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CHAPTER 20
Printing from SWF Files
You can add printing functionality to your Macromedia Flash Basic 8 and Macromedia Flash
Professional 8 document that lets users print from Flash Player. You can use the ActionScript
PrintJob class, or you can use the
print() or printAsBitmap() ActionScript functions.
Users can also access the Flash Player context menu and select the Print command there.
Additionally, users can print from a browser, rather than from Flash Player, by selecting a
command such as File > Print from the browser window. However, printing from Flash Player
directly, rather than from a browser window Print menu, offers several advantages, including
the following:
■ Users can print all frames or certain frames that you’ve labeled as printable from Flash
Player. Additionally, you can set the print area of a frame.
■ You can specify that content print as vector graphics (to take advantage of higher
resolution) or as bitmaps (to preserve transparency and color effects).
■ The ActionScript PrintJob object improves upon the print() and printAsBitmap()
functions by adding the ability to print dynamically rendered pages as a single print job.
The
PrintJob object also provides the user’s printer settings, which can be used to format
reports specifically for the user. See “Using the ActionScript PrintJob class” on page 537.
■ Flash Player versions earlier than 4.0.25 (Windows) or 4.0.20 (Macintosh) do not support
printing frames directly. Flash Player 7 and later supports the PrintJob class.
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