brochure printing

users
#1

Can someone settle my mind please here? Has the page size setup changed at some point for doing brochure printing from Writer?

I don't do this too often, so my memory may be wrong. However, I find this week that to make an A5-size booklet, I need to create A4 pages with scaled up contents, that are then scaled down [factor sqrt(2)] by LO and printed 2-up on A4 paper when 'brochure' is selected. Paper size and orientation is greyed out in the print dialogue.

I'm pretty certain (and the one example I can find from OOo days in 2006 seems to bear this out) that once upon a time, I'd have had to create an A5 document, specify A4 landscape paper, and brochure mode would then print my A5 pages unscaled, 2-up.

Is my memory wrong? If things have changed, what was the rationale? - the latter way seem IMO much more convenient.

Thanks!!

#2

Hi Mike,

Mike Scott schrieb:

Can someone settle my mind please here? Has the page size setup changed
at some point for doing brochure printing from Writer?

I don't do this too often, so my memory may be wrong. However, I find
this week that to make an A5-size booklet, I need to create A4 pages
with scaled up contents, that are then scaled down [factor sqrt(2)] by
LO and printed 2-up on A4 paper when 'brochure' is selected. Paper size
and orientation is greyed out in the print dialogue.

I'm pretty certain (and the one example I can find from OOo days in 2006
seems to bear this out) that once upon a time, I'd have had to create an
A5 document, specify A4 landscape paper, and brochure mode would then
print my A5 pages unscaled, 2-up.

Is my memory wrong? If things have changed, what was the rationale? -
the latter way seem IMO much more convenient.

Your memory is correct and you should not use the method of scaling down. For me it works out-of-the-box when my document is A5 and I check "brochure" in the tab "Page Layout". I use LO5.1 (a current daily developer build) and have got a printer Epson-WP-4025.

But the communication between LO and your printer might be not optimal. You can try, whether it works better, when you check the options "Use only paper tray from printer preferences" and "Use only size form printer preferences" in the tab "Options". In that case you need to open the printer properties in tab "General" and set the actual paper size and orientation in the printer driver dialog. Start with a test document of four A5 pages on one paper sheet of A4. Depending on your printer, it might be, that you have to set the turn edge in addition.

Kind regards
Regina

#3

.....snip....

Thanks for your comment. Glad I'm not imagining things :slight_smile:

Unfortunately I don't seem to have any choice in the matter. Whatever page size I set (format|page) is /always/ transferred automatically to printer settings, and shows up there greyed out and unchangeable. When I set 'brochure', the format changes to landscape, and the paper size stays the same, with the contents printing scaled down. This is with 5.0.1.2 BTW.

(The printer itself isn't an issue, btw; but thanks for the thought. I've long since worked out which way to twist things between out and in trays to make double-sided come out right!!)

#4

Hi Mike,

Mike Scott schrieb:
[..]

Unfortunately I don't seem to have any choice in the matter. Whatever
page size I set (format|page) is /always/ transferred automatically to
printer settings, and shows up there greyed out and unchangeable. When I
set 'brochure', the format changes to landscape, and the paper size
stays the same, with the contents printing scaled down. This is with
5.0.1.2 BTW.

(The printer itself isn't an issue, btw; but thanks for the thought.
I've long since worked out which way to twist things between out and in
trays to make double-sided come out right!!)

Do you work on Windows? If not, then printing is more difficult. You might need a Linux or Mac user then to help you.

Do you have got a setting to toggle between system print dialog and LO print dialog? (This option does not exist on Windows.)

Do you now how to do an administrative installation? Then testing Lo5.1 might be an options.

You can try, export to pdf and use print dialog of Acrobat Reader, which is really good.

Kind regards
Regina

#5

For me, since I never used the "brochure option", I set up a document
with the correct number of columns and margins for my brochure paper size.

I use US Letter and US Legal sizes of paper, and not A4 or A5.

For me, this seems the easiest way for creating the brochures I produce
from time to time.

I tried the "brochure option" many versions ago, but did not like it due
to printer issues with my HP laser printer and the Epson inkjet I had
back then. I have not tried it on my Canon printer[s] that I bought
after the Epson printer died.

I just work with the manual brochure formatting [columns and margins],
since it is the way I find easiest for me to use.

#6

Hi Mike,

Mike Scott schrieb:
[..]

Unfortunately I don't seem to have any choice in the matter. Whatever
page size I set (format|page) is /always/ transferred automatically to
printer settings, and shows up there greyed out and unchangeable. When I
set 'brochure', the format changes to landscape, and the paper size
stays the same, with the contents printing scaled down. This is with
5.0.1.2 BTW.

(The printer itself isn't an issue, btw; but thanks for the thought.
I've long since worked out which way to twist things between out and in
trays to make double-sided come out right!!)

Do you work on Windows? If not, then printing is more difficult. You
might need a Linux or Mac user then to help you.

Sorry; should have mentioned this is on linux (Mint qiana). I rather assumed the problem would be OS-independent.

Do you have got a setting to toggle between system print dialog and LO
print dialog? (This option does not exist on Windows.)

Do you now how to do an administrative installation? Then testing Lo5.1
might be an options.

You can try, export to pdf and use print dialog of Acrobat Reader, which
is really good.

But not on linux :slight_smile:

I've a selection of ps and pdf tools available, which can help -- so I do have a workaround (although at present I'm working scaled-up and letting LO scale things down again).

But given LO has the brochure facility, it really ought to work consistently. If I can work out how without blowing the system apart, I'll perhaps try reverting to V4.x and see what happens.

(To answer another reply; multicolumn certainly has its uses, but can't re-order pages as needed.)

Thanks.

#7

...

But given LO has the brochure facility, it really ought to work
consistently. If I can work out how without blowing the system apart,
I'll perhaps try reverting to V4.x and see what happens.

I think I see what's going wrong. Could someone check please? - make a document, say A5 page format, then start the print dialogue and check what page size is set there under device properties and whether it can be changed or not.

I find that even the print-n-pages per sheet facility is crippled - anything other than 1 will cause scaling the size down, because the printer page size is forced to the size of the current page layout. At least, it is here.

Might it be a CUPS driver problem of some sort? Or is it an LO bug?

Thanks.

#8

Hi Mike,

Mike Scott schrieb:

...

But given LO has the brochure facility, it really ought to work
consistently. If I can work out how without blowing the system apart,
I'll perhaps try reverting to V4.x and see what happens.

I think I see what's going wrong. Could someone check please? - make a
document, say A5 page format, then start the print dialogue and check
what page size is set there under device properties and whether it can
be changed or not.

I find that even the print-n-pages per sheet facility is crippled -
anything other than 1 will cause scaling the size down, because the
printer page size is forced to the size of the current page layout. At
least, it is here.

Have you really checked both options "Use only paper tray from printer preferences" and "Use only size form printer preferences" in the tab "Options"? After this options are enabled, the settings in the printer properties should be enabled.

Kind regards
Regina

#9

Hi Tim, all,

I use US Letter and US Legal sizes of paper, and not A4 or A5.

For me, this seems the easiest way for creating the brochures I produce
from time to time.

I tried the "brochure option" many versions ago, but did not like it due
to printer issues with my HP laser printer and the Epson inkjet I had
back then. I have not tried it on my Canon printer[s] that I bought
after the Epson printer died.

I just work with the manual brochure formatting [columns and margins],
since it is the way I find easiest for me to use.

I use brochure size for printing concert programs for a music group I manage. I do this every month and a half or so.

Here are the settings for US Letter I use that allow me to edit and print with very little wasted white space close to the header/footer of booklet pages. And, as mentioned elsewhere, the page numbering is done automatically.

These settings work really well.

Steps:

Set Booklet Page Format
* go to Format->Page
* set Width: 5.50"
* set Height: 8.50
* set Orientation: Portrait
* set all margins to 0.50"

When Editing
*if your monitor is large enough, at bottom of your Writer window, click on "Multipage-view" (it's the icon with 2 separate pages). This will allow you to see 2 pages side by side.

To Print in booklet/brochure format:
* go to File->Print
* in General tab, you will now see the pages represented on the left-hand side
* go to the "Page Layout"
* Pages per sheet: 1
* Order: left to right, then down
* leave "Draw a border around each page" unchecked
* choose "Brochure"
* choose "Page Sides"
** Include: Back sides/left pages
** choose "OK"
** the back sides of pages will all print
** left the pages print then flip the whole pack of pages
** Include: Front sides/right pages
** choose "OK"
** the front sides of the pages will print

That's it! You should be able to fold your printed booklet and/or staple if needed.

Cheers,

Marc

#10

....

Have you really checked both options "Use only paper tray from printer
preferences" and "Use only size form printer preferences" in the tab
"Options"? After this options are enabled, the settings in the printer
properties should be enabled.

Duhh! I've just looked back, and that's exactly what you said originally. And I didn't. Sorry - and yes, that fixes it; thank you (twice!)

But - isn't this a bit of an odd user interface? You set the brochure option on /this/ tab, enable setting the paper size on /that/ tab, then click a button on yet another tab to open the dialogue to actually set the size. Could this not be tidied up? (And the defaults must have changed - I'm sure I've never had to worry about this before) Nor, AFAICS, is this mentioned anywhere in the help file (which I did read!)

Incidentally, I notice that the 'brochure' setting now is stored with the document (it used not to be), as is 'Use only paper tray....' whereas "Use only size from printer preferences" isn't saved and needs resetting every time the document is opened. But thankfully the paper size and orientation are saved. Curious design.

Anyway, problem solved; apologies again, and thanks for your patience.