Printer problems with Allen Bradley DOS PLC 2 software

  • Thread starter FACTORY AUTOMATION SYSTEMS LTD
  • Start date
F

Thread Starter

FACTORY AUTOMATION SYSTEMS LTD

Dear List Members,
I am having difficulties in printing the ladder program of an Allen Bradley PLC 2/17 processor using Allen Bradley DOS PLC 2 software version 6.24 . When I press print report having selected HP laser printer, My Windows 95 Laptop Monitor screen goes blank then a message ''An exception 06
has occurred at 0028.00000017 in VxD---. This was added to 0028.C000A0F9 in VxD Vmm +....'' and then the Laptop hangs up. I am wandering whether someone out there is aware of this problem and its' solution. If you have a computer that is able to print PLC 2 programs, you could also give me your configuration to try. I will greatly appreciate your kind help .
Regards, Gabriel

 
S

ScienceOfficer

Gabriel---

Unfortunately, the 10-year-old PLC-2 software knows nothing of Windows and little of laser printers.

You should print to a file, not a printer, then manipulate the result with your word processor. Your modern word processor will need a fixed, not proportional, font to render the result correctly.

Hope this helps!

Larry Lawver
Rexel / Central Florida
 
C

Curt Wuollet

Try loading Linux and running the program under dosemu. It can use the Linux printing subsytem which supports modern printers well. I've done this to work with a bunch of old WordStar files and a PCB design that needed DOS. I have native Linux tools now, but a couple times a year I need to run something from DOS. Not nearly often enough to go through the grief of maintaining a MS system. The dosemu worked a lot better than I expected and you can even configure it to load automatically when you run a DOS program. It's weird, but Linux seems to have better support for DOS than recent Windows versions do. You have a great deal of flexibility in how devices and drives are mapped which can solve some tricky problems. The DOS memory games are even supported.

Regards

cww
 
L

Larry Lawver

Curt---


You've got to get out of this habit of prescribing brain surgery for every hangnail.

The answer I gave Gabriel was directly responsive to his actual problem, and in fact is what I do myself. Your solution tragically misses the point that Gabriel is already using an unsupported operating system, so you are hardly helping by moving him to a different unsupported operating system!

If changing the OS was really the best answer, then the change would be to DOS.

Gabriel's question, like many that come up on the list, could have been solved by my selling him something. Instead, I offered a solution that made the best use of the tools already available. If I posted dozens of messages a week that recommended a Rockwell Automation solution to every problem, the effect would be tiresome and people would quit taking my
posts seriously.


Hope this helps!


Larry Lawver
Rexel / Central Florida
 
C

Curt Wuollet

Hi Larry

> Curt---
>
> You've got to get out of this habit of prescribing brain surgery for every
> hangnail.

This would probably work right out of the box. The magicfilters usually know what to do once you pick a printer. This should take less time than loading DOS and finding an old printer. Can you even buy DOS anymore?

> The answer I gave Gabriel was directly responsive to his actual problem,
> and in fact is what I do myself. Your solution tragically misses the
> point that Gabriel is already using an unsupported operating system, so
> you are hardly helping by moving him to a different unsupported operating
> system!
>
> If changing the OS was really the best answer, then the change would be to
> DOS.

Except for the fact that it wouldn't solve the problem. The problem is DOS printing where the application handles the formatting. He needs a layer of translation from tty style dump to laser printing. You do that manually. I do that with the very capable Linux printing subsystem. To do it once or twice your way is fine. If you are going to continue to use the software frequently, a free, permanent solution seems quite appropriate. Most of my customers would prefer this. Of course, it does seem reasonable to expect that this should work in W95. But I can't help much with that. Perhaps the application isn't well behaved and is attempting to access the hardware directly. A virtual machine might help.

If I had any idea what W95 was choking on, I would surely offer that up. All I can offer is what I know.

Or perhaps I misunderstand the problem.

> Gabriel's question, like many that come up on the list, could have been
> solved by my selling him something. Instead, I offered a solution that
> made the best use of the tools already available. If I posted dozens of
> messages a week that recommended a Rockwell Automation solution to every
> problem, the effect would be tiresome and people would quit taking my
> posts seriously.

If you offered it free and it solved the problem, I don't think folks would mind too much. I certainly apologize if my trying to help Gabriel put your nose out of joint.

Regards

cww
 
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