Connect a 488 printer as a windows printer

[scottyoo]

Hello,


I have an out-dated thermal GPIB printer that does not have a Windows driver. I use the NI488 card and NI4882 commands to communicate with it. I would like to "trick" the user into thinking they can print to any printer including this GPIB printer. I want them to be able to select any printer from the PrintDialog.

I would then intercept after the PrintDialog that they want to print to the GPIB printer and programatically send print commands to the GPIB printer.

Can I create a GPIB printer as a printer that comes up as a selection in the Windows printdialog?


Thanks for any ideas.

ScottyO

Message Edited by scottyoo on 05-18-2005 04:27 PM

[craigherdman]

ScottyO,

Unfortunately I'm just not sure how you can add your own printer to the list that is returned by the PrintDialog. I'm thinking that this information becomes 'known' to the OS when the printer driver is installed and registered. Since the idea here is to sort of circumvent this process I'm not positive that we can do it. I've poked around the MSDN and couldn't really find anything besides information on the PrintDlg call and such. Hopefully someone in the community has some experience with this!

Craig H.

Message Edited by Craig H. on 05-19-2005 04:17 PM