Problem of getting extra blank pages

[RNTH]

Hi,

I have a problem with a program, in which 2 extra blank pages are getting printed before the report starts printing. I am not sending any command explicitly to print blank pages. What may be the reason of this? What all commands can cause blank pages?

Thanks,
RNTH

 

[jlasman]

A formfeed (^L) is the only command that I know of that for sure will unconditionally print a blank page.

There are a few others that will cause a page eject, but these usuallly require printable data already exist it the printer. Page size, tray select.

Can you direct the output to a file and then look for clues?

Which printer? Which OS? Which program?

Jim Asman

 

[Guest_imported]

I agree with Jim with one further suggestion- print to file and then open it in a hex editor, which will allow you see form feeds and other "invisible" characters. The form feed in Ascii is 0C hex, carriage returns are 0D and line feeds are 0A.

 

[Buff1]

As Jim mentioned, the reset EscE (if I recall correctly)
will force a page eject but normally only if there is
data printed on the page. It might do it if you send
any command to the printer first (such as a font) but
I'm not sure about that. Normally the problem is getting
blank page(s) between pages which is usually the result of
going past the vertical printable area of the page. (for example trying to print too many lines) like printing to line 65 on a page that will only accept 64 lines.

 

[DansDadUK]

Perhaps some PJL, or similar, statements are preceding the report, are not being recognised by the device, and are hence being 'printed' - but in the unprintable area at top?

As Jim Brown suggests, examination of a 'print to file' sample would be useful in determining the cause.

 

[RNTH]

Hi All,

I am encountering this problem while dealing with an online program in CICS(Mainframe). Somebody please tell me how can I get the output report of an Online program into a file.

Thanking you,
RNTH

 

[DansDadUK]

You'll probably need to post in the CICS forum forum312, rather than this PCL one, to get an answer to your last question.

 

[Guest_imported]

I don't know about CICS, but in output systems like JES you would change one of the control cards to output to say tape. You should speak to one of your CICS support guys or post in the CICS forum as suggested.