Dear Friends,

I am a new member to this community and would like help from all of you.
I am having a PC based application using dBASE III Plus and clipper.
The application has facility for printing passbook using serial port (com port). When the PC was having Windows 98, this arrangement was working perfectly. Now, after upgrading the OS to Windows XP, the application does not print the way expected. The user, after giving the required input has to come out each time from the application to DOS prompt, then the printing starts. For other reports (where printer is on parallel port) also, many times the DOS window needs to be closed before taking multiple reports.

Pl. let me know, if any one of you has faced these problems and the solution for the same.


Prasad

Hi,
I'm not an expert, but I had a similar problem tying to print from an XP platform using programs that worked well in 98. I got the following advice from one of the Dbase forums. Dbase is expecting the printer to be on LPT1 as a default. I was told (and did) the folowing.
Go into Control Panel and select 'printers and fax' option. Then select your default printer and select properties. Under the properties menu selct 'ports' . Next select the box down at the bottom left that says ' enable pooling', now go up and select 'LPT1'. Now your system should send all output to LPT1 which although is not configured with a printer will pool the output to your default printer on the serial port.
You may have to add a statement to your print fies to 'set printer to LPT1' but I'm not sure that is necessary. You might want to try a small test program to see if the suggestion above works for you. It did for me although my printer was on a USB port.
I'm just passing along my experience that others were good enough to share with me...Good Luck

The easiest way to do this is to "share" the printer. Then any of the networked computers (including the host) can print to it using:

net use LPT1 \\Host\Laser

Also, if you can find TameDOS and install it on your computers running the Clipper Applications. It will let the print jobs thru without having to "exit" the app.

Aloha