topic Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file in Modeling

Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

DennisG — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 04:38:12 GMT

Interesting anomoly, am wondering if anyone else has encountered this?

I inserted a PDF into the PLN file, plan view, using "File-External Content-Place External Drawing" command.

Once the PDF was inserted I drew a number of lines over it.

When I went to print the results, I found that all that printed was the lines that I had drawn.

The only way I could print an accurate depiction of what I'd created was to click on the inserted PDF so that it was highlighted, and then print to PDF Factory, creating another PDF. I was then able to print a hard copy from PDF Factory.

The same tactic did not work when I tried printing to the Canon printer.

Thankfully I was able to print a hard copy, but not until after one hour of mucking about.

Has anyone else experienced this? Did I do something wrong? Is there an unspoken rule about attempting to print inserted PDFs?

Thanks,

Dennis

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Anonymous — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 08:43:40 GMT

We had the same problem in the office but I'm also hoping for a solution

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Chazz — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 16:13:53 GMT

Yep. Particularly with complex PDF's. I've heard elsewhere that having the PDF's cropped can also contribute to them not printing . Interestingly, in my case the failure was device dependent: I could get it to print (never tried a PLOT) to a n HP 500 but it would fail every time to a Ricoh. Installed memory could be a factor. Whatever the cause, the failure mode is lousy: you never get feedback on what the problem is.

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Rakela Raul — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 16:47:42 GMT

http://www.archicadwiki.com/Bugs/Drawings_with_images_do_not_print

anything to do with this ?

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Anonymous — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 17:39:58 GMT

Chazz wrote:
I could get it to print (never tried a PLOT) to a n HP 500 but it would fail every time to a Ricoh.

I have had mixed experiences with Ricoh and very bad ones with Kyocera. The Kyocera problems also came up with AutoCAD so I suspect a lot of the issues relate to the underlying differences between CAD/technical drawing and mainstream text, image and illustration standards.

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Chazz — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 18:02:32 GMT

Rakela wrote:
http://www.archicadwiki.com/Bugs/Drawings_with_images_do_not_print

anything to do with this ?

I doubt it. This Wiki post relates to rasters (Jpg, and PNG) and the PDF problem (at least in my case) had to do with pure vector PDFs. But it is possible that embedded rasters in PDFs could be a factor for some. It's a tricky issue.

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Anonymous — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 18:13:50 GMT

Chazz wrote:
...It's a tricky issue.

Printing always has been. At least it's gotten lots better over the years. Presumably it will get sorted out as PDF becomes more settled as the universal standard (somehow I find it hard to believe that Autodesk really has a chance to make DWF a widespread standard).

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

DennisG — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 18:45:19 GMT

Chazz wrote:
Yep. Particularly with complex PDF's. I've heard elsewhere that having the PDF's cropped can also contribute to them not printing .

Good point - this was a cropped PDF - not large or complex at all.

Chazz wrote:
Installed memory could be a factor.

Could be, though my machine has plenty.

Chazz wrote:
Whatever the cause, the failure mode is lousy: you never get feedback on what the problem is.

Agree.

Thanks much for the responses - glad (and concerned) to hear I'm not the only one experiencing this.

Dennis

Re: Can't Print PDF inserted into PLN file

Chazz — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 18:45:28 GMT

Matthew wrote:
Printing always has been [tricky]. At least it's gotten lots better over the years. Presumably it will get sorted out as PDF becomes more settled as the universal standard (somehow I find it hard to believe that Autodesk really has a chance to make DWF a widespread standard).

Yes, but despite that I find myself occasionally harkening back fondly to the halcyon days when men were men and plotters CAME with HPGL/2 cards and we always plotted, never printed. I still see issues with scale creep and font weirdness when using PDF as an exchange/output format.

As for DWF, it certainly has impressive speed but, yes, I think Autodesk has lost that one. I'm just not sure they have lost it to Adobe. Silverlight is very impressive and as much as I would hate to see Microsoft dominate this market, some competition would be good.

Are we OT yet?