Help needed w/booklet-printing macro, round 2

[David Nebenzahl]

In our last episode, I was having problems with the booklet-printing
macro posted on the MVPS FAQ site.

Well, I still am, but it turns out the macro works just peachy. No
problems with it; it's actually pretty simple, once you read it. It
simply uses Application.PrintOut to print the pages, so no magic there.

Turns out I had never tried to print my pages out 2-up, the way they'd
appear in the booklet sheets. When I did, I found the problem is with
the way Word is printing my document.

I'll try to supply all the relevant info. I'm trying to print a booklet
with finished size 4-3/4" x 5".

Page setup:

* 2 pages per sheet
* Paper size: 10" (width) x 4-3/4" (landscape orientation)
* Margins: top: 0.25"; bottom: 0.2"; outside/inside/gutter: 0.2"
* Header & footer from edge: 0"
* Gutter position: left

Everything's in one section, with page breaks between.

PROBLEM: the 2-page spread prints too far towards the right side of the
page, looking at the spread in landscape orientation. In other words,
the right side of the right page is almost at the edge of the paper.

I also get the error alert "The margins of section 1 are set outside the
printable area of the page.". (Not sure which ones it's unhappy about:
my guess would be the 0.2" ones.)

I want it to print in the *center of the sheet* (both ways).

I realize now that even though I consider myself something of an expert
Word user, I really don't understand the whole concept of "paper size"
here. What I'm trying to define is a PAGE that's 4.75x5" (2-up), printed
on a SHEET that's 8.5x11".

Maybe I'm just doing some little stupid thing wrong. I hope so. I truly
hope I don't have to resort to populating my little document with
frames, text boxes or the like.

Oh, and it's W2K.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Since I've never used that macro, I don't know exactly how it works, but I
think it is using the "2 pages per sheet" option in either the Print or the
Page Setup dialog. If the former, then you would have to create the pages at
twice the size (more or less) because they would be reduced. If the latter,
then you're creating the pages at full size and the macro is printing them
in the required order to make a booklet.

In either case, however, if you're printing on a full-size sheet, then you
need to adjust the margins to print in the desired location. If you're
printing on smaller paper, you may be out of luck unless your printer
supports that paper size because often the only way to set up custom sizes
is to pretend they're Letter or A4 and adjust the margins accordingly, which
will not be possible for "2 pages per sheet." From the sound of it, this is
what you're running into here. Can you print on that paper size correctly (2
pages per sheet) without using the macro? If so, and if you don't have a
gazillion pages, you can do this manually by printing specific pages: x, 1,
2, x-1, x-2, 3, ...

 

[David Nebenzahl]

Suzanne S. Barnhill spake thus:

Since I've never used that macro, I don't know exactly how it works, but I
think it is using the "2 pages per sheet" option in either the Print or the
Page Setup dialog. If the former, then you would have to create the pages at
twice the size (more or less) because they would be reduced. If the latter,
then you're creating the pages at full size and the macro is printing them
in the required order to make a booklet.

In either case, however, if you're printing on a full-size sheet, then you
need to adjust the margins to print in the desired location. If you're
printing on smaller paper, you may be out of luck unless your printer
supports that paper size because often the only way to set up custom sizes
is to pretend they're Letter or A4 and adjust the margins accordingly, which
will not be possible for "2 pages per sheet." From the sound of it, this is
what you're running into here. Can you print on that paper size correctly (2
pages per sheet) without using the macro? If so, and if you don't have a
gazillion pages, you can do this manually by printing specific pages: x, 1,
2, x-1, x-2, 3, ...

You must have misread my message.

There is nothing wrong with the macro. No problem there. The macro just
rearranges the order in which pages are printed, and it does that
correctly. The problem is just printing normally from Word. (As I
pointed out, the macro merely uses the Application.PrintOut function to
print the pages; it does no formatting at all.

I still don't understand the relationship between *page size* (what I
think of as the printed area of the page, in this case 4.75" x 5" x 2),
and sheet size (what Word calls "paper size"). I guess it boils down to
this: how do I get Word to print a 10" x 4.75" 2-page spread in the
middle of a sheet of letter-size paper?

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

Okay, now we're getting down to brass tacks! This is going to take a little
trial and error, but you will have to imagine your page as Word sees it. It
is seeing two 5.5" x 8.25" pages side by side on your 11" x 8.5" sheet. So
draw a line down the center of your paper and draw your 4.75" x 5" pages on
either side of that line. That is where you are trying to print. Of course
you already know this, but this may make it easier to visualize. The trick
is to adjust the margins so that they will cause this.

The first thing you'll need to do is check the box for "Mirror margins" (in
Word 2002/2003 this is a dropdown list item) so that you will have different
margins on odd and even pages. Since your 10" document size is 1" smaller
than your 11" paper (0.5" on each side), add 0.5" to whatever you have set
as the Outside margin. The Inside margin will not need any adjustment.

The top and bottom margins will be handled the same way. Assuming you want
the 4.75" centered in the middle of the 8.25" page height, you will need to
add 1.75" to whatever top and bottom margins you want.

You wouldn't have to go through all this if your printer driver supported
the document size you want AND you actually had paper that size, but since
you're printing on larger paper, you have to make up the difference with
your margin settings.

 

[David Nebenzahl]

Suzanne S. Barnhill spake thus:

Okay, now we're getting down to brass tacks! This is going to take a little
trial and error, but you will have to imagine your page as Word sees it. It
is seeing two 5.5" x 8.25" pages side by side on your 11" x 8.5" sheet. So
draw a line down the center of your paper and draw your 4.75" x 5" pages on
either side of that line. That is where you are trying to print. Of course
you already know this, but this may make it easier to visualize. The trick
is to adjust the margins so that they will cause this.

The first thing you'll need to do is check the box for "Mirror margins" (in
Word 2002/2003 this is a dropdown list item) so that you will have different
margins on odd and even pages. Since your 10" document size is 1" smaller
than your 11" paper (0.5" on each side), add 0.5" to whatever you have set
as the Outside margin. The Inside margin will not need any adjustment.

This just plain doesn't work; at least with W2K, if you select "2 pages
per sheet" (as I must, as it's the only way to get the pages to print
2-up on the sheet, side by side), the "Mirror margins" option is grayed out.

And I take it you were assuming the "2 pages per sheet" option was set,
right? Because otherwise, you'll get just one page per sheet.

The top and bottom margins will be handled the same way. Assuming you want
the 4.75" centered in the middle of the 8.25" page height, you will need to
add 1.75" to whatever top and bottom margins you want.

Yes; as you say, now we're getting somewhere. I got it to work by
telling it the paper is letter size (which it is), and by defining the
margins pretty much as you'd suggested. This prints the pages in the
center of the sheet. There are a couple little problems, like not being
able to use a layout that handles left & right pages correctly (as I
can't use the "Mirror margins" option), but for this project, it'll do.

You wouldn't have to go through all this if your printer driver supported
the document size you want AND you actually had paper that size, but since
you're printing on larger paper, you have to make up the difference with
your margin settings.

Actually, this just reinforces--as if I needed to remind myself--that
Word is a piss-poor tool for this job. Back when I had my print shop, I
would have used InDesign, and it would have taken me 10 minutes to set
up and print this project. I even had a bookletizer add-on that did
automatic pagination in print order. Word can't even come close to that.
Oh, and InDesign prints crop marks, too, something Word has no clue about.

I wouldn't want to print it on the actual-size sheets, because they're
pretty small, plus I need to stitch (staple for non-printers) the
booklet before trimming it.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I'm not sure how this works in Word 2000, but in Word 2002, when you set "2
pages per sheet," the margins change to Inside and Outside anyway, which
means you get mirror margins into the bargain.

If you still can't make this work, though, then you would definitely be
better off with Publisher, then, which can do booklets natively, can handle
custom size documents, and can print crop marks.