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Post by np18358 on Jul 23, 2019 21:47:07 GMT -5
The ability to use a thermal printer (Rollo, Zebra, DYMO, Brother, etc) to make labels onto varying size labels.
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Post by mstuen on Aug 25, 2020 15:32:03 GMT -5
This one has been requested in various areas for years. It's such an essential thing for Film/TV/Commercial that I know others that have switched to custom setups from Filemaker Pro and MS Access.
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Post by johnmcsoft on Aug 29, 2020 18:43:41 GMT -5
This is also one of the most difficult things to do, by several magnitudes compared with printing to any other kind of printer. Everything that Lightwright prints goes through the operating system's print system, these printers need very different code and have limited capabilities. The drivers that are available for them are very limited, the only way to implement all of their features are as serial devices. I have a Brother QL-800 here in the office, and I now have code that lets me print text on it, but I have yet to figure out how to do things like print on an "endless" tape. If anyone knows where to get or has any kind of programming code that enables these features, I'd love to hear from them.
- John
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Post by captainsmokes on Jan 16, 2021 4:18:23 GMT -5
Have you checked out Brother's b-PAC? They have a full SDK for their P-Touch line of printers. I believe it's windows-only but that'd be a good start for many users, I image a lot of folks would be willing to switch to a windows machine if it simplified their label workflow. I believe Dymo also has a full SDK, which is Windows and Mac compatible. Their printers don't do endless labels (I believe) but I know a lot of folks are already using them and endless labelling isn't necessarily required for most label projects. I'm half-tempted to poke around with them on the weekend and see what I can figure out. |
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Post by Kevin on Feb 10, 2021 12:02:54 GMT -5
A lot of use Ptouch thermal printers, we either export to an excel file and use the Ptouch software which is pretty good, or we use custom filemaker or Excel files to export each label as a custom page size.
We hold out hope that LW will someday include this option. Any help, I am sure would be apreciated.
Kevin
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Post by johnmcsoft on Feb 16, 2021 10:42:57 GMT -5
It's really tough, even within a single manufacturer there are lots of different models, and some of those models work with one SDK, while other models (from the same manufacturer) work with a different SDK, which may be Windows-only, Mac-only, iOS-only, or Android-only. Some of those SDKs use raster drawing only, others use ESC codes, some allow custom fonts, some don't.
Being able to print labels from Lightwright to thermal printers is very high on my wish list, but it won't all happen at once.
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Post by jfreeman on Feb 16, 2021 10:57:16 GMT -5
Thanks JOHN! We know your working on it.  I for one can't wait till that announcement. - Justin |
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Post by captainsmokes on Apr 9, 2021 1:59:59 GMT -5
Just had a thought at work today, if Lightwright only supported 1 or 2 thermal printers, say, the Brother QL-800 or Dymo 450, I'm sure a lot of us would go out and buy one of those printers just to be able to use it with Lightwright.
Just my 0.02
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Post by captainsmokes on Sept 14, 2021 16:23:29 GMT -5
I figured out a way to reliably print thermal labels from lightwright! Well, mostly. I've defined a custom label size matching the height of my p-touch tape (0.37" plus 0.04" margin defines the printable area) with an arbitrary width. In this case, I'm using 4", but anything will work. The label sheet has one label, per page. I'll build a label, and print it to Acrobat PDF. The output could look something like this.   Once it's open in Acrobat, I'll print from there to my P-Touch, I'm using a PT-P750W. Below is a screenshot of my P-touch printer dialog settings, I'm printing based on an 8-inch (208.2mm) piece of tape. If you're looking to print a variable-length label, enable trim tape after data, which will trim the label automatically.  Back in the Acrobat print dialog, I set my page handling to Actual Size and Landscape, which lines the print window right up with the top left of the page.  And then hit print! The P-touch treats each page as a separate label and trims accordingly, no fuss! I believe the same method will work with a DYMO or larger label printer, as long as they can use the Windows print dialog. And last, but not least, don't forget to bring a towel! |
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I for one can't wait till that announcement.