print a txt to the default printer with c#
MSDN: Visual Studio 2003 Retired Technical documentation
MS has a newer document for .NET on How to: Print a Multi-Page Text File in Windows Forms for .NET 2.0, 3.0, 3.5, and 4.0.
It's essentially a newer, more complete version of the document in luvieere's answer, which was written for .NET 1.1
Commenting on an old post but since this pops up in the first few items of a Google search for "c# send text string to printer", I thought I would add the results of what I found ... save someone else the few hours of digging.
Sometimes we need to send text directly to a printer -- POS receipt printers, Zebra label printers, old dot-matrix printers, sending PCL commands or other escape sequences to an HP printer or sending raw Postscript files. The normal PrintDocument methods are not appropriate.
Microsoft has a knowledge base article (322091) that provides a method of doing this, how-to-send-raw-data-to-a-printer-by-using-visual-c-.net
The method involves calling parts of the WinAPI as DLLimports.
In case the original file moves or disappears, I've copied the heart of the method here,
using System;
using System.Drawing;
using System.Drawing.Printing;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.IO;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
private void button1_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
// Allow the user to select a file.
OpenFileDialog ofd = new OpenFileDialog();
if( DialogResult.OK == ofd.ShowDialog(this) )
{
// Allow the user to select a printer.
PrintDialog pd = new PrintDialog();
pd.PrinterSettings = new PrinterSettings();
if( DialogResult.OK == pd.ShowDialog(this) )
{
// Print the file to the printer.
RawPrinterHelper.SendFileToPrinter(pd.PrinterSettings.PrinterName, ofd.FileName);
}
}
}
private void button2_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
string s = "Hello"; // device-dependent string, need a FormFeed?
// Allow the user to select a printer.
PrintDialog pd = new PrintDialog();
pd.PrinterSettings = new PrinterSettings();
if( DialogResult.OK == pd.ShowDialog(this) )
{
// Send a printer-specific to the printer.
RawPrinterHelper.SendStringToPrinter(pd.PrinterSettings.PrinterName, s);
}
}
public class RawPrinterHelper
{
// Structure and API declarions:
[StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential, CharSet=CharSet.Ansi)]
public class DOCINFOA
{
[MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStr)] public string pDocName;
[MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStr)] public string pOutputFile;
[MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStr)] public string pDataType;
}
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="OpenPrinterA", SetLastError=true, CharSet=CharSet.Ansi, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool OpenPrinter([MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStr)] string szPrinter, out IntPtr hPrinter, IntPtr pd);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="ClosePrinter", SetLastError=true, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool ClosePrinter(IntPtr hPrinter);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="StartDocPrinterA", SetLastError=true, CharSet=CharSet.Ansi, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool StartDocPrinter( IntPtr hPrinter, Int32 level, [In, MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStruct)] DOCINFOA di);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="EndDocPrinter", SetLastError=true, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool EndDocPrinter(IntPtr hPrinter);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="StartPagePrinter", SetLastError=true, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool StartPagePrinter(IntPtr hPrinter);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="EndPagePrinter", SetLastError=true, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool EndPagePrinter(IntPtr hPrinter);
[DllImport("winspool.Drv", EntryPoint="WritePrinter", SetLastError=true, ExactSpelling=true, CallingConvention=CallingConvention.StdCall)]
public static extern bool WritePrinter(IntPtr hPrinter, IntPtr pBytes, Int32 dwCount, out Int32 dwWritten );
// SendBytesToPrinter()
// When the function is given a printer name and an unmanaged array
// of bytes, the function sends those bytes to the print queue.
// Returns true on success, false on failure.
public static bool SendBytesToPrinter( string szPrinterName, IntPtr pBytes, Int32 dwCount)
{
Int32 dwError = 0, dwWritten = 0;
IntPtr hPrinter = new IntPtr(0);
DOCINFOA di = new DOCINFOA();
bool bSuccess = false; // Assume failure unless you specifically succeed.
di.pDocName = "My C#.NET RAW Document";
di.pDataType = "RAW";
// Open the printer.
if( OpenPrinter( szPrinterName.Normalize(), out hPrinter, IntPtr.Zero ) )
{
// Start a document.
if( StartDocPrinter(hPrinter, 1, di) )
{
// Start a page.
if( StartPagePrinter(hPrinter) )
{
// Write your bytes.
bSuccess = WritePrinter(hPrinter, pBytes, dwCount, out dwWritten);
EndPagePrinter(hPrinter);
}
EndDocPrinter(hPrinter);
}
ClosePrinter(hPrinter);
}
// If you did not succeed, GetLastError may give more information
// about why not.
if( bSuccess == false )
{
dwError = Marshal.GetLastWin32Error();
}
return bSuccess;
}
public static bool SendFileToPrinter( string szPrinterName, string szFileName )
{
// Open the file.
FileStream fs = new FileStream(szFileName, FileMode.Open);
// Create a BinaryReader on the file.
BinaryReader br = new BinaryReader(fs);
// Dim an array of bytes big enough to hold the file's contents.
Byte []bytes = new Byte[fs.Length];
bool bSuccess = false;
// Your unmanaged pointer.
IntPtr pUnmanagedBytes = new IntPtr(0);
int nLength;
nLength = Convert.ToInt32(fs.Length);
// Read the contents of the file into the array.
bytes = br.ReadBytes( nLength );
// Allocate some unmanaged memory for those bytes.
pUnmanagedBytes = Marshal.AllocCoTaskMem(nLength);
// Copy the managed byte array into the unmanaged array.
Marshal.Copy(bytes, 0, pUnmanagedBytes, nLength);
// Send the unmanaged bytes to the printer.
bSuccess = SendBytesToPrinter(szPrinterName, pUnmanagedBytes, nLength);
// Free the unmanaged memory that you allocated earlier.
Marshal.FreeCoTaskMem(pUnmanagedBytes);
return bSuccess;
}
public static bool SendStringToPrinter( string szPrinterName, string szString )
{
IntPtr pBytes;
Int32 dwCount;
// How many characters are in the string?
dwCount = szString.Length;
// Assume that the printer is expecting ANSI text, and then convert
// the string to ANSI text.
pBytes = Marshal.StringToCoTaskMemAnsi(szString);
// Send the converted ANSI string to the printer.
SendBytesToPrinter(szPrinterName, pBytes, dwCount);
Marshal.FreeCoTaskMem(pBytes);
return true;
}
}