Is the DuplexMode-Setting reliable?

Hello,

I'm wondering, if the inital value of PrintJob.PrintOptions.DuplexMode is a robust indicator for the effective duplex setting that the printer uses.

I want to print with the DuplexMode which the user selected in the printer settings dialog. The problem is, that I merge multiple documents together into one single PrintJob and therefore I have to insert blank pages, if the source documents have odd page count to ensure no new document starts on the backside of a sheet.

Since many of these printer settings dialogs seem to be driver specific, I would assume that there might be issues with some drivers reading the selected duplex-mode setting. I have tested it with two different printer drivers and the library always correctly displayed the selected duplex-mode in the PrintJob.PrintOptions.DuplexMode setting. But I'm not sure if this is a just a conincedence with these two printer drivers or if the the inital value of PrintJob.PrintOptions.DuplexMode always reliably yields duplex-mode settings used by the underlying printer?

Hello,

Yes, you can read and set the printer settings which are available from the PrintOptions class reliably. Please let us know if you find any issues so that we can look into it.

Thanks,
ceTe Software Support Team.

We have now tested it at our target site and as feared, the setting PrintJob.PrintOptions.DuplexMode always yields Simplex regardless of the configuration in the printer settings dialog (see screenshot: http://imgur.com/NaS3QIX). The printer uses the SHARP FollowMe system and has the following specs:
- Model: SHARP MX-5141N PCL6
- Drivername: SHARP MX-5141N PCL6 v256

I would assume you are querying some generic windows printing interface, to initialize the value for the DuplexMode setting. Is it possible, that this specific printer driver only adjusts the setting in the driver-specific part of the software and doesn't sync the change back to the generic windows printing interface?

Hello,

Yes, the PrintManager uses the generic Windows print API to read the printer driver settings and to send the print job to the printer. The specific driver you are using is not returning the changed print settings back to the Windows print interface hence the PrintManager is unable to read those driver specific settings. It is not possible for PrintManager to directly read the print settings that fall outside the generic Windows printer interface.

We have done a blog post on how to print to such printers that do not support generic Windows print interface.

Thanks,
ceTe Software Support Team.

OK - thank you for the quick and helpful support!