From time to time I need to export 2 pages in format A4 to one A3 landscape page. On the latest official version of LibreOffice on Kubuntu 20.04 I was able to select A3 from the properties settings of the "print to file"-printer. On 7.3.7.2 on Kubuntu 22.04 this does not work respectively only with a workaround. When I click on die properties button when the "print to file"-printer is selected, the properties of the physical standard printer are shown. As this one only can print to A4, I cannot select A3 anymore. For the "print to file"-printer I would expect all possibilities of this virtual printer in the properties dialog - or none, but the possibility so select all possibilities of the "print to file"-printer below in the page layout section of the printing dialog. This also is not the case as long as the physical standard printer does not support printing to A3. Workaround: I installed a printer which can print to A3. After making it standard an restarting LibreOffice the properties settings of the "print to file"-printer show this printer where I can select A3. As my physical printer normally should be the standard printer I have to switch back the same way. (The cups-ppd virtual printer creates big bitmap PDF files which I don't want.) => BUG: Wrong settings dialog after clicking on the properties button for the "print to file"-printer. I hope I translated the German terms correctly: Eigenschaften <=> properties Einstellungen <=> settings In Datei drucken ... <=> print to file ... Perhaps this is a duplicate, but then I used the wrong search terms. Thanks in advance!
Created attachment 183865 [details] screenshot: printer settings dialog of standard printer even print to file is selected
I reproduce that it opens the properties of a printer. I guess the behaviour is inherited from the earlier style of the dialog, when Print to file was a checkbox in another tab and the main tab did not have Print to file as a "device". Tested with older versions as well. UX: should this be solved by disabling the Properties button when Print to file is selected? Arch Linux 64-bit, X11 Version: 7.6.0.0.alpha0+ (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community Build ID: 013fbfb592f71c1f0a60b6a7ec08aded375515ac CPU threads: 8; OS: Linux 6.2; UI render: default; VCL: kf5 (cairo+xcb) Locale: fi-FI (fi_FI.UTF-8); UI: en-US Calc: threaded Built on 9 March 2023 Version: 7.6.0.0.alpha0+ (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community Build ID: a179f6c91692076e7e17babf4890638caa398384 CPU threads: 2; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 22621; UI render: Skia/Raster; VCL: win Locale: en-US (en_FI); UI: en-US Calc: threaded
Created attachment 185860 [details] sample multi-page A4 onto A2 via Print to File with suitable file printer Not clear this is an issue. The Print to file... dialog will use properties of the os/DE provided "default" printer. But the print dialog allows selection and configuration of any printer available to the os. I rarely use the LO "Print to file.." and instead set one of any of multiple PS or PDF print options as default. However if the system "default" printer is set to any ghostscript based printing (e.g. gs & CutePDF Writer), or to the Microsoft print to PDF, or to Adobe print to PDF (when Acrobat is installed) then the LO "Print to file..." dialog will use it. Configurations provided by any of those direct to file based printers when set as system default respond correctly in the LO "Print to file..." dialog. You can get multiple pages onto a single =-testing-= Version: 7.6.0.0.alpha0+ (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community Build ID: a179f6c91692076e7e17babf4890638caa398384 CPU threads: 8; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 19045; UI render: Skia/Vulkan; VCL: win Locale: en-US (en_US); UI: en-US Calc: threaded GPL Ghostscript 9.53.3 CutePDF Writer 4.0
(In reply to linux from comment #0) > For the "print to file"-printer I would expect all possibilities of this > virtual printer in the properties dialog... Me too, I don't see why the file shouldn't be capable of A3 or larger. And installing another printer is a hacky workaround, at best. However, these options modify the page properties so it can be printed at all, eg. the page is letter but the printer works with A4. This becomes irrelevant in case of print to file and the actual "paper size" selection is grayed out. Ilmari's suggestion to disable the "Use only paper size..." makes sense in this regards. What I now expect is that my page settings are respected. Meaning the preview changes from A4 to A3 (if the page is defined as A3 and the printer is print to file) and the exported document has this dimension. And that's not working. The checkbox was introduced for bug 79077.