Important Notice

The pages on this site contain documentation for very old MS-DOS software, purely for historical purposes. If you're looking for up-to-date documentation, particularly for programming, you should not rely on the information found here, as it will be woefully out of date.

                                                     ◄Up► ◄Next► ◄Previous►
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
 
All printer drivers are required to export the DeviceMode function, which
displays a dialog box to edit the default environment. This function sets
the profile strings in the WIN.INI file for the options chosen by the user.
It should also set the environment using the SetEnvironment function. The
DeviceMode function uses USER functions, such as DialogBox (USER.240), to
display dialog boxes.
 
The most common way to call DeviceMode is with Control Panel. However, other
applications that make heavy use of printer output, such as Microsoft Write
or Microsoft Excel, may also provide a means for calling the printer
driver's DeviceMode function.
 
Windows 3.x drivers also export two environment-related functions,
ExtDeviceMode and DeviceCapabilities. These functions are designed to allow
greater application control over the printer environment. All printer
drivers should implement these functions.
 
ExtDeviceMode enables the application to call the driver to obtain device
initialization data either from the user or from the application's
modifications to the default environment. GDI then calls the Enable function
with a pointer to this information, allowing the driver to preset its
GDIINFO and PDEVICE structures according to the application's options,
rather than the defaults. That way, the application can store different
printer settings for itself and its documents or even request specific setup
properties, such as orientation.
 
DeviceCapabilities enables the application to get information about such
things as what DeviceMode fields the driver uses and what limits, ranges, or
selections are valid.
 
Indexes for the DeviceCapabilities Function
 
Printer drivers must process requests from applications for new
DeviceCapabilities indexes. A driver's DeviceCapabilities function must
check for and process the following values.
 
Value                     Meaning
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
DC_ENUMRESOLUTIONS (13)   Retrieves a list of resolutions supported by the
                          model.
 
DC_FILEDEPENDENCIES (14)  Retrieves a list of filenames which also need to
                          be installed when the driver is installed.
 
DC_TRUETYPE (15)          Retrieves the driver's capabilities with regard to
                          printing TrueType fonts.
 
DC_PAPERNAMES (16)        Enumerates the actual string describing the paper
                          names.
 
DC_ORIENTATION (17)       Retrieves the relationship between Portrait and
                          Landscape orientations in terms of the number of
                          degrees that portrait orientation is to be rotated
                          counterclock-wise to get landscape orientation.
 
DC_COPIES (18)            Retrieves the maximum number of copies the device
                          can print.
 
The implementation of one or all of the indices is optional. If a driver
does not implement a given index, the DeviceCapabilities function should
return -1. For more information about the new indices, see the
◄DeviceCapabilities► function.
 
New Paper Sizes
 
There are 21 new predefined paper sizes. The include file, PRINT.H, contains
a complete list of all supported paper sizes. Applications typically call
the DeviceCapabilities function to retrieve names and sizes of the supported
paper sizes, so printer drivers must be ready to process the following
DeviceCapabilities index values:
 
Value          Meaning
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
DC_PAPER       Retrieves the identifiers of the listed paper sizes.
 
DC_PAPERNAMES  Retrieves the names of the listed paper sizes.
 
DC_PAPERSIZES  Retrieves the width and height of the listed paper sizes.
 
 
                                      ♦