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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
 Posted - 19 August 2002 : 12:44:02
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Something I noticed about printer friendly mode. It inherets the forums color sceme. This becomes a problem for light on dark forums, because white print on a black background isn't very printer friendly. Even this blue font on a whitebackground can be trying on color ink cartrages.
Perhaps pop_printer_friendly.asp should be hardcoded to black text on a white background. |
 Nathan Bales
CoreBoard | Active Users Download |
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RichardKinser
Snitz Forums Admin
USA
16655 Posts |
Posted - 19 August 2002 : 14:45:22
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| we probably should, or else it's not very "Printer-Friendly". We could probably just hardcode the default colors used here into the files. |
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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
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OneWayMule
Dev. Team Member & Support Moderator
Austria
4969 Posts |
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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
Posted - 19 August 2002 : 23:16:48
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quote:
Simply create a "theme file" that sets the variables to the desired colors just for pop_printerfriendly.asp?
Anything thats color isn't friendly to my printer. I have to copy it into word and make it black and white. Thats not very friendly either. |
Nathan Bales
CoreBoard | Active Users Download |
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RichardKinser
Snitz Forums Admin
USA
16655 Posts |
Posted - 19 August 2002 : 23:23:05
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| I agree that black on white would probably be better, but what about smilies or other graphics someone might place in their message? |
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redbrad0
Advanced Member
USA
3725 Posts |
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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
Posted - 20 August 2002 : 03:29:07
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I would say go ahead and show images. Images don't hurt my eyes or blue cartrage as much as blue text does.  (The color contrast for this blue works on screen. . . but try a printout. . .)
But. . .
I just thought, what about forum code? Some of these dark colord background forums may have font thats inside [white] or [yellow] tags. That wouldn't do well on white. . .
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Nathan Bales
CoreBoard | Active Users Download |
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alex042
Average Member
USA
631 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 12:41:42
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How about just hardcoding the background color to white then replacing out any white fonts with black? Personally, I like a little color in my prints. Afterall, most modern printers have the option to print in shades of gray if someone doesn't want the color.
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Roland
Advanced Member
Netherlands
9335 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 12:46:23
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| Maybe I'm being stupid here.... Okay, I know how people think of me so let's just say I am being stupid here, but why don't you just set your printer to only print greyscale, and your browser not to print background colors and background images? I've never had it print an all black page with some white text after setting IE to not print background colors.... |
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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 12:55:41
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I printed a page from here *dark blue* the dark blue is hard to read on paper, so I switched to greyscale. It didn't print in black either, it printed in dark gray. I couldn't read it so I had to copy the thing into word to get a good printout.
Thats what prompted this topic. |
Nathan Bales
CoreBoard | Active Users Download |
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alex042
Average Member
USA
631 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 13:10:02
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I guess what we need to do is further define 'Printer Friendly'. My assumption would be to minimize ink on paper and yet retain readability. Therefore, that would mean replacing any background images and colors, including those in tables, with a white background. And to retain readibility, any light colored text would have to be replaced with a darker color. i.e. whites or yellows. One option would be to just replace out all text colors with black so any text printed in black and white. Another option would be to only replace out light colors which would mean defining all 'light colors'.
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Edited by - alex042 on 21 August 2002 13:11:00 |
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Roland
Advanced Member
Netherlands
9335 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 13:20:51
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| in short, to make it sound simple for simple people like myself: all color tags should be removed. Either with CSS or in the body tag a default text color and page background color should be set (hard coded), and you'd be done. |
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Nathan
Help Moderator
USA
7664 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 13:26:21
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Its easy to get rid of the font colors
<style>font{color:black;}</style> |
Nathan Bales
CoreBoard | Active Users Download |
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snaayk
Senior Member
USA
1061 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 13:31:13
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I definetly see the value in printing in black and white, but color is also valuable. I print most of my stuff to a laser printer, which is in greyscale.
I had a printer friendly version of a topic with some code tips and examples. I printed it a month ago, yesterday as I am going to implement some of the ideas, the post read: Change the code in red to.....oops, which is the code in red?
As you can see, this was not a good thing. Who knows how many implementations of a forum is being used that might require printer friendly color print outs.
I hate asking for more after so much, but perhaps a choice on how you want it...... 
I guess it always a PITA to please all sides of an argument. |
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Roland
Advanced Member
Netherlands
9335 Posts |
Posted - 21 August 2002 : 13:50:12
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I'm using a color laser printer (it's actually a color copy machine with a RIP, but who cares) so I print everything with backgrounds.
Snaayk's example shows that it often is important to be able to print in color, and the only way around it as I see it now is to make two printer friendly options: color and black & white. This could be done by adding a select case statement to pop_printer_friendly.asp, depending on the mode, it'd either include or leave out the style sheet to make the page black and white. |
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