Advanced Print View - Various print issues

[Chad-Smith]

Description

The Advanced Print View has a number of issues with the formatting on the print.

Refer image below;

Green - Using the default format ${workspace.metadata.grid.title.value} shows the original tab name which is Grid. In this workspace the Grid tab name had been renamed. This is not showing the changed tab name.

Blue - Between grid rows, it is quite common to get gaps between grid lines.

Red - Grid rows are split between pages. The split row should be starting as a full row on the next page. Having these rows split across pages makes it harder to read.

Impact

Looks messy. Not professional enough to give to clients.

Severity

High

Solution

See if these issues can be improved for neatness.

Maybe rendering the Advanced Prints as HTML isn't the correct answer to this. Maybe the print should be converted to a PDF on the server-side in order to obtain correct formatting on the print, and then served to the client as a download, and/or the PDF displayed to the browser ready for viewing and then printing.

[jared.sund]

Brausmith, we’re considering export to PDF or other document formats to try and help with these sorts of issues. HTML is supported differently by browsers, and is not a very good document format. Do you think having a the ability to choose the format for a report html/document (pdf) would be good path for these kinds of issues?

[Chad-Smith]

I agree that having a HTML output is certainly not ideal. It's not very consistant and therefore an unreliable format. When mixed in with my other idea here, we can see that we don't get a very good output for presentable reports.

I would definitely think a PDF format would be good (at minimum), and possibly also Word (.docx) so that we able to take te output into Word and keep working. Getting the output processed on the server-side should allow PLM to configure this in a much more flexible way.

[jared.sund]

Noted, I'll talk this idea over with dev and see about moving this to an accepted idea.

-jared

[DonovanJr]

Yes, The limitations in the current Advanced Print HTML Editor do not allow for Business Level output.

One of the nice features of LM is the inclusion of our Vendors in the workflow, but I still have the need to generate a formal document for Purchase orders, RFQ etc and the current level of design options in Advanced print does not provide enough for me to produce acceptable output.

Another method of exporting information at workflow transitions into a custom printable form is needed if Advanced Print is not to be improved or intended to make professional level document output

Bob Donovan

[giliar.defriesperez]

Hi Chad,

Due to the current direction of the product, we are not considering this idea for implementation at this time. Thank you for your contribution, every idea is welcome. We encourage your continued participation on the Idea Station.

Giliar Perez
Product Owner - Fusion Lifecycle
Autodesk Canada Co.