Drawing prints as blank page

[Mathias Hofmann]

The attached drawing does not print (the printout is blank).
It does print as bitmap (360 dpi .. 720 dpi), but gives blank at 1440dpi
As printer I am using an Epson B1100 or PdfCreator.

Former version of the drawing used to print OK.
Save as pdf worked and printed on Adobe, but took very long on FoxitReader

Inkscape versions: 0.48.2.0 ... 0.48.3.1
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 24bit Intel i5-2450 4GB RAM

Thank you very much for your great work on this wonderful application

[su_v (suv-lp)]

> Former version of the drawing used to print OK.
> Save as pdf worked and printed on Adobe, but took very long on FoxitReader

Did you also use reduced opacity values for all the colored grid lines in earlier versions instead of actually modifying the color values?

(reduced object opacity causes a far more complex structures in the PDF files, and - if exported to a PostScript-based format - is not supported (i.e. needs to be rasterized to keep up the same appearance)).

If you don't need the semi-transparency at the crossings of the grid lines, I'd recommend to test whether printing gives better results without unnecessary transparencies in the SVG file.

(Note: you can use the color picker to convert the mixed color shade (created by rendering with a reduced opacity against the white background) to a flat solid color:
<http://tavmjong.free.fr/INKSCAPE/MANUAL/html/Attributes-Fill-Stroke.html#Attributes-Color-Dropper>)

[Mathias Hofmann (m-hofmann-b)]

Thank you very much for your answer.

>Did you also use reduced opacity values for all the colored grid lines in earlier versions instead of actually modifying the color values?

I just did the test: if I set opacity to 100% for all lines, it prints OK.
So it seems to be a memory problem?
If yes, is there something to be done about?
Further, it would be nice, if Inkscape woud be more talkative in those situations...

[su_v (suv-lp)]

Probably related to (or duplicate of):
Bug #961260 “Printing problems”
<https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/961260>

[Steve Crook Jr (stevecrookjr)]

I am hesitant to create a whole new bug ticket for what seems to be the same problem as this & #961260...

This morning (yes, I am up late... again!) I created a font sampler for a client; all but one of the fonts I downloaded and installed tonight. The drawing only has text and one box. To make life easy for me, some of the text flows off the edge of the paper, where I expect the program or print driver to ignore it. My file has no raster images or opacity settings, so it is different than these two, but the result is the same.

The .svg file is 11.9kb and is attached.

Computer:
ancient P4 running XP SP3
sample of major software: GIMP 2.8; GhostScript 9.05; VLMC 0.2.0; Picasa 3.9; Audacity 1.3; OpenOffice 3.4; Chrome 21.0.1180.79 m

Inkscape v0.48.2 r9819

Two physical printers,
1) Canon MX-330 inkjet (raster only driver {as far as I know})
2) HP LaserJet 4050 (PCL6 & PS drivers)

First print to MX-330 produced blank page; while the Canon was doing its pre-print stuff, sent the print to the HP PS driver - also blank page.

Second print to the MX-330, set to raster print 600dpi (Print -> Rendering -> Bitmap...) printed fine. Sent to the HP PCL6 driver at 1200dpi... Inkscape crashed.

Looking through the bug reports to try to find a solution, and saw several steps you ask people, so tried saving as... .pdf and it saves fine and printed to the HP from Adobe Reader.

If I forgot anything, please feel free to yell at me to get it straight.

SCJ

[su_v (suv-lp)]

@Steve - since your file does not contain any semi-transparent objects, it's very unlikely related to this report (bug #1021237) or bug #961260. It seems more an issue related to the printer drivers, as is tracked in
- Bug #531342 “Print job gets deleted before printing”
  <https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/531342>
and the various reports mentioned in the comments there (and linked as duplicates).