Printing Issues
When I print a web page, the other columns on many pages overlap with the content I'm trying to print resulting in an unreadable printed pages. This issue does NOT occur in other browsers so I've had to resolve by printing using IE or Chrome. I've tried ALL of the recommended fixes on your help topics with NO fix. All my print page settings are at the recommended default and I've reset the printer properties via your help topic recommendation. Can you help? My printer is a HP laserjet 2200d. My OS is Windows 7, 64-bit.
All Replies (20)
Please consider checking the drivers for the printer are up to date : https://wiki.linuxfoundation.org/en/O.../HpFAQ#How_do_I_define_unprintable_margins.3F
Thanks, but probably not my issue. The same web pages print correctly in IE and Chrome. This seems to be an issue on my system just with Firefox. Tried deleting and reinstalling Firefox using all default settings. Same issues. See attached file for example of the printing issues I'm having - look at left margin towards the top and see the overlap. This overlap doesn't happen in other programs.
Just curious - does the print preview show the same thing?
Yes, the print preview shows the same thing. In fact, the screen capture I included in my previous reply was from the print preview.
Are you losing the whole first page or is that page 2 in your screen shot? I've attached the first two pages of a print to PDF and yours seems to have the sidebar from page 1 overlaid on page 2. I have lots of add-ons, so it's possible one of those is cleaning up this page. I should test in Safe Mode (when time permits!).
Page 1 prints normally. Page two overlays the information (apparently from page 1 sidebar) and does the same on all subsequent pages. Interesting that the sidebar is on the right side of the web page when viewed on the web but prints on the top left side on pages 2+. I only have one add-on which is Norton anti-virus. Everything is at the default settings as I just tried deleting and reinstalling Firefox - didn't help. Any idea why the print page seems to want to print the sidebar from page one? My other brousers don't have this issue.
Modified
Are you zooming the page or have set a larger default minimum font size?
- Tools > Options > Content : Fonts & Colors > Advanced
No. Everything is at the default settings.
Interesting update. I have a separate Windows 7, 64-bit laptop which is not tied to my HP laser printer. I have the same issues on this laptop as I do on my main computer with the overlays from page one showing up in the print preview on pages 2+ regardless on which printer option and/or layout option I choose. It appears that this must be a conflict between Mozilla Firefox and Windows 7- 64 bit. Is anyone else having this issue?
When you open Page Setup, thru the File menu - or in the header in the Print Preview window, what is the Scale set for? In the middle of the Print Preview toolbar.
100% or Shrink to Fit ??
"It appears that this must be a conflict between Mozilla Firefox and Windows 7- 64 bit" If it is, I would have expected more than one questions thread started about this specific issue since 02-24 when Firefox 36 was released or even in the 6 weeks that Firefox 36 was in the beta phase of testing prior to release.
It is set to Shrink to Fit. However, I've tried ALL of the scale setting and get the same result. Same is true if I change the orientation from Portrait to Landscape.
Sorry, I can't help you with testing that any further, I'm on WinXP.
When I looked at that page on the 27th with Firefox 36 on WinXP and my Brother printer as the default, I didn't see an issue in Print Preview or have that problem when actually printing those pages. Consumables are too expensive "for my tastes and pocketbook" with HP printers. With what I save in 6 months by using generic ink cartridges instead of the OEM cartridges, I afford can buy two new Brother inkjet printers or 1 1/2 when I was using an Epson inkjet printer.
Thanks for your help - I truely appreciate you trying.
I also have a Windows 8 system on my wife's computer so later today I'll see if the same issues appear on her system.
Thanks again for your help!
This page has an interesting feature. When you starting scrolling down, the sidebar content stops scrolling and stays fixed in place. A script in the page is assigning the style rule position:fixed to that block of content. As a result, Firefox will lock it to a particular place on the screen AND on the printed page.
The reason it flops to the left on the printout is harder to explain, but the site only sets how far from the top the content block should be, and not how far from the left. On the screen, it remains inside the tall gray box of the sidebar. On paper, though, Firefox does NOT duplicate that box on page two, so the fixed position content goes to the left margin.
There is no built-in workaround for suppressing position:fixed content on subsequent pages, which sometimes is annoying because header bars can overprint content. In this case, a workaround is to scroll all the way to the top, reload the page, then print WITHOUT scrolling so that the position:fixed rule is not added to the page.
In other cases, you could use an extension like one of the following to hack the page:
- Nuke Anything Enhanced
- Remove It Permanently (saves edits for later visits to the site)
- Print Edit (integrates with Print Preview)
Thank you jscher 2000 for you information. I'll try the hacks you listed to see if these workarounds work for me. Interesting, do you know why I don't have this issue when printing from Internet Explorer?
-> try version 37 to see if this is still happening in beta. @jscher not sure maybe affected by the font
< rant mode on > Every browser out there has always worked better than Firefox (or Mozilla Suite / SeaMonkey) as far as printing to paper. The "print" code is the oldest in Gecko, dating back to the first version of Netscape in 1994-95 - 20 years old now. There is page after page of "print" related Bugs that never seem to get fixed, going back to when the Mozilla was founded in 1998. currently 1875 "print" Bugs Few of which will actually ever be fixed.
Starting in 2002 until like 2008 I foolishly thought that the "print" Bugs that caused me problems would eventually get fixed, given enough time. But during the time that Firefox 3.0 was being developed, and a new or changed feature broke something in a big way, I came to the sad realization when following 2 different Bug reports - that if the developers were struggling so much to fix something that they broke themselves, that they weren't ever going to fix the many hundreds of accumulated Bug reports of the previous 10 years.
I honestly think that Mozilla doesn't have even one programmer that actually knows how all that code works as a package or could "fix their way out of a wet paper bag" to fix something that was working well and then got broken when they "tweaked" a print feature. Example - https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1007779 In Firefox 29 Mozilla changed the Print button to go to Print Preview first, rather than show the "native print dialog". As I stated here - https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1007779#c1- that prevents the user from print a "selection of text" when using the Print button. That Bug was filed in May 2014 and is IMO a regression from Firefox 28 and earlier versions. This Bug - https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=868586 - was IMO not thoroughly tested. IMO, that will never be fixed based upon past performance by the developers. And I have read a few dozen complaints from users in this forum about "how do I print a selection of text? I used to work fine and no it doesn't." But "no skin off my teeth" - I never have used the Print button anyways. No point in wasting a toolbar position over something that can be done via the keyboard using {Ctrl + P} which is the same command used in all Windows OS programs.
Some days I "rue the day" that I got hooked on the extensibility concept of Firefox back in 2002, over the poor printing it provided and my mistaken assumption that it would eventually be fixed. For many years when I did a Print Preview in Firefox and saw a problem like what we are discussing here, I would open IE or Opera to do the actual printout of the page I wanted to print. Then when add-ons like Print Edit started appearing, I would "edit" the page to print only what I wanted on paper. A huge advantage over both Opera and IE where a user couldn't easily block advertisements from being printed, much less all the website "navigation" crap that is useless in a sheet of paper. < rant mode off >
I'm sorry that using Print Edit didn't occur to me few days ago, probably because I couldn't see that myself.
At any rate, if the web page developers spent a little more time working with @media print CSS rules when they create a new page or put it in their site wide CSS files, users wouldn't be affected by code that just isn't needed on a print sheet of paper. http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/media.html#at-media-rule Is that any less necessary than for handheld or screen these days?
rtomanek said
When I print a web page, the other columns on many pages overlap with the content I'm trying to print resulting in an unreadable printed pages. This issue does NOT occur in other browsers so I've had to resolve by printing using IE or Chrome. I've tried ALL of the recommended fixes on your help topics with NO fix. All my print page settings are at the recommended default and I've reset the printer properties via your help topic recommendation. Can you help? My printer is a HP laserjet 2200d. My OS is Windows 7, 64-bit.
It's nothing to do with your printer, or operating system in opinion. I've been printing fine over the last year, my problem started arround a month ago aprox. Also I suddenly became unable to access my own bank account online. So I phoned them - first question was "am I using firefox" he told me to use chrome, had no problem then. So I tried chrome with printing - not perfect, but plenty good enough to do what I wanted. My problem now is that I have always hated chrome, but I need to use it.
Hi thelmafletcher, at the risk of getting off topic, do you know whether your bank has updated its site to be compatible with Firefox by now, or whether they still do not support it? There some people behind the scenes who contact websites to encourage them to support Firefox, so if you would like some help with that, you could "name names" and see whether someone can get the ball rolling.
Hi log in problems with Intellegent finance bank. Printing problems with Ebay invoice/address labels.
I am not clever enough to do anything about it myself, so I hope this helps someone else to do whatever.