CODEWITHSUNDEEP
cwinapiprinting
Jacob Marble
Jacob Marble

Reputation: 30132

How to get printer manufacturer and model from Win32 API?

I have eight different printers installed on a Windows 8.1 computer. These printers are various manufacturers and models, there are two HP LaserJet printers, an Epson inkjet, a CutePDF Writer, a Windows Fax printer, and others.

For all of my printers, this call to DeviceCapabilities returns -1, which means "either that the capability is not supported or there was a general function failure". Other fwCapability values, like DC_DUPLEX, succeed.

DeviceCapabilities(pDevice, pPort, DC_MANUFACTURER, NULL, &devMode);

My guess is that DC_MANUFACTURER and DC_MODEL are "newer" and therefore unimplemented. CUPS has a printer-make-and-model attribute, required PPD options Manufacturer and Model.

What is the proper way to query the manufacturer and model of a printer with Win32?

Upvotes: 2

Views: 2495

Answers (1)

Barmak Shemirani
Barmak Shemirani

Reputation: 31599

DC_MANUFACTURER and DC_MODEL are not listed in MSDN documentation, they are not worth investigating.

pDevice parameter in DeviceCapabilities is usually printer name and model. For example "HP LaserJet 123" It's the same thing in control panel. That should be all you need.

Sometimes printer name gets changed, in which case you can use driver name to identify the printer. 

int wmain()
{
    DWORD flags = PRINTER_ENUM_LOCAL | PRINTER_ENUM_CONNECTIONS;
    int level = 2;
    PRINTER_INFO_2* printerInfo;
    DWORD memsize, printer_count;

    EnumPrinters(flags, NULL, level, NULL, 0, &memsize, &printer_count);
    if (memsize < 1) return 0;

    BYTE* bytes = new BYTE[memsize];
    if (EnumPrinters(flags, NULL, level, bytes, memsize, &memsize, &printer_count))
    {
        printerInfo = (PRINTER_INFO_2*)bytes;
        for (UINT i = 0; i < printer_count; i++)
        {
            std::wcout << "printer: " << printerInfo->pPrinterName << "\n";
            std::wcout << "printerInfo->pDriverName: " << printerInfo->pDriverName << "\n\n";
            printerInfo++;
        }
    }
    delete[] bytes;

    return 0;
}

In above code, printerInfo->pPrinterName should match printer name as shown in control panel (or pDevice). printerInfo->pDriverName should always be printer name and model.

To get the manufacturer name you can go through DRIVER_INFO_6 and pszMfgName However that may not be very useful.

Upvotes: 1

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