Tips For Printing Graphs

One of the best features of Windows® is its ability to isolate application programs, such as Ballistic Explorer, from the printing hardware, which lets applications work with most printers and utilize their full capabilities. Besides Windows® itself, the software that makes this possible is the printer driver. Many of these drivers are provided with Windows®, but others are supplied by printer manufacturers. Depending on the capabilities of the printer, and the source of the printer drivers, the options and settings vary greatly. Also, some printer drivers have bugs, and the printers themselves have limitations, such as memory. Printing graphs seems to find these weaknesses faster than anything else. The options that cause the most problems are as follows:

Dithering: Recommend setting this option to None. When this option is not set to None, extra dots may appear on the graph. Also the dots of the grid may not print at all.

Resolution: Recommend setting this option to its highest value. When set at lower values than the natural resolution of the printer, the registration of text and graphics may be lost (text is out of place on the graph).

Orientation: Recommend setting this option to Portrait. When set to Landscape, some older laser printers with limited memory may not print all of the graph when printing large size graphs.

When printing on color printers the graph will be printed in the selected colors. Note that the colors on the screen usually don't match the printed colors; this is not the fault of Ballistic Explorer. However, Ballistic Explorer always assumes a white background when printing, regardless of the background color of the graph window. Also, Ballistic Explorer converts white text and lines on the screen to black when printing.