Conditions - printing topics and omitting master pages

[NeilsonB]

I don't seem to have found a good answer to this issue in the forums, so I'm starting this one.

I have created a master page in which is built a navigation menu, a footer and various other proxy items. A topic toolbar proxy is also included from which the print icon is made available to the topic.

This master page is applied to many topics. The idea is (according to the help subjects provide by Madcap) to print only the topic content, but not print the navigation menu, footer or breadcrumbs. Unfortunately the help doesn't seem to explain how this works, since no matter the configuation of print-only or screen only includes or excludes, the page either prints with the full topic including master page, or only the master page - basically it does everything I don't want it to do.

Additionally, any page that does print is has a terrible quality. The style is simply arial, but results in something more like an ink stain. In no other output does this occur except from Madcap. Any ideas welcome.

I'm now understanding why they call it madcap, since I'm getting a little more than frustrated inside the brain cage

Is there any good tutorial on how to use condition tags to print only topics and not master pages. Or can somebody explain to me what I'm doing wrong here.

[wclass]

Conditions work on the source topics to generate the content that ends up in the output, but they don't operate on the output files. I haven't used the toolbar proxy for printing but I suspect it won't relate to the conditions. To specify what you can and can't print once you have the output, have a look at screen and print mediums and how they work with CSS (search for style sheet mediums in Flare help).

[NeilsonB]

Thanks for your response.

Determining print output based on styles is not really the answer I was hoping for. I really need a solution that prints only the topic and does not print the master page (regardless of style), since the master page uses many of the same styles. In your solution I would need to duplicate or create new styles, making one printable and one not - unless I'm missing your point.

Thanks

[wclass]

When a browser prints a page it uses the "print" medium. In Flare, I have all my styles set up under the default medium, but I have about half a dozen that need to display online but I don't need to print. I have created styles for these in the "print" medium with the same name but just the setting "display: none" - this did not take long for a half dozen styles. The content only ever has the one style applied, like H1, footer, whatever - there is no need for conditions - the browser will do the work with the CSS. If your headers/footers etc are in divs you can set display to none for the div when printed.

[LTinker68]

Unfortunately the help doesn't seem to explain how this works, since no matter the configuation of print-only or screen only includes or excludes, the page either prints with the full topic including master page, or only the master page - basically it does everything I don't want it to do.

I'm not sure what you mean by printing the master page. You can't print a master page as the contents and such in a master page are combined with the topic content when you build the output. In other words, when you build the output, there no longer is a separate master page file in the output.

If you're talking about the whole frameset, then whether or not that prints depends in part on what browser you're using and where the cursor is at the point you tell it to print. If none of the panes have focus, then the browser may print the whole frameset (toolbar, navigation, and topic). To print just the topic, some browsers will allow you to click in the topic to give it focus then when you print it prints that topic, but other browsers might require you to right-click in the topic and select the option to print just that "frame" of the frameset. And even then, whether or not graphics or background colors/images print depends on what the user has set in the browser.

[NeilsonB]

Thanks to all who replied.

Since madcap does join the master page and topic at buildtime I'd thought it would be a simple solution to change the master page conditions to exclude when printing. Faulty logic I guess.

The advice to contain the master page elements and set the div to none when printing works exactly as intended. Thanks again.

Cheers