Good day, I've been trying to upgrade an old Print Program that prints raw pcl directly to the printer. The print program takes a PCL Mask and a PCL Batch Spool File (just pcl with page turn commands, I think) merges them and sends them off to the printer. I'm able to send to the Printer a file stream of PCL but I get mixed results and i do not understand why printing is so difficult under .net. I mean yes there is the PrintDocument class, but to print PCL... Let's just say I'm ready to detach my printer from the network and burn it a live. Here is my class PrintDirect (rather a hybrid class) Imports System Imports System.Text Imports System.Runtime.InteropServices <StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)> _ Public Structure DOCINFO <MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)> _ Public pDocName As String <MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)> _ Public pOutputFile As String <MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)> _ Public pDataType As String End Structure 'DOCINFO Public Class PrintDirect <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=False, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function OpenPrinter(ByVal pPrinterName As String, ByRef phPrinter As IntPtr, ByVal pDefault As Integer) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=False, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function StartDocPrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr, ByVal Level As Integer, ByRef pDocInfo As DOCINFO) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=True, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function StartPagePrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Ansi, ExactSpelling:=True, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function WritePrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr, ByVal data As String, ByVal buf As Integer, ByRef pcWritten As Integer) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=True, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function EndPagePrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=True, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function EndDocPrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr) As Long End Function <DllImport("winspool.drv", CharSet:=CharSet.Unicode, ExactSpelling:=True, CallingConvention:=CallingConvention.StdCall)> _ Public Shared Function ClosePrinter(ByVal hPrinter As IntPtr) As Long End Function 'Helps uses to work with the printer Public Class PrintJob ''' <summary> ''' The address of the printer to print to. ''' </summary> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public PrinterName As String = "" Dim lhPrinter As New System.IntPtr() ''' <summary> ''' The object deriving from the Win32 API, Winspool.drv. ''' Use this object to overide the settings defined in the PrintJob Class. ''' </summary> ''' <remarks>Only use this when absolutly nessacary.</remarks> Public OverideDocInfo As New DOCINFO() ''' <summary> ''' The PCL Control Character or the ascii escape character. \x1b ''' </summary> ''' <remarks>ChrW(27)</remarks> Public Const PCL_Control_Character As Char = ChrW(27) ''' <summary> ''' Opens a connection to a printer, if false the connection could not be established. ''' </summary> ''' <returns></returns> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Function OpenPrint() As Boolean Dim rtn_val As Boolean = False PrintDirect.OpenPrinter(PrinterName, lhPrinter, 0) If Not lhPrinter = 0 Then rtn_val = True End If Return rtn_val End Function ''' <summary> ''' The name of the Print Document. ''' </summary> ''' <value></value> ''' <returns></returns> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Property DocumentName As String Get Return OverideDocInfo.pDocName End Get Set(ByVal value As String) OverideDocInfo.pDocName = value End Set End Property ''' <summary> ''' The type of Data that will be sent to the printer. ''' </summary> ''' <value>Send the print data type, usually "RAW" or "LPR". To overide use the OverideDocInfo Object</value> ''' <returns>The DataType as it was provided, if it is not part of the enumeration it is set to "UNKNOWN".</returns> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Property DocumentDataType As PrintDataType Get Select Case OverideDocInfo.pDataType.ToUpper Case "RAW" Return PrintDataType.RAW Case "LPR" Return PrintDataType.LPR Case Else Return PrintDataType.UNKOWN End Select End Get Set(ByVal value As PrintDataType) OverideDocInfo.pDataType = [Enum].GetName(GetType(PrintDataType), value) End Set End Property Public Property DocumentOutputFile As String Get Return OverideDocInfo.pOutputFile End Get Set(ByVal value As String) OverideDocInfo.pOutputFile = value End Set End Property Enum PrintDataType UNKOWN = 0 RAW = 1 LPR = 2 End Enum ''' <summary> ''' Initializes the printing matrix ''' </summary> ''' <param name="PrintLevel">I have no idea what the hack this is...</param> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Sub OpenDocument(Optional ByVal PrintLevel As Integer = 1) PrintDirect.StartDocPrinter(lhPrinter, PrintLevel, OverideDocInfo) End Sub ''' <summary> ''' Starts the next page. ''' </summary> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Sub StartPage() PrintDirect.StartPagePrinter(lhPrinter) End Sub ''' <summary> ''' Writes a string to the printer, can be used to write out a section of the document at a time. ''' </summary> ''' <param name="data">The String to Send out to the Printer.</param> ''' <returns>The pcWritten as an integer, 0 may mean the writter did not write out anything.</returns> ''' <remarks>Warning the buffer is automatically created by the lenegth of the string.</remarks> Public Function WriteToPrinter(ByVal data As String) As Integer Dim pcWritten As Integer = 0 PrintDirect.WritePrinter(lhPrinter, data, data.Length - 1, pcWritten) Return pcWritten End Function Public Sub EndPage() PrintDirect.EndPagePrinter(lhPrinter) End Sub Public Sub CloseDocument() PrintDirect.EndDocPrinter(lhPrinter) End Sub Public Sub ClosePrint() PrintDirect.ClosePrinter(lhPrinter) End Sub ''' <summary> ''' Opens a connection to a printer and starts a new document. ''' </summary> ''' <returns>If false the connection could not be established. </returns> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Function Open() As Boolean Dim rtn_val As Boolean = False rtn_val = OpenPrint() If rtn_val Then OpenDocument() End If Return rtn_val End Function ''' <summary> ''' Closes the document and closes the connection to the printer. ''' </summary> ''' <remarks></remarks> Public Sub Close() CloseDocument() ClosePrint() End Sub End Class End Class 'PrintDirect Here is how I print my file. I'm simple printing the PCL Masks, to show proof of concept. But I can't even do that. I can effectively create PCL and send it the printer without reading the file and it works fine... Plus I get mixed results with different stream reader text encoding as well. Dim pJob As New PrintDirect.PrintJob pJob.DocumentName = " test doc" pJob.DocumentDataType = PrintDirect.PrintJob.PrintDataType.RAW pJob.PrinterName = sPrinter.GetDevicePath '//This is where you'd stick your device name, sPrinter stands for Selected Printer from a dropdown (combobox). 'pJob.DocumentOutputFile = "C:\temp\test-spool.txt" If Not pJob.OpenPrint() Then MsgBox("Unable to connect to " & pJob.PrinterName, MsgBoxStyle.OkOnly, "Print Error") Exit Sub End If pJob.OpenDocument() pJob.StartPage() Dim sr As New IO.StreamReader(Me.txtFile.Text, Text.Encoding.ASCII) '//I've got best results with ASCII before, but only mized. Dim line As String = sr.ReadLine 'Fix for fly code on first run 'If line = 27 Then line = PrintDirect.PrintJob.PCL_Control_Character Do While (Not line Is Nothing) pJob.WriteToPrinter(line) line = sr.ReadLine Loop 'pJob.WriteToPrinter(ControlChars.FormFeed) pJob.EndPage() pJob.CloseDocument() sr.Close() sr.Dispose() sr = Nothing pJob.Close() I was able to get to print the mask, in the morning... now I'm getting strange printer characters scattered through 5 pages... I'm totally clueless. I must have changed something or the printer is at fault. You can access my test Check Mask, here http://kscserver.com/so/chk_mask.zip .