How do I set the size of a printed page in java?

Question

I have written a program that uses the Java print API to print pages from a printer. I believe I have put in code to set the page size to letter, but it still prints on whatever size is default for the printer. Here is my printPage() method:

public void printPage() {
    getTot();
    PrinterJob job = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob();
    PageFormat pf = job.defaultPage();
    Paper paper = pf.getPaper();
    paper.setSize(8.5 * 72, 11 * 72);
    paper.setImageableArea(0.5 * 72, 0.0 * 72, 7.5 * 72, 10.5 * 72);
    pf.setPaper(paper);
    job.setPrintable(this);
    boolean ok = job.printDialog();
    if (ok) {
        if (cov)
            try {
                for (j = 0; j < printPaths.size(); j++)
                    job.print();
                cov = false;
            } catch (PrinterException ex) {
                System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
            }
        if (summ)
            try {
                job.print();
                summ = false;
            } catch (PrinterException ex) {
                System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
            }
    }

}

What am I doing wrong?

Solution 1

Can you try adding this piece of code and rerun :

Book book = new Book();//java.awt.print.Book
book.append(this, pf);
job.setPageable(book);

instead of

job.setPrintable(this);

Solution 2

Book didn't work for me with my multiple pages example (the result was the printing of only the first page), but it gave me another idea. Instead of :

Book book = new Book();//java.awt.print.Book
book.append(this, pf);
job.setPageable(book);

I tried another overloaded method and it worked for all pages:

PageFormat pf = job.defaultPage();
pf.setPaper(paper);
job.setPrintable(this, pf);

If you want custom paper size, you need to forward it to print method as an argument (which Java will do for you but you must pass it to setPrintable method). Changing PaperFormat after method starts to execute will have an effect only on the second and further pages or not have any effect at all.

Anyway, thanks to you both.

Comments

[SaintWacko]

Wow. That works perfectly. It even prints faster now! Can you explain what that does?

[mprabhat]

Glad it worked for you :), It provides the functionality where your page can have different pageformat, I believe you can provide different pages with different formatting though I have never used it :).

[Mohammed Falha]

have any idea how to solve this stackoverflow.com/questions/19983972/… @mprabhat

[GameDroids]

thanks for the hint with the second page, My changed didn't show any effect on a one page document until setting up the pageformat before executing the print job

[Onychomys]

The reason that book.append(this, pf) didn't work for a multi page print is that you have to tell Book going in how many pages to expect. So you'd need to do book.append(this, pf, 14) or whatever. If you omit the number of pages, it defaults to just doing the first page.