, or the number of rows and columns per page.

Printer Drivers

A printer driver includes the initialization and reset strings that format and restart a printer. You need a defined printer driver for each print style that you plan to use with a specific printer type on a specific platform.

Printing Setup Interrelationships

Printer Setup Information Is Cached On Demand

Printer setup information such as Printer Type definitions, Print Style definitions, and Printer Driver definitions, are read into memory (cached) the first time the information is required to print a program's output.

The cache area that holds printer setup information is private to the concurrent managers. Printer setup information remains cached in memory until the concurrent managers are restarted, when the values are erased and new values are cached.

Important: You should issue a Restart concurrent manager command for all currently active managers whenever you edit an existing Printer Type, Print Style, or Printer Driver (unless the type, style or driver has not been referred to or cached yet).

See: Controlling Concurrent Managers

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Customizing Printing Support in Oracle E-Business Suite

Creating Custom Printer Drivers

Printer Setup with Pasta

Overview

Pasta is an Oracle E-Business Suite utility that converts text report files to PostScript and also enables the printing of custom PostScript reports from Oracle E-Business Suite. The reports can then be directed to any PostScript printer.

Setting up your system to use Pasta is much simpler than the standard Oracle E-Business Suite printer setup procedure. The Printer Type, Printer Driver, and SRW driver files are provided. The only setup required to begin printing is the registration of the printer with Oracle E-Business Suite.

Many printing options can be defined using the Pasta configuration file (pasta.cfg). You no longer need to maintain multiple drivers and styles for each printer.

Pasta is provided as an executable named FNDPSTAX.

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

The following setup can be used to enable any PostScript printer to print text or PostScript reports in the following styles: Landscape, Landwide, Portrait, or Dynamic.

Use the Printers window to register your printer:

  1. Enter your printer's name as defined in the operating system and applications.

  2. Select "--Pasta Universal Printer" from the list of values for the printer Type.

You are now ready to print text and PostScript reports from your PostScript printer using the default Pasta configuration.

For more information on the Printers window, see Printers Window.

For more information on setting options in the Pasta configuration file, see: Configuration File Options.

Related Topics

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Command Line Parameters

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

The pasta.cfg file controls many printing options. You can use the default file for many printers for multiple languages. However, if you have printers that require special setup, you can customize these options by creating a configuration file for each printer.

Copy the pasta.cfg file to pasta_<printer name>.cfg. Make the necessary changes to the file. Pasta automatically looks for a printer-specific file name. If it does not find one, Pasta then uses the default file, pasta.cfg.

For example, suppose you have a printer named "hqprinter" for which you want to set the page height and width to letter size:

  1. Copy $FND_TOP/resource/pasta.cfg to $FND_TOP/resource/pasta_hqprinter.cfg where hqprinter is the name of the printer as defined on the operating system.

  2. In the pasta_hqprinter.cfg file, edit the paper size options:

    Set pagewidth=8.5

    Set pageheight=11

Pasta will now use the options as defined in the pasta_hqprinter.cfg file when printing to the hqprinter.

For more information on setting options in the Pasta configuration file, see: Configuration File Options.

Using a Different Configuration File as the Default

You can change the file that is defined as the default configuration file for Pasta by using the -F command line parameter.

For example, suppose you create a PCL print-specific configuration file named pcl.cfg. Set the FNDPSTAX command line option as follows:

-Fpcl.cfg

Pasta will look for pcl_<printer>.cfg first, and if it is not found, Pasta will use pcl.cfg as the default.

These files must be placed under the $FND_TOP/resource directory.

The -F command line parameter can be set in the Arguments field of the Printer Drivers window. See Printer Drivers Window.

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Configuration File Options

Command Line Parameters

Modify an Existing Printer Type to Use Pasta

If your printer is already assigned to a printer type that contains styles and drivers that you want to maintain, you can add Pasta to the existing printer type.

To add Pasta to an existing printer type, you must associate one of the Pasta printer drivers with a print style on the Printer Types window.

The seeded Pasta printer drivers are:

You can associate a Pasta driver with an existing print style, or you can create a new print style. To create a new print style, use the Print Styles window. For more information on defining a print style, see Print Styles Window.

  1. Query your existing printer type in the Printer Types window.

  2. In the Style field, select the style to which you want to assign a Pasta driver.

    Or, if you are assigning Pasta to a style already defined for the printer type, delete the driver in the Driver Name field currently associated with the style.

  3. In the Driver Name field, select the appropriate Pasta driver.

    For more information on the Printer Types window, see Printer Types Window.

Add a New Printer Type to Use Pasta

If you want to add a new Printer Type, you can also add Pasta to your new printer type.

  1. Navigate to the Printer Types window.

  2. Enter the Type of printer.

  3. In the Style field use the list of values to select the style to which you want to assign a Pasta driver.

  4. In the Driver Name field, select the appropriate Pasta driver from the list of values:

  5. PASTA_LANDSCAPE

  6. PASTA_PORTRAIT

  7. PASTA_LANDWIDE

  8. PASTA_DYNAMIC

    For more information on the Printer Types window, see Printer Types Window.

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Configuration File Options

Command Line Parameters

Setting Margins

The margins on your printed output are determined by the margin settings in the pasta.cfg file and the printable area defined by your printer. In order to set your margins properly you must know the printable area for your specific printer and adjust the margin parameter settings in the pasta.cfg file accordingly. The margin parameters are leftMargin, rightMargin, topMargin, and bottomMargin.

For example, suppose you want to set the left margin to one inch. If the printable area for your printer begins at .25 inches from the left, then you must set the leftMargin option to .75 in the pasta.cfg file.

For more information on setting options in the Pasta configuration file, see: Configuration File Options.

Refer to your printer's documentation for information on its printable area.

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Command Line Parameters

Printing a Report Generated Using the noprint Option

When you use the "noprint" printer option to generate a report, you can still have the option of printing it later using Pasta.

Before running the report, associate the noprint printer with the "--Pasta Universal Printer Type" in the Printers form.

Note: You must restart the concurrent manager for this to take effect. See Printer Setup Information is Cached on Demand.

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Configuration File Options

Command Line Parameters

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Pasta can use a preprocessing option to invoke any executable that supports an input file and an output file (filter program). Pasta will invoke the filter program to preprocess the Pasta output before passing it to the printing command. By using the preprocessing option, you can generate output formats other than the formats that Pasta currently supports. For example, by invoking products such as Adobe Acrobat Distiller Server or Ghostscript, you can generate PDF output or PCL output.

Important: Ensure that the executable for the preprocess program is placed in your path.

The preprocessing command is a configuration file (pasta.cfg) option. This option uses {infile} and {outfile}.

Example for Generating PCL Output

In this example, "gs" is Ghostscript and "pxlmono" is a device used with HP black and white PCL XL printers (Laserjet 5 and 6 family).

In the pasta.cfg file, enter the following for the preprocess option:

preprocess=gs -q -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=pxlmono -sOutputFile={outfile} {infile}

To get a list of output devices available in Ghostscript go to http://www.gnu.org/software/ghostscript/devices.html

Example for Generating PDF Output

In this example, "ps2pdf" is a shell script bundled with Ghostscript. The ps2pdf script can convert a PostScript file to a PDF file.

In most cases you cannot send a PDF file to the printer command because the printer command cannot understand PDF. Set the noPrint option to "y" or use the "-np" (no print) command line option if you do not want Pasta to send the PDF file to the printer.

Use the outFile option to define the destination on the middle tier for the output file. You can use {inputfile} in the outFile option. Pasta will replace it with the actual input file name (without the path) specified by the "-f" (input file) command line option.

  1. Using the basic Pasta setup procedure, define a printer in the Printers window called "PDFfile". Assign the "--Pasta Universal Printer" type to the printer.

    For more information about defining a printer, see: Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta.

  2. Create a configuration file for the PDFfile printer called "pasta_PDFfile.cfg".

    For more information about defining a configuration file, see: Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers.

  3. In the pasta_PDFfile.cfg file, enter the following for the preprocess option:

    preprocess=ps2pdf {infile} {outfile}
    noPrint=y
    outFile=<APPLTMP>/{inputfile}.pdf

Related Topics

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Font Source

If your printer does not have the necessary fonts installed, Pasta embeds the required glyphs as a small font in your report from the font files.

If you do not want to use the fonts provided by Oracle you can specify the font you want by using the font name option in the pasta.cfg file. You can use any TrueType fonts on your middle tier; or, if your printer has a font installed suitable for the language of your report, you can utilize the printer font.

The form of the pasta.cfg option is:

Font.Default.<Style>=<TrueType font file name>

or

Font.Default.<Style>=printer:<Printer font file name>

Example using TrueType font file:

Font.Default.Plain=<FND_TOP>/<APPLRSC>/ADUO.ttf
Font.Default.Bold=<FND_TOP>/<APPLRSC>/ADUOB.ttf

Example using Printer Font:

Font.Default.Plain=printer:Courier
Font.Default.Bold=printer:Courier-Bold

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Language-Specific Font Support

Configuration File Options

Command Line Parameters

Language-Specific Font Support

The default pasta.cfg file contains font settings for languages. You override the default setting in the language-specific section of the pasta.cfg file.

For example, if you want to override the default setting of Courier font for French language reports to use Helvetica instead, add the following to the end of the pasta.cfg file:

[FRENCH]
Font.Default.Plain = printer:Helvetica
Font.Default.Bold = printer:Helvetica-Bold

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Configuration File Options

Command Line Parameters

Configuration File Options

The configuration file pasta.cfg governs many printing options. The file is a normal ASCII text file that has a simple format described below.

The options are listed in the following two tables. They are divided into Generic Options and Arabic, Hebrew, and Thai options. For each option are listed the Key Name, the Default Value (if applicable), the Description, and the Equivalent Command Line Option (if applicable).

Note: For options that also have command line equivalents, Oracle recommends that you set the value in the configuration file.

Generic Options

Key Name Default Value Description Command Line Equivalent
outputFormat ps Two output formats are supported: PostScript ("ps") and text ("text"). When the output format is text, you can specify the output character set by the Oracle character set name (for example, text.WE8ISO8859P1). If you use "auto" as the output character set (text.auto), Pasta uses the appropriate character set according to the NLS_LANGUAGE value in the FND_LANGUAGES table. -x
textAutoCharset The default value is taken from the FND_LANGUAGES table. When the outputFormat is set to "text.auto", Pasta uses a default character set for each language based on the language and character set mappings in the FND_LANGUAGES table. To override the default setting for a language, use the textAutoCharset option in the Language-Specific section of the pasta.cfg file. For example, to override the default character set for Japanese to use JA16EUC instead, enter the following: [Japanese] textAutoCharset=JA16SJIS N/A
preprocess N/A Use this option to convert the output file. Enter a preprocessing command to invoke any executable that supports an input file and an output file (filter program). Pasta will invoke the filter program before passing the file to the printing command. N/A
printCommand N/A Specific print command for Unix platform. N/A
ntPrintCommand N/A Specific print command for Windows platform. N/A
outFile N/A If you want to save the output file, use this option to define the ouput file name and its destination on the middle tier. -o
noPrint N/A Set this option to "y" if you do not want Pasta to produce printed output. -np
duplex default Specifies duplex printing. Options are "y", "n", or "default" (uses the printer-side setting). N/A
embednumcopies y Set this option to "y" to embed the number of copies to be printed in a PostScript file. Using this option will eliminate the header page normally printed between reports. N/A
copysort y If you set embednumcopies to "y", you can choose to have the copies collated, by setting this option to "y". N/A
heightScaleRate 1.0 Adjusts the space between lines. -h
widthScaleRate 1.0 Adjusts the space between characters. -w
pagewidth 8.27 Adjusts the page width. -pw
pageheight 11.64 Adjusts the page height. -ph
topMargin .25 Adjusts the top margin. N/A
bottomMargin .25 Adjusts the bottom margin. N/A
rightMargin .25 Adjusts the right margin. N/A
leftMargin .25 Adjusts the left margin. N/A
Font.<Face>.<Style> N/A Specify the TrueType font file name. The <Face> must be either "Default" or the actual font face name (such as Helvetica). The <Style> must be either "Plain", "Bold", "Italic", or "BoldItalic". N/A
fontsize 7.8 (for landscape) 10.0 (for portrait) Font size in points. If this is not set, the font size is calculated automatically. -s
boldfontsize Size in points (Default value from the fontsize parameter) Font size for bold font in points. This option is used mostly when Font.Default.Bold is used for specifying a barcode font. -bs
psEmbeddedFontType type3 (default) type42 A type of font that will be embedded in PostScript.  
tabsize 8 Pasta replaces a tab with the number of spaces specified in this option. N/A
errorlogfile (standard error output) Set this option to have Pasta create a log file. -el

Arabic, Hebrew and Thai Options

Key Name Default Value Description Equivalent Command Line Option
thai_space_compensation n In the Thai language, some characters are combined into one glyph. If this option is set to "y", Pasta will align your report by adding spaces at the end of the column that includes combined characters. N/A
bidi_algorithm oracle If you set this option to "unicode", Pasta follows the Unicode BiDi algorithm. Setting the value to "oracle" will use Oracle's algorithm. N/A
direction default Options are "ltr" (left-to-right), "rtl" (right-to-left), and "default" (depends on NLS_LANGUAGE setting). N/A
dolayout y To layout the text, set this option to "y". If not, set it to "n". N/A
doshaping y To shape the text, set this option to "y". If not, set it to "n". This option is for Arabic only. N/A
numerals context Possible values are "arabic" for Arabic numerals, "hindi" for Hindi numerals, or "context" to use Arabic or Hindi depending on the context. Required for Arabic data only. N/A

Related Topics

Setup for Basic Printing with Pasta

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Command Line Parameters

Command Line Parameters

When using the Pasta utility from the command line, you can use the options below.

FNDPSTAX [options]
Variable Description
-c<number> <number> specifies the number of copies to print.
-el<logfile> Specifies the error log file's path and name. The path is the absolute path to the error log file.
-f<filename> <filename> specifies the input file name. Example: -fmyfile.txt
-F<cfgfile> Specifies the configuration file's path and name.
-h<rate> Adjusts the space between lines. The default value is 1.0. If <rate> is larger than 1, the space between lines will be larger.
-w<rate> Adjusts the space between characters. The default value is 1.0. If <rate> is larger than 1.0, the space between characters will be larger.
-l Print in landscape mode. (The default is portrait).
-o<filename> <filename> specifies the output file name.
-s<size> Overrides the font size option in pasta.cfg.
-bs<size> Overrides the font size in -s and fontsize for bold font.
-np No print option.
-ph<height> <height> specifies the paper height in inches.
-pw<width> <width> specifies the paper width in inches.
-pform<psfile><pf file> Converts a PostScript file <ps file> to a PrintForm file <pf file>.
-pf<pf file> <pf file> specifies a PrintForm file to be merged in a Pasta output at runtime.
-pn<printername> <printername> specifies the printer name.
-t<banner title> Banner option for use with the Unix lp command.
-v Displays the version number.
-x<ps|text.[charset|auto]> Specifies the output format. Two output formats are supported: PostScript ("ps") and text ("text").

Related Topics

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Modify/Add Printer Type to Use Pasta

Setting Margins

Printing a Report Using the noprint Option

Generating Other Formats Using the Preprocessing Option

Font Source

Language-Specific Font Support

Configuration File Options

Using PrintForms

PrintForms is a feature of the E-Business Suite that allows you to create your own background template for a report and use it at print-time either as a background image (such as your company logo) or as a standard form (such as an invoice).

The PrintForm process combines the input report file and the background template file to generate one PostScript file, which is then passed to a PostScript printer.

Because this process is executed at print-time, the need to customize report definitions is eliminated, which also simplifies maintenance. Moreover, using the PrintForm as a standard form can replace printing solutions that require expensive preprinted stationery and specialized printers.

There are two phases to using PrintForms:

  1. Create the PrintForm

  2. Deploy the PrintForm to Oracle E-Business Suite

    Note: The following instructions are general guidelines for creating and using PrintForms. For more detailed instructions see the "Pasta User's Guide Release 3.0" available in Knowledge Document 239196.1 on My Oracle Support.

Create the PrintForm

Creating a PrintForm is a five-step process:

  1. Create an image file using the supported editor of your choice.

  2. Convert the image file to a PostScript file (.ps).

  3. Convert the PostScript file to a PrintForm file (.pf) to use as your template.

  4. Place the PrintForm file in the appropriate directory.

  5. Update printer driver information (in the Printer Drivers window) to use the PrintForm.

Create an image file

The following editors can be used to create the image file that will become your PrintForm template.

When creating your image file ensure that the paper size, margin settings, and style of the document are appropriate for the report you are fitting the template to.

Note: Even if you need only one type of image (such as a company logo added to all your reports), you must create one PrintForm for each print style that you plan to use (such as portrait, landscape, and landwide) with the appropriate placement of the image for the style.

Convert the image file to a PostScript file

The PrintForm template file must be created from a PostScript file. The PostScript file can be generated in one of the following ways:

  1. Generate a PostScript file from Oracle Reports.

  2. Convert any Windows application file (such as Microsoft Word or PowerPoint) to PostScript using the Adobe Generic Printer Driver "save to file" option.

  3. Convert any PDF file to PostScript using a third-party utility, such as Xpdf (available for Windows and Unix platforms).

    Note: For information about downloading and using Xpdf see http://www.foolabs.com/xpdf/

Convert the PostScript file to a PrintForm file

Use a Pasta command line parameter to convert the PostScript file to a PrintForm (.pf) file. During this process comments are added to the PostScript file.

The syntax for the command line is as follows:

FNDPSTAX -pform <PostScript template file>.ps <PrintForm file>.pf

For more information about Pasta command line parameters, see Command Line Parameters.

Deploying the PrintForm to Oracle E-Business Suite consists of the following steps:

  1. Place the PrintForm in the APPL_TOP.

  2. Update the printer driver information.

  3. Restart the Concurrent Manager.

Place the PrintForm in the appropriate directory

You can place the PrintForm file anywhere under APPL_TOP in the Concurrent Processing node, but Oracle recommends that you put the file under the FND_TOP/resource/<lang> directory, where <lang> is the language code (such as US for English or KO for Korean).

Update the printer driver information

  1. Navigate to the Printer Drivers form.

  2. Query up the printer driver to which you want to add the PrintForm option.

  3. Edit the Arguments field for the printer driver to use the PrintForm in the appropriate directory.

    For example, if you place a PrintForm called logo_ls.pf in the $FND_TOP/resource/US directory and you want to apply the PrintForm to the PASTA_LANDSCAPE driver, edit the Arguments field as follows:

-pn$PROFILES$.PRINTER -f$PROFILES$.FILENAME -c$PROFILES$.CONC_COPIES -l -pf<FND_TOP>/resource/US/logo_ls.pf

where <FND_TOP> is the actual path for your $FND_TOP.

For more information about this form, see Printer Drivers Window.

Restart the Concurrent Manager

You must restart the concurrent manager for this to take effect. See Printer Setup Information is Cached on Demand.

Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) Integration

CUPS is a third-party product that provides printing service to most PostScript printers and raster printers. It is based on the Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) technology making it open to any system that supports IPP. CUPS can run on various kinds of Unix systems, such as Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, Tru64, and major Linux distributions. CUPS is provided under the GNU GPL license.

For more details about CUPS, refer to http://www.cups.org/

Two integration scenarios are described in the following sections:

Scenario 1: All printers connected to a single CUPS server residing on the E-Business Suite concurrent processing node

This scenario is graphically depicted in the following diagram:

the picture is described in the document text

There are no special configuration steps required if the printer system has been replaced with CUPS on the server.

If you maintain both the System V printing system and CUPS, you must define a new printer type with the required print styles and printer drivers.

  1. Create a new Pasta configuration file for CUPS in the $FND_TOP/resource directory (example: pasta_cups.cfg).

  2. Ensure that the lp command that is set for the printCommand parameter in the Pasta configuration file is a CUPS lp command. You can specify the full path to the command if you maintain both the UNIX standard lp command and the CUPS lp command.

  3. Create a set of printer drivers for each print style with the configuration file created in Step 1.

    Example:

    Printer Driver Name: PASTA_LANDSCAPE_CUPS

    Arguments:

    -pn$PROFILES$.PRINTER -f$PROFILES$.FILENAME -cPROFILES$.CONC_COPIES -l -Fpasta_cups.cfg

    You can refer to the existing printer driver definitions created by Oracle, such as PASTA_LANDSCAPE, PASTA_PORTRAIT, or PASTA_LANDWIDE.

  4. Create a printer type for the CUPS printer.

    Example:

    Printer Type: Pasta printer for CUPS

    Print Style Printer Driver
    LANDSCAPE PASTA_LANDSCAPE_CUPS
    PORTRAIT PASTA_PORTRAIT_CUPS
    LANDWIDE PASTA_LANDWIDE_CUPS
  5. Register your printer with the print style.

Scenario 2: Multiple CUPS distributed servers with printers connected to each CUPS server

The following figure displays multiple CUPS distributed servers with multiple printers attached to each:

the picture is described in the document text

In this scenario, one printer type is required for each server on which a CUPS process is running with a physical printer.

  1. Create a Pasta configuration file in the $FND_TOP/resource directory for each server on which the CUPS process is running .

    For example: pasta_cups1.cfg, pasta_cups2.cfg, pasta_cups3.cfg

  2. For each configuration file, make the following change:

    printCommand=lp -h<cupshost> -d{printername}

    where <cupshost> is replaced with the actual server name.

    Make sure that the lp command is a CUPS lp command. You can specify the full path to the command if you maintain both the UNIX standard lp command and the CUPS lp command.

    Leave {printername} as is. This parameter will be replaced by Pasta at runtime with the actual printer name.

  3. Create a set of printer drivers for each print style with the configuration file created in Step 1.

    Example:

    Printer Driver Name: PASTA_LANDSCAPE_CUPS1

    Arguments:

    -pn$PROFILES$.PRINTER -f$PROFILES$.FILENAME -cPROFILES$.CONC_COPIES -l -Fpasta_cups1.cfg

    You can refer to the existing printer driver definitions created by Oracle, such as PASTA_LANDSCAPE, PASTA_PORTRAIT, or PASTA_LANDWIDE.

  4. Create a printer type for each server in Oracle E-Business Suite.

    For example: Pasta printer CUPS1, Pasta printer CUPS2, Pasta printer CUPS3

    Add the required print styles associated with the printer drivers to the printer type.

    Example:

    Printer Type: Pasta printer for CUPS1

    Print Style Printer Driver
    LANDSCAPE PASTA_LANDSCAPE_CUPS1
    PORTRAIT PASTA_PORTRAIT_CUPS1
    LANDWIDE PASTA_LANDWIDE_CUPS1
  1. Register your printer with the print style.

    For example, if printer1 is defined on the server CUPS1 and you have created Pasta printer CUPS1 printer type for the server, register printer1 with the Pasta printer CUPS1 printer type.

Related Topics

Printers Window

Printer Types Window

Print Styles Window

Printer Drivers Window

Defining Configuration Files for Specific Printers

Configuration File Options

Customizing Printing Support in Oracle E-Business Suite

Oracle E-Business Suite provides numerous predefined printer types with which you can identify your printers, as well as print styles that define the dimensions of Oracle Reports output files, and printer drivers that instruct the various printer types how to output the selected print style.

Use the Printer Types form to query the combinations of print style and printer driver that support each type of printer you have.

Important: Predefined printing components may have to be modified for different printer types and/or operating platforms.

For example, if a blank page is being printed after each printed page, the number of rows defined for the print style may need to be reduced, or an escape sequence that is being interpreted differently, creating a page eject command, may have to be rewritten.

Verify and, if necessary, Customize Printer Driver Definitions

Upon installation for any printer type you are using, verify your printer driver definitions, particularly the following:

If you need to define a new print style, verify the printer driver you assign to the new print style, for any printer type you use.

Verify and, if necessary, Customize Oracle Reports SRW Drivers

If you have a printer type that does not properly interpret the control characters in the SRW driver files that set page breaks, bold on/off and underline on/off attributes in your Oracle Reports files, you can copy the SRW driver file and modify it.

Creating Custom Printer Drivers

If necessary, edit the Initialization string and the Reset string for the printer type you are using. Refer to your printer's user guide for instructions. The Initialization and Reset fields appear on the Printer Drivers form.

Edit your Initialization string or Reset string if:

Printer Driver Methods

There are three methods to invoke a printer driver:

Variable Description
Command The concurrent manager can issue an operating system print command and its arguments.
An operating system print command, along with all its arguments, is entered in the Arguments field of the Printer Drivers form.
Program The concurrent manager can call a custom print program and pass arguments to the program.
The name of a custom print program is entered in the Program Name field and any arguments to be passed to the program are entered in the Arguments field of the Printer Drivers form.
Subroutine The concurrent manager can call a predefined Oracle E-Business Suite subroutine that passes a print command and arguments to the printer via the operating system.
A subroutine is predefined by Oracle E-Business Suite, and the name is entered in the Program Name field of the Printer Drivers form.
The arguments field is disregarded when the driver method is Subroutine. However, the concurrent manager reads the Initialization and Reset escape sequences.
On UNIX systems, the subroutine method, unlike the command method, does not start an operating system shell along with the print command.

Example - Using the Program Driver Method

The Program driver method allows customers to define their own custom print programs. For example, your company might want to write a custom program that opens a file, allows the file to be edited and saved under a second filename, then sends the second (edited) file on to the printer by issuing the print command. This method of issuing print commands is called a filter.

Location for Custom Print Programs

To call a custom print program using the Printer Drivers form, the program name, including the full path to the program, should be entered in the Program Name field.

The path to the program name is not necessary if the program's location can be identified by the operating system's PATH environment variable (i.e., is in the $PATH variable name).

For platforms where the equivalent of a $PATH variable doesn't exist, then use the full path name. A path can be up to 255 characters.

Custom print programs are not registered as concurrent programs with Oracle Application Object Library, but are called after the concurrent process has completed.

Using Operating System Shell Scripts

For operating system shell scripts, the printer driver method can be either command or program, as long as you populate the argument field correctly.

The script for a command shell procedure should reside in:

$FND_TOP/$APPLBIN.  

Arguments That a Concurrent Manager Can Supply Values For

The concurrent manager can supply four different values as arguments to the operating system print command it issues, or to a custom print program that it calls. An example of using these values as arguments follows.

Example - Entering a Print Command and Arguments

In this example, the UNIX print command "lp" is entered along with the arguments that a concurrent manager can supply values for. While print commands vary, the tokens for which values are retrieved are always the same.

Because print commands are operating system dependent, please refer to Oracle E-Business Suite Installation Guide: Using Rapid Install .

Example - Printer Drivers Form's Arguments field:

lp -d$PROFILES$.PRINTER -n$PROFILES$.CONC_COPIES -t"$PROFILES$.TITLE" $PROFILES$.FILENAME

The following table lists arguments and their contents for the UNIX lp print command:

Argument Syntax Token and Value Retrieved
-d$PROFILES$.PRINTER -d calls out the destination printer. $PROFILES$.PRINTER retrieves the operating system name of the printer associated with the request.
-n$PROFILES$.CONC_COPIES -n calls out the number of copies to print. $PROFILES$.CONC_COPIES retrieves the value of the profile option Concurrent:Report Copies, unless this value is updated at runtime.
-t"$PROFILES$.TITLE" -t calls out the report title to print on a banner or header page. "$PROFILES$.TITLE" retrieves the title of the output file, typically titled as Application username.Request ID. For example, if user John Smith ran a report whose concurrent request ID was 64225, the title would be JSMITH.64225. This is operating system dependent.
$PROFILES$.FILENAME $PROFILES$.FILENAME calls out the filename of the report to be printed. The value retrieved is the output file name, including the path to the file.
Note that this file is a temporary file created from information from the Printer Driver definition (from the Printer Drivers window) and the actual output for the report.

In addition, the following table lists arguments and their contents in the cases of an original print request and reprint requests:

Argument Syntax Original Print Request Value Retrieved Reprint Value Retrieved
$PROFILE$.ORIGREQID Request ID. Original request ID.
$PROFILE$.ORIGUSERNAME User name. Original user name.
$PROFILE$.REPREQID 0 (zero) Reprint request ID.
$PROFILE$.REPUSERNAME NULL Reprint request user name.
$PROFILE$.OUTFILENAME Output file path and filename. Output file path and filename.
Note that the file here contains only the report output.
$PROFILE$.OUTFILEHOST Host name. Host name.

Using Standard Input

When Standard Input is set to Yes, the printer driver accepts standard input, so you can feed a report's output directly to the printer from standard input. Two examples of using standard input are:

The Standard Input field should be set to No when the Driver Method is set to Program or Subroutine. Unless the program accepts standard input, the Standard Input field should always be set to No.

Important: When Standard Input is set to No, the print command issued by the concurrent manager runs asynchronously. That is, the concurrent manager issues the command, and does not wait for an operating system response.

Using Initialization and Reset Strings

Use the initialization and reset strings to set and reset the orientation, character set and line density for your printer.

Initialization and reset strings consist of control characters and escape sequences.

For nonprintable characters, you may represent their value in octal mode. For example, 0x26 is represented as “ /046 ". As an example, if you need to represent the escape sequence:

^ [ ^ L ^ [ l 6 D ( 0 x 26 )

you can represent it as:

/ e ^ L / e l 6 D / 0 4 6

Using a Spool File

When Spool File is set to No, then a temporary file is created where the initialization and reset strings are inserted, and the file is sent to the print command or program.

Set the Spool File to Yes only if the print program creates its own temporary file. This option is recommended when using the Program driver method and the print program creates its own temporary file.

This option helps to reduce the creation of temporary files, since the concurrent manager will not create a temporary file when Spool File is set to Yes.

When Spool File is set to Yes, it is recommended that the:

This option does not apply to the Subroutine driver method.

Creating Custom SRW Drivers

SRW drivers are read by Oracle Reports when a report is generated, and insert control characters that tell the destination printer where to set page breaks, and which characters to format as bold or underlined.

SRW drivers only pertain to Oracle Reports output files. An SRW driver is used during the generation of a report. A printer driver is used when the completed output file is sent to the printer.

SRW drivers are designed for the DEC LN03 printer, and all printers that understand the same control characters as the LN03.

Location and Content of SRW Driver Files

SRW driver files reside in $FND_TOP/$APPLREP, and have the file extension “.prt". The predefined SRW file names are:

Creating a Custom SRW Driver

You can customize any of the SRW driver files to support a printer type that is not correctly interpreting the control characters used to set page breaks and format text as bold or underlined in Oracle Reports files.

For example, you may need to change the control characters that instruct the printer to set a page break.

on an LN03   on an XYZ LaserInk   
new page ... ^L      ^[E 

If you need to change formatting control characters for page breaks, underlined text, or bold text in Oracle Reports:

SRW Drivers - Print Styles and Printer Drivers

When the concurrent manager calls Oracle Reports to run a report, the SRW driver name is passed as a parameter to Oracle Reports.

The SRW driver is not required because some customers might be using styles or printer drivers for non-Oracle Reports programs.

The SRW driver name you enter in the Print Styles and Printer Drivers forms is used in slightly different ways depending on whether you are printing or simply viewing the report.

If you run an Oracle Reports program without printing the output file, the SRW driver associated with the report's print style is used.

If you run an Oracle Reports program and print the output file, the SRW driver that is correct for the destination printer type is chosen by selecting the SRW driver associated with the printer driver.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Creating Custom Printer Drivers

Print Styles field help

Printer Drivers field help

Hierarchy of Printer and Print Style Assignments

A printer and a print style can be chosen and their identities can be included in a concurrent program's definition. When a concurrent program is defined to send its output to a specific printer, or is required to generate its output in a specific print style, those values cannot be overridden by users, or by report set default settings, or by user profile default settings.

Often, a default value can be set in more than one way. This leads to a hierarchical relationship among the various default settings, where one default takes precedence over another. The diagram below illustrates the order of how printer or print style values are read by the concurrent manager when submitting a report program to run.

Important: Defining a concurrent program with a default print style, or requiring a concurrent program to output a specific print style, does not make that style available at a printer. You must assign the print style, and its corresponding printer driver, to each printer type you wish to print from.

The concurrent manager reads the printer value using the following hierarchy: concurrent program definition, report set definition, printer user profile option value, and value specified by user during report submission.

The concurrent manager reads the print style value using the following hierarchy: concurrent program definition, report set definition, and value specified by user during report submission.

the picture is described in the document text

Hierarchy of Printer Assignments

As System Administrator, you can restrict concurrent programs and reports to direct their output to a specific printer. Restricting a program or report's output to a specific printer overrides user profile option settings and prevents report set or user runtime printer choices.

If a printer is not included as part of a concurrent program's definition, then default printer settings may be entered, as indicated in the table below. Users can override any default setting at runtime.

The following table describes the printer assignment hierarchy:

Form Explanation
Concurrent Programs System Administrator As System Administrator, you can define a concurrent program to always direct its output to only one specific printer.
This setting cannot be overridden at runtime or when defining a report in a report set.
Request Set System Administrator As System Administrator, you can assign a default printer to a report within a report set.
Request Set Application Users Users can assign a default printer to a report within a report set, when they own the report set.
This default setting can be changed by the System Administrator.
Personal Profile Values Application Users Users can assign a default printer for all their reports using their Personal Profile Values form.
This assignment overrides the default Printer profile option set by the System Administrator.
System Profile Values System Administrator As System Administrator, you can assign a default printer to an installation site, Oracle application, responsibility, or user.
Users can override this setting at runtime.

Hierarchy of Print Style Assignments

As System Administrator, you can require concurrent programs and reports to generate their output in a specific print style. Requiring a program's or a report's output to be in a specific print style prevents report set or user runtime print style choices.

Requirements for alternate print styles

All concurrent programs whose execution method is “Oracle Reports" require a print style to be selected when the program is defined. When the print style is not designated as a required print style, then other print styles may be selected, either as a default for a report in a report set, or at runtime when submitting the report, if two conditions are satisfied:

The following table describes the print style assignment hierarchy:

Form Explanation
Concurrent Programs System Administrator As System Administrator, you can require a concurrent program to generate its output in a specific print style.
This setting cannot be overridden at runtime or when defining a report in a report set.
If a Print Style is entered in a program definition, but is not required, it serves as the first default setting to be read.
Request Set System Administrator As System Administrator, you can assign a default print style to a report within a report set.
Request Set Application Users Users can assign a default print style to a report within a report set, when they own the report set.
This default setting can be changed by the System Administrator.

System Administrator Printer and Print Style Settings

Program Definitions, Printers and Print Styles

As System Administrator you can restrict programs to send their output files only to a specified printer, for example, a printer in a secure office, using the Concurrent Programs form. You can also require a report to generate its output in a specific print style.

Assigning Default Printers and Print Styles to Reports in a Set

As System Administrator you can identify a default printer for each report within a report set, and assign a default print style for each report, using the Request Set form.

Assigning Default Printers Using Profile Options

As System Administrator you can identify a printer as a default printer for your installation site, a specific Oracle Application, a specific responsibility, or any of your end users, by setting the “Printer" user profile option in the System Profile Values window.

Users can override a default profile option value by:

End User Printer and Print Style Settings

End users may:

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Setting up Your Printers

Printer Setup with Pasta:

Printers

Print Styles

Printer Drivers

Postscript Printing in UNIX

You can convert your report output files into postscript format when printing in some UNIX environments by using the enscript UNIX utility.

Important: Refer to your UNIX documentation before using enscript. Usage and the arguments employed by enscript may be specific to your platform.

Concurrent Manager Arguments

The concurrent manager can supply four different values as arguments to an operating system print command or custom print program. See the example of using all four values provided by the concurrent manager. See: Example - Entering a Print Command and Arguments

See the example of using the enscript UNIX utility and two of the values the concurrent manager supplies as arguments. See: Example - Using the UNIX Enscript Command.

Enscript Arguments and Print Styles

The following table lists some sample enscript arguments, using the Courier font, for converting a report's output into postscript for the portrait, landscape, landwide, and A4 print styles.

Print Style Enscript Arguments Explanation Result
Portrait -fCourier10 Font is Courier 10 point. 80 characters portrait
Landscape -r -fCourier8 -r rotates the printer's output 90 degrees to print in landscape mode. Font is Courier 8 point. 132 characters landscape
Landwide -r -fCourier6 -r rotates the printer's output 90 degrees to print in landscape mode. Font is Courier 6 point. 180 characters landscape
A4 -fCourier10 Font is Courier 10 point. 132 characters landscape (A4 paper)

Example - Using Enscript to Print Postscript

In this example, the enscript command, followed by its arguments, is entered in the Arguments field of the Printer Drivers window, and the Driver Method is set to Command.

Printer Drivers window Arguments field:

 enscript -r -fCourier8 -B -P$PROFILES$.PRINTER $PROFILES$.FILENAME

The following table explains the syntax for the enscript command.

Syntax Explanation
-r Enscript argument. Rotates the printer's output 90 degrees to print in landscape mode.
-fCourier8 Enscript argument. -f selects the font, in this example the font is Courier with a point size of 8.
-B Enscript argument. Omits page headings.
-P$PROFILES$.PRINTER Enscript argument. -P precedes the name of the printer which the output is sent to. Concurrent manager token. $PROFILES$.PRINTER retrieves the operating system name of the printer associated with the request.
$PROFILES$.FILENAME Concurrent manager token. $PROFILES$.FILENAME calls out the filename of the report to be printed. The value retrieved is the output file name, including the path to the file.
Note that this file is a temporary file created from information from the Printer Driver definition (from the Printer Drivers window) and the actual output for the report.

In this example, the UNIX enscript command is entered along with two arguments that a concurrent manager can supply values for.

The following table lists additional arguments and their contents in the cases of an original print request and reprint requests:

Argument Syntax Original Print Request Value Retrieved Reprint Value Retrieved
$PROFILE$.ORIGREQID Request ID. Original request ID.
$PROFILE$.ORIGUSERNAME User name. Original user name.
$PROFILE$.REPREQID 0 (zero) Reprint request ID.
$PROFILE$.REPUSERNAME NULL Reprint request user name.
$PROFILE$.OUTFILENAME Output file path and filename. Output file path and filename.
Note that the file here contains only the report output.
$PROFILE$.OUTFILEHOST Host name. Host name.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Setting up Your Printers

Hierarchy of Printer and Print Style Assignments

Printer Types Window

the picture is described in the document text

Use this window to define a printer type and to assign print styles and their corresponding printer drivers to the printer type.

Defining printer types allows you to assign print style and printer driver definitions to any number of printers by registering the printers as a specific “type".

When users choose a printer to send a report to, the available print styles are normally determined by the printer type.

Concurrent programs, however, can be defined to require their report output in a specific print style. For example, some Oracle Reports programs may require a specific print style in order to print correctly.

Important: You should issue a Restart concurrent manager command for all currently active managers whenever you edit an existing Printer Type, Print Style, or Printer Driver.

See: Controlling Concurrent Managers

Printer Types Block

Type

Enter a name for a printer type. Example printer types might be “LINE" for a line printer or “LN03" for an LN03 model printer.

You select this printer type when you register a printer using the Printers window.

Printer Drivers Block

Use this block to assign print styles and printer drivers to your printer types.

The Style button opens the Printer Styles window.

The Driver button opens the Printer Drivers window.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Setting up Your Printers

Printers

Print Styles

Printer Drivers

Printers Window

the picture is described in the document text

Printers Block

Printer

Enter the name your operating system specifies for the printer.

Type

Select your printer type (i.e., manufacturer and model). Some reports require a printer of a specific type in order to print correctly.

You can only select a previously defined printer type. Use the Printer Types button to open a window to define a printer type.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Setting up Your Printers

Printer Types field help

Print Styles field help

Printer Drivers field help

Print Styles Window

the picture is described in the document text

Use this window to define print styles. A print style describes how your report should be printed. For example, print style determines the:

Oracle E-Business Suite reports are designed to work with standard, shipped print styles. The following print styles are predefined:

Not all reports work with all print styles. You may define additional print styles to customize your reports.

Once defined, a print style cannot be deleted.

Print Styles Block

Define a print style. The combination of Name and User Name uniquely identifies a print style.

Important: You should issue a Restart concurrent manager command for all currently active managers whenever you edit an existing Printer Type, Print Style, or Printer Driver.

See: Controlling Concurrent Managers.

Style Name

Multiple print styles display alphabetically in a list window.

You cannot update a print style's name.

Sequence

Enter a number that determines the display sequence for your print style when performing a query in this window. A negative sequence number appears before zero, and zero appears before a positive sequence number.

User Style

This user name does not appear anywhere except this window.

SRW Driver

Enter the name of the Oracle Reports (SRW) driver to be called when printing an applications report generated by Oracle Reports. This field is used only by applications reports generated by Oracle Reports.

Layout Block

Columns

Enter the number of columns your print style defines.

Rows

Enter the number of rows your print style defines.

Suppress Header

Reports may print with a header page that indicates who requested the report and when. Check the Supress Header check box to define a print style that suppresses printing of this header page.

For example, suppressing the header page when printing checks prevents a check from being overwritten and maintains the orderly sequence of check numbers.

Orientation

Enter the orientation of your printed page, for example, portrait or landscape.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Printer Types field help

Printers field help

Printer Drivers field help

Printer Drivers Window

the picture is described in the document text

Use this window to define your printer driver and printer commands.

Important: You should issue a Restart concurrent manager command for all currently active managers whenever you edit an existing Printer Type, Print Style, or Printer Driver.

Oracle E-Business Suite ships printer drivers for the following print styles:

Oracle E-Business Suite also ships printer drivers for specific printer types, including the following:

Define additional printer drivers if you have different types of printers, or define additional print styles.

Printer Drivers Window Fields

Driver Name

The printer driver name must be unique for a given platform.

User Driver

This user name is referenced by Oracle E-Business Suite and must be unique for a given platform.

SRW Driver

Enter the name of the Oracle Reports (SRW) printer driver, if any, that will be invoked by your printer driver. Only Oracle Reports programs require this information.

Enter the entire path to the file, or just the file name. If you enter only the file name, Oracle E-Business Suite assumes the file is located in the $FND_TOP/$APPLREP directory.

Platform

Select the platform for which the printer driver is defined. Do not assign platform codes to printer drivers unless you have multiple drivers of the same name. If it cannot find a specific platform code associated with a driver, the concurrent manager will default to the driver with a null platform code.

Driver Method Region

Variable Description
Command The printer driver executes within an operating system shell. An example is the lpr command in UNIX.
Program The printer driver executes directly as a program, not through an operating system shell.
  • An example is a C standalone program for printing.

  • This method executes faster than the Command method, but cannot access shell commands like PRINT on MS-DOS.

Subroutine The printer driver executes a predefined Oracle E-Business Suite routine.
Subroutines are specific to operating platforms and are invoked directly by a system call from the concurrent manager

Driver Method Parameters Region

Spool File

Select whether the printer driver creates its own copy of a file for printing. If this check box is checked when the Driver Method is set to Program, the print program creates its own spool file.

Standard Input

Select whether the printer driver accepts standard input. Uncheck this check box when the Driver Method is set to Program. Unless the program accepts standard input, this check box should always be unchecked.

Program Name

If the driver method is Program, enter the full path to the program that the driver invokes. The path is not necessary if the program's location can be identified by the operating system's PATH environment variable. See Location for Custom Print Programs.

If the driver method is Subroutine, enter the subroutine name that the driver invokes.

Arguments

When the Driver Method is set to Program, enter any generic arguments that must be supplied to the print program.

When the Driver Method is set to Command, enter the full command and its arguments.

Initialization

Enter the initialization string that must be sent to the printer before the printer driver can begin printing.

Reset

Enter the reset string that returns the printer to its ready state when printing is complete.

[ ]

The double brackets ([ ]) identify a descriptive flexfield that you can use to add data fields to this form without programming.

This descriptive flexfield allows you to define special commands specific to your printer driver and/or the platform it runs on.

Related Topics

Overview of Printers and Printing

Printer Types, Print Styles, and Printer Drivers

Creating Custom Printer Drivers