[FX.php List] [OFF] printable very wide table?

[Joel Shapiro]

Thanks Dale & GGT

I'm aware of media="print" for CSS, and I use that on printable pages.

The client's request is to be able to print spreadsheet-style tables  
with potentially dozens of columns, so this will definitely require  
multiple printed pages.  They've suggested using fixed-height divs to  
simulate fixed page breaks so that rows A thru X would print at the  
same places consistently on each page, with each page having a  
different set of columns... but it seems to me that with all the  
different possible printing environments for indiv users (e.g. browser  
print settings: scale to fit, print header/footer; & printer specs:  
fixed page margins...) it'd be pretty much impossible to get the rows  
and pages to line up correctly & consistently for all users.

Which is why I'm thinking that a PDF, in which I *could* set page  
breaks, is a more reliable option.

Can anyone think of anything better?

Thanks,
-Joel


On Dec 11, 2010, at 12:05 PM, Dale Bengston wrote:

> Hi Joel,
>
> I'm not sure what your objective is - to get it all to fit on a  
> single page widthwise and "flow" down, or to print it on multiple  
> pages across and down. If it's the former, you can do this by  
> changing the browser's print settings to do a "shrink to fit." This  
> works differently in all browsers, so beware of differences. In  
> fact, most printing settings are browser- or OS-specific (print  
> setup), so getting stuff to work consistently is a big, frustrating  
> drag.
>
> One thing that does work is specifying a different style sheet for  
> screen and print. This allows you to do cool things like suppressing  
> your navigation buttons for printing, and shifting all elements to  
> black and white. There are a few print-only CSS attributes as well,  
> but they're not widely supported. (In fact, Firefox 3.6.12 - Mac and  
> Windows - just magically started supporting page break CSS.) If  
> you're just printing a big ol' HTML table, it will break across  
> pages pretty well without much intervention.
>
> Here's an overview of media types supported in CSS:
> http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/media.html
>
> Hope this helps,
> Dale
>
>
>
> On Dec 10, 2010, at 5:41 PM, Joel Shapiro wrote:
>
>> Hi all
>>
>> I've got a request to have a printable web page that would be a  
>> potentially _very_ wide table (data coming from FM).
>>
>> I've suggested to the client that instead we create an excel  
>> spreadsheet from the data so users can print from Excel, but the  
>> client doesn't want that.
>>
>> In FMP, the client is thinking they could create a layout w/ all  
>> text rotated 90 degrees, so the "width" could be indefinite as it  
>> runs from one page to the next.  I've done a quick test of CSS  
>> transform:rotate and that's not gonna work well for the web page.
>>
>> I'm thinking of outputting to PDF, making sure the row height is  
>> consistent across all pages, so a user could line up the pages  
>> after they've printed...  but thought I'd check in here to see if  
>> anybody's got any thoughts or suggestions.
>>
>> TIA,
>> -Joel
>>
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>> Joel Shapiro
>> FileMaker Pro
>> database & web design
>> http://www.jsfmp.com
>> 415-269-5055
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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