Dynamically Generated Printer Commands
Important
The modern print platform is Windows' preferred means of communicating with printers. We recommend that you use Microsoft's IPP inbox class driver, along with Print Support Apps (PSA), to customize the print experience in Windows 10 and 11 for printer device development.
For more information, see Modern print platform and the Print support app design guide.
Each time you specify a printer command in a GPD file for a Unidrv minidriver, you can use one of the following two methods:
Place the command string in the GPD file.
When you place the command string in a GPD file, Unidrv sends the command to the print spooler at the appropriate time. These command strings can include standard variables, which Unidrv evaluates before sending the command.
Provide a callback function.
If you provide a callback function, Unidrv calls the function when it is time to send the command, and the function is responsible to send the command to the print spooler. This enables you to include the code that dynamically generates a command string and then sends it to the printer.
To place a command string in a GPD file, you need to include a *Cmd attribute within the command's *Command entry.
To provide code that dynamically generates a command string, you must do the following:
Provide a rendering plug-in that implements the IPrintOemUni::CommandCallback method.
Include a *CallbackID command attribute and, optionally, a *Params attribute, within the command's *Command entry in the GPD file.
When Unidrv is ready to issue a printer command, it checks the minidriver database to determine if the command has been specified with a *Cmd attribute or with a *CallbackID attribute. In the former case, Unidrv sends the command string to the print spooler. In the latter case, Unidrv calls the IPrintOemUni::CommandCallback method, passing the *CallbackID and *Params values as input arguments.