Fax a Report

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Guest

I would like to automate faxing reports using vb & the xp fax printer from within Access, has anyone had a go at this. Would prefer not to use MAPI method but print to fax driver and set fax number etc using VB
 
George:

You really have to look at the fax software availalbe and determine which
allow you some level of automation to accomplsh what you are trying to do.
There's one common path, which is to use WinFax Pro, which is automateable
either through DDE or a COM object. (You just have to avoid using version
10.02, which was buggy and didn't allow automation.)

The second, low cost but not as easily used or effective solution is to use
the built in fax server program of Windows 2000 or Windows Xp. Each expose
a COM object that you can use for automation, in Win2K its called Faxcom 1.0
in the references list (Fax Service Client API for Windows 2000 in MSDN ) in
Xp its called the Microsoft Fax Service Extended Com Type Library in the
references list (Fax Service Extended COM api in MSDN). The drawback to
using this service, is that you have to output your report to an
intermediate file (e.g. a snapshot or pdf file) in order to fax it; secondly
when the item is faxed it leaves the server for the intermediate file type
running and doesn't shut it down. (All possible to be worked around). In
any event there are loads of vb examples for using both in the MSDN library
and you can come up with common code that works with both services for
platform independence. However, you can't support any Win9.x or NT clients
with this route either.

If you are interested in an inexpensive an easy to use interface to the
Winfax integration, then you might take a look at our Winfax Integration
Library for Access on our web.

HTH
--
Steve Arbaugh
ACG Soft
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/attac-cg

George said:
I would like to automate faxing reports using vb & the xp fax printer from
Click to expand...
within Access, has anyone had a go at this. Would prefer not to use MAPI
method but print to fax driver and set fax number etc using VB
 
Just for your info: Symantec has informed and confirmed that winfax does not
support graphics in Access reports. When faxing you get blanks where all
graphic images are. Any suggestions would be helpful here.
 
Ed:

Thats not always true. Depends on the resolution of your graphics and on
the type of graphic. It does sometimes have problem with Graph Objects, but
we've fax reports with embedded emf files, bmps etc. High res JPEGs and
GIFs can cause probems.
 
Ed said:
Hi: OK, Whats the format that works and I'll try to change my graphics.
Is it low res or high res that works. or is it trial & error or guessing.
Click to expand...

Just for grins, try using TIFF's for graphics at 100 dpi resolution.
Recalling the old DOS days when fax modems were becoming all the rage, every
fax application I dealt with loved TIFF's (and most old B&W scanners, too).
 
Thanks, Tiffs do not work either.
Must be some fix with symantec of a type of graphic to work.
Really appreciate everyone trying.
Ed
 
Chirag:

The short answer to your question is that it is unlikely that there's a way
to automate faxing to that fax machine by just opening the report or
printing it.

What's required to do that is to have a way for Access to communicate with
what ever software is on your PCs that controls the fax and fax printer
through what is called "Automation". The Cannon software or printer driver
is unlikely to support this capability, but you should check with the
documentation on the software or with Cannon's representatives.
--
Steve Arbaugh
ACG Soft
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/attac-cg

Chirag said:
Hi

I have a Access report to be faxed.The report itself has the fax number.We
Click to expand...
have a Canon Fax machine which is on the network(not connected to any
PC).Now is there a way to just fax this report without the user having to
enter the fax number ie the user should just be able to open the report and
click a button called fax and the fax should be sent.
 
Any examples for this using VBA?Or some particular
direction that I should proceed ?I already contacted Canon
but they said they dont have any thing

Chirag.
 
There's no way to do this via VBA unless you can communicate with the driver
or fax software that Cannon has. If the interface is not exposed, then you
can't address the internal operations of that software. Sure you could use
send keys or some other lame way to fill in a fax number when its requested
after the report is sent to print, but that is so prone to problems that its
a very poor solution.

There are are a number of fax software vendors that do expose interfaces
such as WinFax, Facsys, RightFax and others. But those are PC based fax
solutions not free standing printer/fax machines.
 
I'm confused. The typical fax driver functions like a printer, and the
Printer Object is available to VBA. I've done plenty of programming that
automated printing functions this way. My *ass*umption is that fax services
shouldn't be much different... should they? Of course, I was also
*ass*uming faxing from the PC or using a fax device that provided the proper
interface...

Randall Arnold
 
Randall:

Sure, one could easily set Access to output the report to the fax printer
driver. However most fax drivers have internal code that launch other
software that gathers the send to phone numbers etc. The problem is that,
as Chirag indicated when he talked to Cannon, that they do not "expose" an
interface to their fax software that is programable using VBA. The printer
object in Access does NOT provide access to the extended devmode properties
which may (unlikely) or may not (very likely) contain the actual bits where
the fax number could be pushed. More than likely however its not a printer
driver issue at all (hence you can't get to it with the printer object) but
rather all the driver does is output faxable TIFF images, which Cannon's fax
software then que's up and sends. If the Fax software doesn't, as I said,
expose a programable interface, either through DDE or COM, then Chirag is
hosed with automating a fax with that network fax machine, because there's
now way to communicate the phone number as the software sends the TIFF
images down the wire the fax machine.
 
Yes you are right.Typically i would like some kind of an
API provided by Canon to program with VBA.

Thanks
 
The short solution is to go out and buy for $120 or so Winfax 10.03 and
connect your PC to a phone line and then automate faxing using the PC rather
than the external fax. (You could use our Winfax Library to do this all and
save yourself a bunch of time; you've probably expended that much in time
value already trying to find out how to control the cannon.)
 
Now that the result appears to recommend the Winfax software. Be aware that
Winfax does not support Access graphics in reports. I need to print reports
to pdf format then fax the pdf file as attachment. nice ha! Hoping Winfax
will address compat issue.
 
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