Original LXSeries Forum

(Thanks, Claude for being so swift and helpful in answering my other inquiries!)

I have a printer capable of printing tabloid sized (11x17) color prints. I want all of my plots to be that size on one page.

I thought I had it done yesterday. I opened a new document. Set the page size to tabloid and then went to the Inspector and set thewidth and size ti 1 page each.

I then imported a scan of my stage layout with grid (I work in a thrust stage) as a background to use to "trace" all of the relevant layers I wanted to have in my plot template. I created 7 layers and saved it as my template. It printed out perfectly - I was happy.

Today, I came in to begin to do the fixes you had suggested to me from my other posts. I opened the template file I had saved and when I printed it, it printed on 2 letter size pages. I went to page setup, changed that to tabloid and the Inspector and changed that to 1 and one and when the tabloid print came out - my layout was xery small in the center of the paper???? HOW can I get it to remain the size and paper size I saved it as?

I also tried opening it - setting the page to tabloid and page numbers to 1 - the graphics appeared perfectly in the screen window - proper location and layout on the tabloid page - yet when I printed it - the image was small and in the middle of the tabloid page????

Help....

There's not much that LXFree does with the print info returned by the OS except store it with the plot. It is read back in and sent to the OS when a plot is opened. The only other thing that happens is that the print info is queried for the page size so that the correct page dimensions can be displayed in the Inspector.

If you send the OS version and version of the printer driver, I can see if it is possible to duplicate your problem.

Just as a guess, the OS may interpret the print info for the default printer when a plot is opened. You might need to re-do the page setup if the target printer is different. I don't know this to be true. But in trying to duplicate your problem, it would be helpful to know what printers are connected to your computer and which one is the default printer.

After further examination, it appears that the paper size was not being read properly with 10.3.9. This behavior may have extended to other drivers--only a simple Tabloid size for Any Printer was tested.

This lead to a change in the way that LXFree stores the printInfo with a plot. With LXFree v0.9.1211 there should be more complete saving of page setup and print settings.

Let me know if you have further problems after you try the new version.

OK - GOOD... I downloaded immediately the 0.91211.

I opened the latest re-do I had made of the layout (which was printing out in full scale on tabloids. I printed the new one - and it came out half sized in the middle of the tabloid page?? Even when - on screen - it showed me the full sized layout on a tabloid format white page?

Am I going to need to start the process of designing the templates completely anew with the 0.91211 version?

When I start a design layout - I first select the tabloid size in page setup - then import background image - trace over each element in the proper layer and proper color, etc and then save it..... when I print it - it is the right size. I brought in the new version - opened the layout - it looked fine on the tabloid page - I resaved it with the new version and when I printed it - got the small layout in the middle of the page.

so...... what now?

(I GREATLY appreciate your working with me on this. I am quite anxious to get this working for my rapidly approaching winter production in which I will be introducing this tool to a student designer - and want to reduce her frustrations! You have been quite special in working with me.... and I did fix the two other problems - have not yet been able to tackle the addition of the Cinabex colors.... but that is not nearly the worst of my worries. I can always put a C17 as color and get it to display in front of the instrument and on the paperwork - just minus the sexy colored light!

There is obviously something else (other than the way the page size is saved) happening with your printer. The problem that I was able to duplicate only happened under OS 10.3.9. So, to help you further, I will need to know the printer and operating system and attempt to re-create your problem.
Not knowing what printer driver, I can't advise you on any options to check. There may be a "fit to page" or "center on page" or some other option that is actually responsible for what is happening.
It may be a simple thing, but, I also have to ask: You are not printing with the plot zoomed out? If this was the case, you would end up with exactly what you describe because LXFree prints the same as the current view unless the printer driver is set to scale the output. For example, if your page setup is set to scale the plot to 50%, and the LXFree zoom is set to actual size, the same thing will happen-- the plot will print at half size.
You should be able to use the preview button rather than actually printing to check to see that the printer correctly prints in tabloid size from another application. You should also be able to "Save as PDF" rather than printing and should be able to check the output using Preview.
Along with sending the printer and operating system version, you can send a copy of the plot in question to lx@macluxpro.com and we can take a look at the internal printing information that is saved to try to determine what might be going on.

One more thing that was perhaps unclear about v0.9.1211 is that a plot saved with a previous version of LXFree still uses the prior method of storing the printInfo when read by 0.9.1211.
In order to have the file include the printInfo with the new method, you must select page setup, correct your settings and re-save the plot using 0.9.1211.
0.9.1211 can read printInfo stored with both the old and new methods but only saves using the newer, more complete, method.

Apple, for an unknown reason, requires an extra step to archive a NSPrintInfo object in order to save it along with a file's other data. The NSPrintInfo object is responsible for the page setup and other print settings.

Due to this fact, prior to v0.9.1211, LXFree only saved certain settings, such as the name of the paper size and its orientation. The complete NSPrintInfo object also contains private data structures known only to the printer driver. These structures require the extra step to be saved. Apparently, not all printer drivers can correctly choose the paper size based on the name and/or require their own extra information to correctly restore the page setup. Because the system checks to make sure that the page setup is valid, these drivers would "correct" the page setup information when a plot was loaded. This resulted in unexpected paper sizes being selected along with other apparently random behavior. (Such as a plot being inexplicably scaled when printed.)

v0.9.1211 now stores the entire NSPrintInfo object with the plot, so it can be completely restored. This produces the desired result: The page setup restores to how it was set (assuming that the printer driver that stored the information is available to validate it when the plot is loaded).

Plots saved with older versions of LXFree do not contain the entire NSPrintInfo object. So, it may be necessary to open the page setup dialog and then check document size before attempting to print them.

Even if a plot is saved using 0.9.1211 and later, you still may need to check the page setup if you move a plot to a different computer or if you update the system or the printer's driver.