Serial Printers "Printer Not Accepting

DocumentID: 646163
Revision Date: 29-Feb-96 8:19:13 PM

The information in this document applies to:
WordPerfect® 5.1 for DOS

Problem

Symptoms: We are getting reports from the support operators that several customers printing from WP 5.1 through a serial interface are getting the error message "Printer Not Accepting Characters". In each of these reports, the customers say that if they print from WP 5.0 and then from WP 5.1, it prints fine. But they get the error if they go directly into WP 5.1 and print. If they put a MODE command in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file, they are able to print directly from WP 5.1. Is WP 5.1 failing to initialize serial ports? Solutions: When printing to a serial printer WordPerfect first sets the serial port to the proper baud rate, data bits, parity, etc. After setting the port, WP tests the port to see if the printer is ready to accept data. Some printers don't tell the port they are ready until at least one character is received. In 5.0 we sent a NULL byte to the printer so we could get a valid response on this type of printer, but this messed up intelligent devices that used the first character to determine what kind of mode it was to print in. If the printer received this NULL it would fail. So in WP 5.1 we took out the NULL being sent, but if there were printers or even serial boards that need a character sent first the port thought the printer was not ready so we printed the message "Printer Not Accepting Characters". With the next interim release of 5.1, WP will send the proper first character to the printer, if the printer still is not ready the error message will print in printer control. Otherwise we should print properly now.

Answer:

Details:

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