Help talk:Printing

Section line

What CSS-Code is needed when I want the gray horizontal section lines printed (first section only) as seen online when I read an article on Wikipedia? 178.7.107.30 (talk) 13:54, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

I think you mean the border under the article title. You need to create an account, then add this to [[Special:MyPage/skin.js]] Special:MyPage/skin.css:

@media print {
    h1 { border-bottom: 1px solid #aaa; }
}

---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 14:39, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Printable version

I'm trying to figure out where the printable version link is actually useful. If the browser does not support CSS, then the printable version is of no use, as it depends on stylesheets. Even with CSS, the printable version does not apply any @media print rules, nor does it apply browser formatting such as headers, footers and page numbers, making its use as a print preview very limited.

Using the Firefox Accessibility Extension, I can disable CSS. This makes it very obvious that CSS is used to format the printable version page and without CSS, the printable version is useless.

--Gadget850 (talk) 13:21, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure, but i believe there was a time that several major browsers did not support "<link media=print>" (did not use print style sheets when printing), but did support enough CSS to print the printable version when commanded to. IE5 perhaps ? --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:39, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

and to quote IRC.

15:38 < werdna> not really, but people like it being there
15:38 < flyingparchment> when it was removed, people kept mailing OTRS asking how to print pages

Ah! Now that I know what to look for, this handy chart shows that IE5, IE6 and others do not support <link media= "print">. --Gadget850 (talk) 14:02, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

But these browsers also do not support @media print.[1] So- it looks like the stylesheets would apply, but not the @media print rules. I probably have IE5 or 6 on my NT box (if it fires up). --Gadget850 (talk) 14:14, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Correct. As far as I know, we only VERY sparsely uses @media print rules. Those are more useful for user's CSS stylesheets. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 18:43, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Info not printed?

Can anyone tell me why the print version shows succession boxes but not navigation boxes? Was there a consensus reached on this at some point? ("Self-reference" can't be the answer, can it? That would exclude "See also".) 205.172.16.60 (talk) 23:57, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

As noted in the lead, "Certain page elements that are self-references within Wikipedia normally do not print; these include section edit links, navigation boxes, message boxes and metadata." AS to who decided and why, you can dig through the archived discussions at MediaWiki talk:Common.css and Template talk:Navbox. If you really want to print navboxes, I can figure out a CSS hack, but you will have to register for an account. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 00:23, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. I did a search for "print" in the two archives you recommended. Nothing helpful came up. Should I use another term? 205.172.16.60 (talk) 01:00, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Not sure where else to put this... but a printed copy of selected articles with a full DVD could be used to generate funds. Might make a great antique for the future. Another idea I had - when cash runs close to running out make a charge for access by IP/hostname. Set the price via geolocation and that countries GDP. Obviously a last ditch thing though in desperation. Please pass this info on, I don't know where it should be written. 173.45.225.215 (talk) 14:02, 21 September 2010 (UTC)jago25_98

Link on left toolbar?

The article says: "The left toolbar includes a link to a printable version". I can't see such a link; where on the toolbar is it supposed to appear? Between which other items on the toolbar? David Biddulph (talk) 14:42, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

It does not appear in Vector; Toolbox → Share → Print will bring up the browser print dialog.

Printing without printable version?

Hi guys! I was curious to know if there is a (possibly easy) way to print the "standard" version of a page (including navbars, etc.), if one wishes, instead of the "printable" version... If there is a such way, the help page should tell it ("Personal customization" section seems to be too complex for standard use). --Gig (talk) 11:02, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Looks like User:TheDJ/Print dialog should do what you want. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 12:14, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Printable?

I can see that a lot of thought and effort has gone into making Wikipedia pages printable. However, this comment was motivated by my experience in trying to print the page at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Spaceflight/Assessment

What happened? Some nearly blank pages. Color information completelely lost. Typeface very small. Major table was truncated on the right. The printout was useless.

Why print from Wikipedia? Sometimes I prefer to have the topic on paper instead of one more tab on my browser or file on my computer. For example, the use of an article can be greatly facilitated by being able to carry a printout to another venue, or by simply handing a printout to another person (who might not be computer-facile). To date, paper has a definite edge in some areas of utility and convenience.

I encourage people with the right talents and access to continue to work on improving the printing capabilities of material from the Internet, and in particular, from Wikipedia articles.

Likewise, I encourage those who believe the world should be moving towards paperless-ness to continue inventing ways of handling text and graphical information with greater agility than today's display hardware and software. Wcmead3 (talk) 18:59, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Woof. That page layout is horrible. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 00:55, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Looks better using PrintFriendly. Collapsed content is not shown. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 01:01, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

What does this mean?

"Remember that rules using @media print will show— or not show if that is the intent —in print preview but not printable version." I think this sentence is pretty unclear. Does it mean that whatever you change in your skin.css, it will only be valid for the print preview but the printed result will not be different? That would be pretty silly. But what else is the sentence supposed to mean? --FA2010 (talk) 15:22, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Printable version does not honor @media print rules but the browser print view does. --  Gadget850 ^talk 23:05, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

And what's the point of this behaviour? --FA2010 (talk) 18:31, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Template:Collapsible list can't be printed?

Hello, I'm from wikipt

We also use Template:Collapsible list within infoboxes but the data aren't printed, is there any other hide/show we should use within infoboxes? Thanks a lot. Dianakc (talk) 20:28, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

Specify parts of a page to be printed

Hello,

I need to print only some parts of a page. I tried to use <span class = "noprint">...</span> on my page but the text is still here in the printable version. Does anyone have an idea to solve my problem ?

Thanks --Nanoukaplus (talk) 14:59, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

Text only printing

How can I print a page without any templates or pictures but with font and size settings? Clayblockmc (talk) 18:20, 23 September 2017 (UTC)

@Clayblockmc: You cannot print without templates, since templates are generators of output, for all intents and purposes, they don't exist when you view or print a page. My print dialog script has some additional options to hide or show certain features, but if you want more than that, you'll likely have to write your own print CSS styling. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:15, 4 October 2017 (UTC)

Searches for said media = print

Searching the wikitext of all pages for a media=print, with or without spaces and quotes:

all: insource: "media print" insource:/media *\= *\"*print\"*/

It says this is used in wikitext, but is it really? Should we update or clarify this statement in the page: "...browsers will parse the media="print" CSS styles included in the markup of Wikipedia pages."? 21:07, 5 October 2017 (UTC)

Print only content

<span class="printonly">foo</span> does not work, contrary to what Help:Printing#Controlling print says. Is there any way to fix this? Thanks.--Nevé–selbert 13:57, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

I can't quite imagine why having print-only content would ever improve the encyclopedia, but if you think this should be fixed, you should open a ticket on Phabricator. See Wikipedia:Bug reports and feature requests. Huon (talk) 19:29, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Well, of course we can also just remove that part from the help page. Huon (talk) 19:30, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

@Huon: I'm currently editing a table, and one cell contains unprintworthy text, i.e. linking to another part of Wikipedia. It recently occurred to me that instead of there being an empty cell in the printable version of said page, a note could appear in its place instead:

Wikipedia has an article on: Premierships of Benjamin Disraeli (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premierships_of_Benjamin_Disraeli).

References with external links appear somewhat like this in Print Mode, so maybe the same thing could be done here with a parameter added to {{noprint}} such as |main=Premierships of Benjamin Disraeli. I hadn't thought of this until yesterday, and I think this could work to limit empty space in print.--Nevé–selbert 08:08, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Two comments

The first sentence is incomprehensible. Wtf is the "MediaWiki sidebar on"?

The statement "The default Vector skin has a selection in the left sidebar for 'Print page'" is not true for me, using Chrome, with the Vector skin. The left sidebar has no such item.

Maproom (talk) 09:02, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Printable PopUp(Javascript Print POP) Comes two times

There are two type of issue i am facing in Wikimedia printable view : 1) Format issue 2) Printable PopUp(Javascript Print POP) Comes two times

Kindly help me here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 147.1.18.25 (talk) 05:11, 10 August 2020 (UTC)