There is no built-in feature in Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications to obtain a list of paper names (Letter, Legal, A4, and so forth) supported by the active printer. This article contains Visual Basic for Applications sample code that returns the paper names supported by the active printer.
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The following sample code displays a list of paper names supported by the active printer.
Option Explicit
Private Declare Function OpenPrinter Lib "winspool.drv" Alias _
"OpenPrinterA" (ByVal pPrinterName As String, phPrinter As Long, _
ByVal pDefault As Long) As Long
Private Declare Function ClosePrinter Lib "winspool.drv" ( _
ByVal hPrinter As Long) As Long
Private Declare Function DeviceCapabilities Lib "winspool.drv" _
Alias "DeviceCapabilitiesA" (ByVal lpsDeviceName As String, _
ByVal lpPort As String, ByVal iIndex As Long, lpOutput As Any, _
ByVal dev As Long) As Long
Private Const DC_PAPERNAMES = 16 ' Value obtained from wingdi.h
Sub GetPaperList()
' Display a message box with the name of the active printer and a list
' of papers it supports.
Dim lPaperCount As Long
Dim lCounter As Long
Dim hPrinter As Long
Dim sDeviceName As String
Dim sDevicePort As String
Dim sPaperNamesList As String
Dim sNextString As String
Dim sTextString As String
Dim iNumPaper() As Integer
GetPrinterNameAndPort sDeviceName, sDevicePort
If OpenPrinter(sDeviceName, hPrinter, 0) <> 0 Then
' Get count of paper names supported by active printer.
lPaperCount = DeviceCapabilities(sDeviceName, _
sDevicePort, _
DC_PAPERNAMES, _
ByVal vbNullString, 0)
ReDim iNumPaper(1 To lPaperCount)
sPaperNamesList = String(64 * lPaperCount, 0)
' Get paper names supported by active printer.
lPaperCount = DeviceCapabilities(sDeviceName, _
sDevicePort, _
DC_PAPERNAMES, _
ByVal sPaperNamesList, 0)
' List available paper names.
sTextString = "Paper available for " & ActivePrinter
For lCounter = 1 To lPaperCount
' Get a paper name.
sNextString = Mid(sPaperNamesList, _
64 * (lCounter - 1) + 1, 64)
sNextString = Left(sNextString, _
InStr(1, sNextString, Chr(0)) - 1)
' Have one paper name.
sNextString = String(6 - Len(CStr(iNumPaper(lCounter))), _
" ") & sNextString
' Add paper name to text string for message box.
sTextString = sTextString & Chr(13) & sNextString
Next lCounter
ClosePrinter (hPrinter)
' Show paper names in message box.
MsgBox sTextString
Else
MsgBox ActivePrinter & " <Unavailable>"
End If
End Sub
Private Sub GetPrinterNameAndPort(printerName As String, _
printerPort As String)
' ActivePrinter yields a name of the form "Printer XYZ on LPT1" while the
' DeviceCapabilities function requires a printer name and port.
'
' Out:
' printerName Printer name derived from ActivePrinter property
' printerPort Printer port derived from ActivePrinter property
Dim sString As String
Const searchText As String = " on "
sString = ActivePrinter
printerName = Left(sString, InStr(1, sString, searchText) - 1)
printerPort = Right(sString, _
Len(sString) - Len(printerName) - Len(searchText))
End Sub
This article was written about products for which Microsoft no longer offers support. Therefore, this article is offered "as is" and will no longer be updated.