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dethell
Blue Pill
Joined: Jun 24, 2010
Posts: 3
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 Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 4:23 am Post subject: iPad printing via PrintCentral/WePrint |
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I am trying to print XLS and ODT files from my iPad using the PrintCentral app. PrintCentral uses a Helper app installed on my MBP called WePrint. Unfortunately, NeoOffice does not work properly when WePrint tries to tell it to print documents. According to the support staff for PrintCentral:
| Quote: | | WePrint will use your default Excel file application to print Excel documents. There is a setting in Excel to open the new document wizard at startup that gets in the way of printing. To turn off that setting go to the Excel menu -> Preferences, click on general and then uncheck "Show Project Gallery at Startup" |
And then they responded when I mentioned I didn't have Excel but used NeoOffice:
| Quote: | | NeoOffice probably doesn't support the standard system print command then. |
Do you have any idea if they are correct? What happens right now if I tell the WePrint server program to use NeoOffice to print XLS or ODS files NeoOffice just opens the document and does not print it. Their support did mention that OpenOffice for Mac should work so I assume that means NeoOffice should as well.
I realize this is slightly out of scope, perhaps, but I wanted to see what you thought.
David |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
Posts: 11949
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 9:03 am Post subject: Re: iPad printing via PrintCentral/WePrint |
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| dethell wrote: | | Do you have any idea if they are correct? What happens right now if I tell the WePrint server program to use NeoOffice to print XLS or ODS files NeoOffice just opens the document and does not print it. Their support did mention that OpenOffice for Mac should work so I assume that means NeoOffice should as well. |
I think that they are correct. I just tested sending a print command to OpenOffice.org 3.1.1 (the version that NeoOffice 3.1.1 is based on) by opening the print queue for my printer in the System Preference's Print & FAX panel. Then I dragged an .odt file onto the print queue icon in the Dock and OpenOffice.org displayed its native print dialog.
So I think that this is a bug in our code. Somewhere in NeoOffice we are failing to convert the native print command to the matching OpenOffice.org print command. I will investigate this bug and I will post again when I have some news to report.
Patrick |
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narf
The Anomaly
Joined: Jan 21, 2007
Posts: 1075
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 9:21 am Post subject: |
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I have created bug 3614 to track this issue.
Fran |
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sardisson
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Joined: Feb 01, 2004
Posts: 4588
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 11:23 am Post subject: |
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Patrick, if you haven't already seen it, this describes what methods AppKit looks for when passing off the print/'pdoc' AppleEvent to the application's own code.
My guess (without inspecting the NeoOffice codebase  ) is you'd need to implement one of those methods and have it call the OOo printing code.
Smokey
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"[...] whether the duck drinks hot chocolate or coffee is irrelevant." -- ovvldc and sardisson in the NeoWiki |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
Posts: 11949
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 11:51 am Post subject: |
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Smokey,
| sardisson wrote: | | My guess (without inspecting the NeoOffice codebase ) is you'd need to implement one of those methods and have it call the OOo printing code. |
I thought I made it clear in my post that I have implemented the proper native event handlers and that the problem is in the code that translates the native event to the matching internal OpenOffice.org code.
Patrick |
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sardisson
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Joined: Feb 01, 2004
Posts: 4588
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 1:00 pm Post subject: |
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| pluby wrote: | | I thought I made it clear in my post that I have implemented the proper native event handlers and that the problem is in the code that translates the native event to the matching internal OpenOffice.org code. |
I suppose "failing to convert the native print command" could be understood as either "the existing code to handle the 'pdoc' event isn't talking to the OOo print code correctly" or "there's no code to handle the 'pdoc' event and call the OOo print code"; to me it sounded like the latter, not the former Anyway, I'll let you get back to debugging the former 
Smokey
_________________
"[...] whether the duck drinks hot chocolate or coffee is irrelevant." -- ovvldc and sardisson in the NeoWiki |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
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dethell
Blue Pill
Joined: Jun 24, 2010
Posts: 3
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 7:26 pm Post subject: |
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It's better than it was in that now it correctly tries to print the document, but there are some issues resulting:
1) It opens the print dialog rather than just printing the document. I believe the standard behavior for the print command from outside the app is to print it without interaction from the user. This is especially important in my scenario since I'm on the iPad and not in front of the machine to handle the dialog box.
2) It has odd behavior for XLS files compared to ODS. In both cases it shows the print dialog. In the case of my XLS file when I click Preview nothing ever gets sent to the Preview app (save to PDF is the same). When I do the same for the ODS file it properly previews/prints/PDFs the file. Not sure why it would be different for XLS than for ODS.
Thanks for such quick turnaround on this bug. This whole issue is just a perfect example of why OpenOffice on the Mac is just not enough and why NeoOffice is necessary for dealing with native behavior like this. Keep up the great work! |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
Posts: 11949
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 7:52 pm Post subject: |
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| dethell wrote: | | 1) It opens the print dialog rather than just printing the document. I believe the standard behavior for the print command from outside the app is to print it without interaction from the user. This is especially important in my scenario since I'm on the iPad and not in front of the machine to handle the dialog box. |
Unfortunately, that is not feasible within NeoOffice. Due to the way that printing is implemented within NeoOffice, you will always see the print dialog appear no matter where the request to print originates from. Not that this helps you, but this is the same behavior that you see in Microsoft Office 2008.
| dethell wrote: | | 2) It has odd behavior for XLS files compared to ODS. In both cases it shows the print dialog. In the case of my XLS file when I click Preview nothing ever gets sent to the Preview app (save to PDF is the same). When I do the same for the ODS file it properly previews/prints/PDFs the file. Not sure why it would be different for XLS than for ODS. |
I have bad news: it appears that OpenOffice.org 3.1.1 cannot print even a simple .xls fils when such files are opened using the native print command. In the case of NeoOffice, we start the print job but the underlying OpenOffice.org 3.1.1 Calc code prints nothing. In OpenOffice.org 3.1.1 and 3.2.1, it is even worse in that the print dialog does not appear at all.
So, from what I can tell, NeoOffice's underlying OpenOffice.org code only supports printing of .odt, .ods, .odp, etc. files using the native print command.
Patrick |
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dethell
Blue Pill
Joined: Jun 24, 2010
Posts: 3
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| Posted: Fri Jun 25, 2010 2:08 am Post subject: |
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Well, at least I'm seeing the coded behavior and not something crazy. I appreciate your efforts in looking into this.
Here's a final question. Is there a way to tell NeoOffice to convert a document (odt or ods or xls) to convert to PDF without any dialog? I'm just wondering if that could be accomplished I might be able to get the doc to PDF first and then have Preview.app print the PDF without a dialog. |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
Posts: 11949
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| Posted: Fri Jun 25, 2010 8:57 am Post subject: |
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| dethell wrote: | | Here's a final question. Is there a way to tell NeoOffice to convert a document (odt or ods or xls) to convert to PDF without any dialog? I'm just wondering if that could be accomplished I might be able to get the doc to PDF first and then have Preview.app print the PDF without a dialog. |
In theory, that is possible. However, you would need to write a macro using the OpenOffice.org Basic language that does the "export as PDF" action. You would then using the Tools :: Customize menu and click on the Events tabs to get your macro to run when you open the document.
Writing macros is custom programming so although I can't help you write such a macro, I do know that you would also have to hardcode the file name that you want to save the PDF file to because if you don't, the native Save dialog will appear.
One other thing to be aware of is that if you implement such a macro, you should send NeoOffice a native "open document" event, not a "print document" event. The reason for this that NeoOffice's underlying OpenOffice.org code opens your file with macro execution disabled when it responds to a print document event.
Another possible option is to store your documents in NeoOffice Mobile. Then, if you log into NeoOffice Mobile from Safari on your iPhone or iPad, selecting a file will automatically download a PDF copy of your document.
Hope that helps.
Patrick |
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pluby
The Architect
Joined: Jun 16, 2003
Posts: 11949
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| Posted: Mon Aug 09, 2010 1:51 pm Post subject: |
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FYI. I have included the fix for the "print document" event bug in NeoOffice 3.1.1 Patch 2. The patch can be downloaded from the NeoOffice patch download page.
Patrick |
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