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

[Steve Winter]

Hey Joel,

Not really, and I have in fact done pretty much exactly what you're proposing for exactly the reasons that you mention, the variability of printers and printer settings are a minefield, so a 'known quantity' like a .pdf is a great way to get round it... assuming that actually putting the data into a spreadsheet for the end user isn't an option...??

Cheers
Steve

On 13 Dec 2010, at 18:46, Joel Shapiro wrote:

> 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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Steve Winter
steve at bluecrocodile.co.nz
m: +44 77 7852 4776
3 Calshot Court, Channel Way
Ocean Village, Southampton SO14 3GR

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