code to ask user to pick a printer

[stuck]

I have simple line that says:

Code: Select all

ActivePrinter = "\\servername\printername"

but now it needs to be something that asks the user to pick the 'printername' they want.

How could I do that?

Ken

[StuartR]

Here is some code to give you a list of available printers. You could use this to populate a dropdown list for the user to select a printer.

[stuck]

Hmm, do I really need that compexity to offer the user an input box with a drop down containing only two choices? If I make them type the printer name I can get away with only:

Code: Select all

 pname = InputBox("type in either name1 OR name2", "Set the A3 printer")
    ActivePrinter = "\\servername\" & pname

Ken

[HansV]

You could create a userform with a combo box populated in the UserFormInitialize event.

Or still simpler, use a message box:

Code: Select all

    Dim pName As string
    Select Case MsgBox("Do you want to print to name1?", vbQuestion + vbYesNo)
        Case vbYes
            pName = "name1"
        Case vbNo
            pName = "name2"
    End Select
    ActivePrinter = "\\servername\" & pName

[stuck]

Or still simpler, use a message box

Simple is good, that does the trick nicely.



Ken

[John Gray]

Just for my amusement, is what you are doing changing the default printer from within Word?
Otherwise, why aren't you just letting the user choose from the printers window when you click on File -> Print (or similar)?

I ask because in my Logon Script, I look up a table of the locations of the PCs, and connect networked printers (using CON2PRT) based on "printer adjacency", with the closest B&W laser printer being assigned as the default for that PC.

[stuck]

I use this code at the start of a macro so that the user can choose the (A3 capable) printer that is nearest to them before the rest of macro goes on prepare a file for printing on A3 paper.

Yes, the effect of this code is to change the default printer in Word but we can live with that for now. I will get round to a more elegant solution eventually.

Ken

[John Gray]

Thanks, Ken - that's more variable than my situation!

[Guessed]

There is a simple one-liner to display a built-in Word dialog where you can change the default printer.

Dialogs(97).Show

As far as I can tell, this dialog is undocumented but it has been kicking around in old versions of Word for well over 10 years and still works in Word 2010.

[StuartR]

...
Dialogs(97).Show
...

That could be very useful, thank you for sharing it.

[stuck]

Neat, that could be handy, thanks.

Ken