Chapter 4
USING THE PRINTER
WITH DOS AND BASIC
Although you will probably do most of your printing with the aid of
commercial software, at times you will want to employ direct commands
or programs of your own. This chapter will give you some ideas. Three
subjects are covered:
l Hard-copying the screen
l Programming the printer with DOS commands
l Programming the printer with BASIC
HARD-COPYING THE SCREEN (MS-DOS AND PC-DOS)
If your computer has a PRTSC (or PrtSc) key, there is an easy way to
get hard copy of the screen. Press the SHIFT and PRTSC keys. The printer
will print the current screen contents. The PRTSC key works both at the
system command level and while you are running application software.
Normally the PRTSC key prints only text data, but if your DOS system
includes a file named GRAPHICS.COM, you can hard-copy graphics dis-
plays, by first typing the command:
A >GRAPHICS
You will find that graphics printing takes considerably more time than
text printing. See your DOS manual for further information on the
GRAPHICS command.
At the DOS command level, there is also a simple way to have the printer
print hard copy continuously, instead of one screen at a time. Press the CTRL
key, hold it down, then also press the PRTSC key. If your computer does
not have a PRTSC key, press the CTRL and P keys. Nothing visible will
happen, but you have just switched on the print-screen function. After this,
the printer will hard-copy all text displayed. For example, try typing the
directory command:
A>DIR
You will obtain a printed directory.
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