Printing an XSTRING in ABAP

[Former Member]

Moderator message: please do not post the same question in two forums. Duplicate deleted

In my ABAP program I have an XSTRING that contains a PDF document. This XSTRING was returned by a web service. In the debugger, if I download the contents of the XSTRING and save it as a PDF I can open it and print it. However, I need to be able to send the XSTRING to a printer in my ABAP program. Is this possible? Do I need to convert the XSTRING to some other format first?

Thank you,

Edited by: Matt on Dec 22, 2008 7:40 AM

[MarcinPciak]

Hmm, not sure if this will help but you may try. Convert xtring to string with fm HR_KR_XSTRING_TO_STRING and try to sent it to your printer.

DATA: xstr TYPE xstring.  "your xstring
          str TYPE string.
          
          CALL FUNCTION 'HR_KR_XSTRING_TO_STRING'
            EXPORTING
              in_xstring = xstr
            IMPORTING
              out_string = str.
 
"now try sending it to the printer

I am myself curious if this works so please let me know the result.

Thanks

Marcin

[Former Member]

How do I print it to the printer? I was thinking about using this

print-control function 'XXXX'.

write: mystring.

print-control function 'XXXX'.

However, what print control ('XXXX') should I use?

thank you

[Former Member]

I was able to make it print. However, it just print the exact string (Not in PDF format).

[MarcinPciak]

That's good. Frankly I have never used it. Try with converting string to pdf or print spool to pdf.

Here is one of thread decribing how to achieve this:

[Convert report spool to pdf|;

I also found some topic about direct convertion from xtring to pdf:

[Converting xstring to pdf|;

Hope they can help you

Marcin

[Former Member]

I think I just need to find the write print control to use for a PDF document. I'm having the same problem with printing ZPL code to a ZEBRA printer. Both the ZPL code and the PDF are returned in a string parameter from a web service. You would think that you could just send the string to the printer. Anyone have a clue?

[Former Member]

I was able to to solve my problem with printing ZPL code. The fix was to use a smartform and pass the zpl code to the smart form and print it. However, I still can't print a PDF. I tried using the smartform in the same way as the ZPL, but it didn't work. What format does the data have to be in when it is passed to the smartform? Binary, PDF, OTF?

Binary Data:

255044462D312E320D0A352030206F626A0D0A3C3C0D0A2F54797065202F584F626A6563740D0A2F53756274797065202F496D6167650D0A2F4E616D65202F536E6F77626F756E64300D0A2F576964746820313730300D0A2F48656967687420323230300D0A2F42697473506572436F6D706F6E656E7420310D0A2F436F6C6............

PDF Data:

%PDF-1.2

5 0 obj

<<

/Type /XObject

/Subtype /Image

/Name /Snowbound0

/Width 1700

/Height 2200

/BitsPerComponent 1

/ColorSpace /DeviceGray

/Filter /CCITTFaxDecode

/DecodeParms <<

/K -1

/Columns 1700 /Rows 2200

/EndOfBlock false

/EndOfLine false

/EncodedByteAlign false

>>

/Length 6 0 R

>>

stream..................

Edited by: Tony Raimo on Jan 6, 2009 2:51 AM