Re: Appleworks printing to 3 up post cards?

[Hugh Hood <hughhood@earthlink.net>]

in article b137596c-f4a3-4be2-af78-1f13ec70a4d5@googlegroups.com, SHartz40
at SHartz40@yahoo.com wrote on 8/6/12 3:09 PM:

> I have 3-on-a-page postcards that I am trying to use on a Deskject (that works
> wonderfully for all my other printing needs)  The cards are on 8.5 x 11
> standard sized paper, and hence measure 3.666 inches.  Appleworks only allows
> a paper length value in tenths of an inch  ie.  3.6"  or 3.7".  Is there a
> work-around to allow me to print a bunch of the 3-up postcards and not 'run
> off the bottom of the page"  after a few sheets are printed?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> Steve


Steve:

I thought this had come up before, but all I found in my reference materials
were unhelpful comments like 'switch to 2 per page postcards'.

Anyway,

I see what you mean -- (3) per page on an 11" page complicates things a bit,
not just for AppleWorks page length purposes, but also for the DeskJet if
you instead try to use the vertical motion index (VMI) PCL commands to pack
12" of lines into an 11" space. Even though you can specify the VMI to four
decimal places, it's still not spot on, and you'll probably experience
printer page creep.

So ...

Provided this is a fairly large quantity of postcards, or you plan to do
this again, I think the easiest way to do it is by using TimeOut
ReportWriter from within AppleWorks.

ReportWriter can have a tough learning curve for _some_ report types, but
it's fairly simple for jobs like this. (See pages 77-78 of the manual, and
the sample report file 'MAILINGLABELS' on the disk).

If you don't already have the program, it's available for download from
several of the usual suspects, although unfortunately I have yet to see that
anyone has scanned the manual to .pdf and made it available for download.

Basically, just define your Report Body Section to have 22 lines (assuming
66 lines per page on an 11" page @ 6 lines per inch / 3 cards) with the
various fields spaced where you want them. Disregard the other Sections
(e.g. Title, Header, Footer, Close).

In the printer options area, use an 11.0" page length and 6 LPI. If your
perforation skip is disabled (or can be), you shouldn't need top and bottom
margins, I believe. (YMMV)

{BTW, if you're using AppleWorks 5.1, make sure you run the stock
ReportWriter through the TimeOut updater so that it will work}.


ALTERNATIVELY, if this is a one time thing for you and the quantity is low,
you can just use the stock AppleWorks to print the FIRST 1/3 of your cards,
ONE PER PAGE, and then load them back into the DeskJet for printing the
SECOND 1/3, and then load them one last time for printing the THIRD 1/3. Of
course, you would change your placement of fields on the report between
printing the thirds.

If you get stumped, I'd be happy to look at a sample record from your file
and make a report. -- Happy, but not necessarily quick. <grin>





Hugh Hood