Adding Print Controls to a Device Type Definition (SAP Library - BC

Adding Print Controls to a Device Type Definition

To add new print controls to a copy of a device type, proceed as follows:

Select Tools ® CCMS ® Spool ® Spool administration ® Full administration. Enter the name of the device type in the Device types field and confirm your input.

Choose

Print controls.

Choose

Std print controls to select the print control you want to add to the device type definition.

Specifying escape sequences for print controls

Enter the attributes and control character sequence of the new print control.

Control character sequence: Enter the appropriate printer command found in your printer manual.

You can enter the command either as:

A hexadecimal string. In this case, be sure to select the Hex field.

If you work in a heterogeneous environment (ASCII hosts that use EBCDIC printers, or EBCDIC hosts that use ASCII printers), enter the control character sequence in hex, not as plain text. Hex values are not sent through the character set conversion, but are passed directly as entered to the target output device.

For an ASCII printer, enter the hex values for the ASCII string to be sent to the printer. For an EBCDIC printer, enter the hex values for the EBCDIC command string. For more information, see the note on maintaining print controls in mixed environments, below.

Plain text. In this case, you can use the special characters (such as \e for escape) shown at the end of Editing Device Types.

Be sure that the escape sequence you enter matches the meaning encoded in the print control name. For example, if you define CI010, then the escape sequence that you enter should configure the printer for character pitch 10.

If the escape sequence contains trailing spaces (spaces at the end of the string), then enter the escape in single quotation marks:

Notes

You can reach all of the utilities described in the following notes by choosing Tools ® CCMS ® Spool ® Spool administration, Full administration and then Print controls (DeviceTypes tab page) and Change.

Which print controls do I need? Are you defining the print controls for a new device type from scratch? If this is the case, see Print Controls for List Output and SAP script Print Controls for lists of the print controls used by the SAP System.

You can also use a similar device type as a guide to the print controls needed. The set of print controls actually required by different devices varies considerably, so following an example from the R/3 standard can save you extra work and/or help you ensure that all required print controls are defined.

You do not need to define the complete set of standard print controls for a device type. Print controls that are not defined for a particular device type or which are defined with an empty Control character sequence field are ignored.

Copying: You can copy the print controls from one device type to another. On the spool administration initial screen, choose Utilities ® For device types ® Copy device type.

Testing: Test print controls by marking the device type you want to test from the list and choosing Print controls and Test. In the following screen, type in the names of the print control(s) that you would like to test along with a test text. (The control character sequences are inserted in the test screen when you choose Enter.)

Choose Print to run the test Print controls and texts are sent to the printer in the order in which they appear on the screen: <print control> <test text>.... You can therefore test sequences of print controls.

Printing print controls with definitions: With Utilities ® For device types ® Print PrCtls, you can print out the list of print controls defined for a device type. The list includes both the hexadecimal Control character sequence of each print control and the character representation of the control sequence. Enter the name of the device type in Device type; in Print control enter the name of the print control.

Print controls for printer fonts and bar codes: Printer fonts and bar codes are defined in SAPscript. To make use of a printer font or bar code, you must also define a print control that selects the printer font or bar code. The name of each print control is determined in the SAPscript printer font/bar code definition.

First Page of SAP Printing Guide