Name: wl91122 Date: 08/23/99


Printing in JDK 1.2
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Hello,

I have been working on printing for a while and I feel I have gotten the
most out of what the JDK can give me... Here are a few things that would
be good to have, and a few other suggestions:

 - There is no possibility (or non documented) to change the current
printer to print to, the current implementation supports only printing
to the default printer as set in the OS.
 - also, some printers have properties (e.g. duplex printing, side
perforation...), even if no direct support is given, I think some way of
passing Properties should be given _after_ a printer is selected.
 - For text printing or PostScript printing, or any other printing aside
from components in the AWT, there is no possibility of streaming to the
printer, or at least sending a byte array... maybe support for LPR?

 - a side comment: It seems a good idea to have the printing api under
io, in a way where the user would open a PrintingStream and output
characters to it for simple printing, or AWTPrintingStream to print
Components or others.

Walid Gedeon
(Review ID: 94268)
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