"Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
news:eoqIjGwuGHA.3552@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> Hello,
>
> Is there a way to send a string of text to a generic tekst printer under
> .NET.
> Somethings as in the good old days
> File f = Open("LPT1");
> f.Writeline("Blablabla");
>
> The goal is to use an old lineprinter as a log printer printing out each
> line (incomming allert) at a time without having to build a whole page
> before printing.
>
> Greets,
>
> Jean Paul
>

"Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]" <mvp@spam.guard.caspershouse.com> schreef
in bericht news:Ow%23uIMwuGHA.4512@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> Jean Paul,
>
>    What you can do is call the CreateFile API function through the
> P/Invoke layer.  This will allow you to specify "LPT1", and give you a
> handle to that printer.
>
>    Then, you can pass that handle to the FileStream class and use that
> instance to write to the port.
>
>    Hope this helps.
>
>
> --
>          - Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]
>          - mvp@spam.guard.caspershouse.com
>
> "Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
> news:eoqIjGwuGHA.3552@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>> Hello,
>>
>> Is there a way to send a string of text to a generic tekst printer under
>> .NET.
>> Somethings as in the good old days
>> File f = Open("LPT1");
>> f.Writeline("Blablabla");
>>
>> The goal is to use an old lineprinter as a log printer printing out each
>> line (incomming allert) at a time without having to build a whole page
>> before printing.
>>
>> Greets,
>>
>> Jean Paul
>>
>
>

"Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
news:eoqIjGwuGHA.3552@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> Hello,
>
> Is there a way to send a string of text to a generic tekst printer under
> .NET.
> Somethings as in the good old days
> File f = Open("LPT1");
> f.Writeline("Blablabla");
>
> The goal is to use an old lineprinter as a log printer printing out each
> line (incomming allert) at a time without having to build a whole page
> before printing.
>
> Greets,
>
> Jean Paul
>

"Kevin Spencer" <u**@ftc.gov> schreef in bericht
news:%23QDu4QwuGHA.976@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> It is certainly possible, although it is not necessarily advisable.
> Printers are accessed via their drivers, and for good reason. Assuming
> that you have an old dot matricx printer that works, and it can print out
> text sent to it directly, you can certainly open the LPT port and write to
> it.
>
> However, as I said, that's not necessarily the best idea. It's hard to
> know without knowing your actual requirements. Your concept of logging is
> rather bizarre. A long time ago, logging was done this way, because it was
> the only way possible. But putting data onto paper is both expensive in
> terms of resources used (paper, ink, etc), and processor overhead (because
> printing is a high priority process). In addition, paper has its purposes,
> but storage of information is hardly one of them. You can store beaucoups
> more information in a much smaller (and more reliable) form on a computer,
> a disk, or a CD/DVD. If you do not want to store it, why are you printing
> it to a permanent (and large) storage medium?
>
> Can you provide some more of the reasons behind this odd approach?
>
> --
> HTH,
>
> Kevin Spencer
> Microsoft MVP
> Chicken Salad Surgery
>
> Expect the unaccepted.
>
> "Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
> news:eoqIjGwuGHA.3552@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>> Hello,
>>
>> Is there a way to send a string of text to a generic tekst printer under
>> .NET.
>> Somethings as in the good old days
>> File f = Open("LPT1");
>> f.Writeline("Blablabla");
>>
>> The goal is to use an old lineprinter as a log printer printing out each
>> line (incomming allert) at a time without having to build a whole page
>> before printing.
>>
>> Greets,
>>
>> Jean Paul
>>
>
>

"Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
news:%23Si5kk3uGHA.1504@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> Hey Kevin,
>
> One of the main reasons to log on paper is the juridical value of the
> paper. We are a garage and by example the law is still requesting that the
> selling of gas oil has to be registered in real time directly on paper.
> Also the entrance and the leave of a car in the garage has to be
> registered on a paper carrier.
>
>
>
> An other good reason to log on paper is, if you log only important events
> on the paper, that it is more fasten to control. If I log my backup events
> in the application logbook it is certainly fine but most of the time my
> backup runs without any problem. On the server there are so many
> application events that most of the time one only inspect this logbook
> when there is really a known problem. I have five servers running and so
> real problem events can hide in the mass. If now there is a real problem
> with a backup on one of the machines and I send this event to the log
> printer it just need a quick inspect in the morning and if I see an error
> message between the lines of selling gas oil and registering the cars, it
> is seen directly and can be corrected.
>
>
>
> And a third reason is that one can easy centralize debug information. It's
> a habit I inherited from my VAX time writing in Fortran and Assembler
> having merely no debuggers (we only had crashdumps, if you ever analyzed
> one you know what I mean). So when an error or a certain event occurs and
> you can send this to a printer from wherever on the network, it
> reconstructs better and helps on tracking problems.
>
>
>
> If you restrict to one line logging and only relevant items you nearly use
> one box of paper a year. So that's not a reason to not doing it.
>
>
>
> About storing logs to a digital medium; can you still read 8" disks... so
> I have to go to the museum for inspecting my logs what with CD's in  ten
> or fifty years... but I can still read the papers of the middle ages. And
> I am sure that those people would wonder why one should, for God shake, be
> interested a 1,000 years later in what they wrote on a sheet of paper.
>
>
>
> CU
> JP
>
>
>
> "Kevin Spencer" <u**@ftc.gov> schreef in bericht
> news:%23QDu4QwuGHA.976@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
>> It is certainly possible, although it is not necessarily advisable.
>> Printers are accessed via their drivers, and for good reason. Assuming
>> that you have an old dot matricx printer that works, and it can print out
>> text sent to it directly, you can certainly open the LPT port and write
>> to it.
>>
>> However, as I said, that's not necessarily the best idea. It's hard to
>> know without knowing your actual requirements. Your concept of logging is
>> rather bizarre. A long time ago, logging was done this way, because it
>> was the only way possible. But putting data onto paper is both expensive
>> in terms of resources used (paper, ink, etc), and processor overhead
>> (because printing is a high priority process). In addition, paper has its
>> purposes, but storage of information is hardly one of them. You can store
>> beaucoups more information in a much smaller (and more reliable) form on
>> a computer, a disk, or a CD/DVD. If you do not want to store it, why are
>> you printing it to a permanent (and large) storage medium?
>>
>> Can you provide some more of the reasons behind this odd approach?
>>
>> --
>> HTH,
>>
>> Kevin Spencer
>> Microsoft MVP
>> Chicken Salad Surgery
>>
>> Expect the unaccepted.
>>
>> "Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
>> news:eoqIjGwuGHA.3552@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>>> Hello,
>>>
>>> Is there a way to send a string of text to a generic tekst printer under
>>> .NET.
>>> Somethings as in the good old days
>>> File f = Open("LPT1");
>>> f.Writeline("Blablabla");
>>>
>>> The goal is to use an old lineprinter as a log printer printing out each
>>> line (incomming allert) at a time without having to build a whole page
>>> before printing.
>>>
>>> Greets,
>>>
>>> Jean Paul
>>>
>>
>>
>
>

"Kevin Spencer" <u**@ftc.gov> schreef in bericht
news:uL8h3Y6uGHA.4360@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> Good enough, Jean Paul!
>
> At any rate, I see that your question has been more specifically answered
> already. Let me know if you need any more specific information.
>
> --
> HTH,
>
> Kevin Spencer
> Microsoft MVP
> Chicken Salad Surgery
>
> Expect the unaccepted.
>

"Jean Paul Mertens" <ON7AMI@newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
news:OYf4427uGHA.724@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> To all,
>
> If ever one is interested doing the same here is my solution
>
> Greets and succes
>
> JP
>
> [Code snipset...]
> public class ErrorPrinter : MarshalByRefObject
>
> {
>
> public ErrorPrinter()
>
> {
>
> }
>
> const uint GENERIC_READ = 0x80000000;
>
> const uint GENERIC_WRITE = 0x40000000;
>
> const uint OPEN_EXISTING = 3;
>
> [DllImport("kernel32.dll", SetLastError = true)]
>
> static extern SafeFileHandle CreateFile(string lpFileName, uint
> dwDesiredAccess,
>
> uint dwShareMode, IntPtr lpSecurityAttributes, uint dwCreationDisposition,
>
> uint dwFlagsAndAttributes, IntPtr hTemplateFile);
>
>
> public void LPrint(string msg)
>
> {
>
> Console.WriteLine("Message is: {0}", msg);
>
> SafeFileHandle handleValue = null;
>
> string toPrint = string.Format("{0:dd/MM/yy hh:mm:ss}:
> {1}\n",DateTime.Now, msg);
>
> // open LPT1 for Writing
>
> handleValue = CreateFile("LPT1:", GENERIC_WRITE, 0, IntPtr.Zero,
> OPEN_EXISTING, 0, IntPtr.Zero);
>
>
> if (handleValue.IsInvalid)
>
> return ;
>
>
> FileStream f = new FileStream(handleValue, FileAccess.Write);
>
> byte[] buffer = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(toPrint);
>
> f.Write(buffer, 0, buffer.Length);
>
> f.Flush();
>
> f.Close();
>
> }
>
> }
>
> [End Code Snipset...]
>
>
> "Kevin Spencer" <u**@ftc.gov> schreef in bericht
> news:uL8h3Y6uGHA.4360@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>> Good enough, Jean Paul!
>>
>> At any rate, I see that your question has been more specifically answered
>> already. Let me know if you need any more specific information.
>>
>> --
>> HTH,
>>
>> Kevin Spencer
>> Microsoft MVP
>> Chicken Salad Surgery
>>
>> Expect the unaccepted.
>>
>
>