I'm very new to
java... How do you print information on paper (e.g. a record from a database) through java. Is there any method to print the info directly to the printer without writing it in to a file first.
I would like to be able to send reports to a printer based on the data that I have in my database. I haven't a clue how to do this. I was able to print the plain text document below without any problem. It's an example from the Java Print API. It was pretty easy.
Java Print API tutorial:
http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-10-2000/jw-1020-print.html But how do I go about adding the data that's in my database to this document. I tried inserting a query statement in the code below to see if that would work. I don't have a clue. If you have any ideas could you let me know..
Duncan
/**
* Class: Example5
*
* Example of using the TextLayout class to format a text paragraph.
* with full justification.
*
* @author Jean-Pierre Dube <
[email protected]>
* @version 1.0
* @since 1.0
*/
import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.font.*;
import java.awt.geom.*;
import java.awt.print.*;
import java.text.*;
import java.util.*;
import java.sql.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import com.borland.jbcl.layout.*;
import javax.swing.border.*;
import com.borland.dbswing.*;
import com.borland.dx.sql.dataset.*;
import com.borland.dx.dataset.*;
public class Example5 {
//--- Private instances declarations
private final static int POINTS_PER_INCH = 72;
private OrderPanel fields;
private JTextArea textOutput;
private Connection connection;
public ResultSet rs;
public Statement statement;
/**
* Constructor: Example5
*
*/
public Example5 () {
//--- Create a new PrinterJob object
PrinterJob printJob = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob ();
//--- Create a new book to add pages to
Book book = new Book ();
//--- Add the cover page using the default page format for this print job
book.append (new IntroPage (), printJob.defaultPage ());
//--- Add the document page using a landscape page format
PageFormat documentPageFormat = new PageFormat ();
documentPageFormat.setOrientation (PageFormat.LANDSCAPE);
book.append (new Document (), documentPageFormat);
//--- Tell the printJob to use the book as the pageable object
printJob.setPageable (book);
//--- Show the print dialog box. If the user click the
//--- print button we then proceed to print else we cancel
//--- the process.
if (printJob.printDialog()) {
try {
printJob.print();
} catch (Exception PrintException) {
PrintException.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
/**
* Class: IntroPage
*
* This class defines the painter for the cover page by implementing the
* Printable interface.
*
* @author Jean-Pierre Dube <
[email protected]>
* @version 1.0
* @since 1.0
* @see Printable
*/
private class IntroPage implements Printable {
/**
* Method: print
*
* @param g a value of type Graphics
* @param pageFormat a value of type PageFormat
* @param page a value of type int
* @return a value of type int
*/
public int print (Graphics g, PageFormat pageFormat, int page) {
//--- Create the Graphics2D object
Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D) g;
//--- Translate the origin to 0,0 for the top left corner
g2d.translate (pageFormat.getImageableX (), pageFormat.getImageableY ());
//--- Set the default drawing color to black
g2d.setPaint (Color.black);
//--- Draw a border arround the page
Rectangle2D.Double border = new Rectangle2D.Double (0,
0,
pageFormat.getImageableWidth (),
pageFormat.getImageableHeight ());
g2d.draw (border);
//--- Print the title
String titleText = "Printing in Java Part 2, Example 5, Using full justification";
Font titleFont = new Font ("helvetica", Font.BOLD, 18);
g2d.setFont (titleFont);
//--- Compute the horizontal center of the page
FontMetrics fontMetrics = g2d.getFontMetrics ();
double titleX = (pageFormat.getImageableWidth () / 2) - (fontMetrics.stringWidth (titleText) / 2);
double titleY = 3 * POINTS_PER_INCH;
g2d.drawString (titleText, (int) titleX, (int) titleY);
return (PAGE_EXISTS);
}
}
/**
* Class: Document
*
* This class is the painter for the document content.
* The print method will render a text paragraph fully
* justified.
*
*
* @author Jean-Pierre Dube <
[email protected]>
* @version 1.0
* @since 1.0
* @see Printable
*/
private class Document implements Printable {
/**
* Method: print
*
* @param g a value of type Graphics
* @param pageFormat a value of type PageFormat
* @param page a value of type int
* @return a value of type int
*/
public int print (Graphics g, PageFormat pageFormat, int page) {
//--- Create the Graphics2D object
Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D) g;
//--- Translate the origin to 0,0 for the top left corner
g2d.translate (pageFormat.getImageableX (), pageFormat.getImageableY ());
//--- Set the drawing color to black
g2d.setPaint (Color.black);
//--- Draw a border arround the page using a 12 point border
g2d.setStroke (new BasicStroke (4));
Rectangle2D.Double border = new Rectangle2D.Double (0,
0,
pageFormat.getImageableWidth (),
pageFormat.getImageableHeight ());
g2d.draw (border);
//--- Create a string and assign the text
String text = new String ();
text += "Manipulating raw fonts would be too complicated to render paragraphs of ";
text += "text. Trying to write an algorithm to fully justify text using ";
text += "proportional fonts is not trivial. Adding support for international ";
text += "characters adds to the complexity. That's why we will use the ";
text += "<code>TextLayout</code> and the <code>LineBreakMeasurer<code> class to ";
text += "render text. The <code>TextLayout<code> class offers a lot of ";
text += "functionality to render high quality text. This class is capable of ";
text += "rendering bidirectional text such as Japanese text where the alignment ";
text += "is from right to left instead of the North American style which is left ";
text += "to right. The <code>TextLayout<code> class offers some additional ";
text += "functionalities that we will not use in the course of this ";
text += "series. Features such as text input, caret positionning and hit ";
text += "testing will not be of much use when printing documents, but it's good ";
text += "to know that this functionality exists. ";
text += "The <code>TextLayout</code> class will be used to layout ";
text += "paragraphs. The <code>TextLayout</code> class does not work alone. To ";
text += "layout text within a specified width it needs the help of the ";
text += "<code>LineBreakMeasurer</code> class. This class will wrap a string of ";
text += "text to fit a predefined width. Since it's a multi-lingual class, it ";
text += "knows exactly where to break a line of text according to the rules ";
text += "of the language. Then again the <code>LineBreakMeasurer</code> does ";
text += "not work alone. It needs information from the ";
text += "<code>FontRenderContext</code> class. This class' main function is to ";
text += "return accurate font metrics. To measure text effectively, this class ";
text += "needs to know the rendering hints for the targeted device and the font ";
text += "type being used. ";
//**********************************
try {
while (rs.next()); {
text += rs.getString( "contact" );
}
}
catch ( SQLException sqlex ) {
sqlex.printStackTrace();
textOutput.setText( sqlex.toString() );
}
//*************************
//--- Create a point object to set the top left corner of the TextLayout object
Point2D.Double pen = new Point2D.Double (0.25 * POINTS_PER_INCH, 0.25 * POINTS_PER_INCH);
//--- Set the width of the TextLayout box
double width = 8 * POINTS_PER_INCH;
//--- Create an attributed string from the text string. We are creating an
//--- attributed string because the LineBreakMeasurer needs an Iterator as
//--- parameter.
AttributedString paragraphText = new AttributedString (text);
//--- Set the font for this text
paragraphText.addAttribute (TextAttribute.FONT, new Font ("serif", Font.PLAIN, 12));
//--- Create a LineBreakMeasurer to wrap the text for the TextLayout object
//--- Note the second parameter, the FontRendereContext. I have set the second
//--- parameter antiAlised to true and the third parameter useFractionalMetrics
//--- to true to get the best possible output
LineBreakMeasurer lineBreaker = new LineBreakMeasurer (paragraphText.getIterator(),
new FontRenderContext (null, true, true));
//--- Create the TextLayouts object
TextLayout layout;
TextLayout justifyLayout;
//--- Create a Vector to temporaly store each line of text
Vector lines = new Vector ();
//--- Get the output of the LineBreakMeasurer and store it in a Vector
while ((layout = lineBreaker.nextLayout ((float) width)) != null) {
lines.add (layout);
}
//--- Scan each line of the paragraph and justify it except for the last line
for (int i = 0; i < lines.size (); i++) {
//--- Get the line from the vector
layout = (TextLayout) lines.get (i);
//--- Check for the last line. When found print it
//--- with justification off
if (i != lines.size () - 1)
justifyLayout = layout.getJustifiedLayout ((float) width);
else
justifyLayout = layout;
//--- Align the Y pen to the ascend of the font, remember that
//--- the ascend is origin (0, 0) of a font. Refer to figure 1
pen.y += justifyLayout.getAscent ();
//--- Draw the line of text
justifyLayout.draw (g2d, (float) pen.x, (float) pen.y);
//--- Move the pen to the next position adding the descent and
//--- the leading of the font
pen.y += justifyLayout.getDescent () + justifyLayout.getLeading ();
}
//--- Validate the page
return (PAGE_EXISTS);
}
}
//*******************Begin QueryResult Method*********************
public void QueryResult()
{
try {
//int recordNumber = rs.getInt( "id" );
// if ( recordNumber != 0 ) {
statement =connection.createStatement(ResultSet.TYPE_SCROLL_SENSITIVE,
ResultSet.CONCUR_UPDATABLE);
String query = "SELECT * FROM pt_order " +
"WHERE contact = '" +
fields.contact.getText() + "'" +
"OR account_number = '" +
fields.accountNumber.getText() + "'" +
"OR phone = '" +
fields.phone.getText() + "'";
rs = statement.executeQuery( query );
//************retrieves the number of rows********
rs.last();
rs.beforeFirst();
textOutput.setText( "Query successful... ");
rs.next();
//statement.close();
//}
//else
//textOutput.append("\nEnter account number here then press Query" );
}
catch ( SQLException sqlex ) {
sqlex.printStackTrace();
textOutput.setText("An error occurred during Query: " + sqlex.toString() );
}
}
//*************************End of Query Result method************************
} // Example5
