Re: Widgets and printing [Was: Why GTK+ vs. GNOME?]

[Lauris Kaplinski <lauris helixcode com>]

On Wed, 16 Aug 2000, David T. Bath wrote:

> Alan Shutko wrote:
> 
> > > Printing surely does not belong to widget set. It is way too big and
> > > complex, needing to handle:
> > 
> > So what _does_ it belong to?  It doesn't belong to the app... we know
> > what kind of nightmare that is.
> 
> Yes, good question.  Consider one nice thing in Microsoft Access where a
> widget might display partially (viewable using scrollbars), but the
> "can grow" property, if true, allows it to show the entire contents.
> While printing is a monster problem, I wonder if the Gtk or Gnome widget
> might provide hints as to how it should be printed with the following
> properties:
>    1. please try and keep me together on one page (like html tables in
> netscape)
>    2. allow me to grow vertically in print mode if required
>    3. use callback xxxxxxxxx() when printing.
>       (Does this imply an "on-print" event?)
> Just thinking.  It is a difficult problem to think thru.

It is more layout generation than printing problem IMHO. Layout generation
is inherently application problem (nobody can decide for it, how it should
layout it's data). Printing system shouldn't do any layouting itself.

If there is certain large class of apps, using similar layouting rules,
that can be moved to library as well.

Lauris