Note

This tutorial seems not to be up to date with current KDE4 development.

[edit] The mission

Print Hello World on your printer.

[edit] The KDE version

This code will work for KDE 3 as for KDE 4.

[edit] The code

#include <kprinter.h>
#include <qpainter.h>
#include <kapplication.h>
#include <kaboutdata.h>
#include <kmessagebox.h>
#include <kcmdlineargs.h>
 
/*
This prints Hello World on your printer
*/
 
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
  KAboutData aboutData( "test", "test", "1.0", "test",
      KAboutData::License_GPL, "(c) 2006" );
  KCmdLineArgs::init( argc, argv, &aboutData );
  KApplication app;
 
  KPrinter job;
  job.setFullPage( true );
  if ( job.setup() )
  {
    QPainter painter;
    painter.begin( &job );
    painter.drawText(100,100,"Hello World");
    painter.end(); 
    // this makes the print job start
  }
}

[edit] Explanation

You need a KDE instance to print, because this instance stores your configuration, including your printer configuration. You create one by instanciating the KApplication class.

[edit] How to compile

[edit] With KDE 4 and CMake

[edit] CMakeLists.txt

find_package(KDE4 REQUIRED)
include_directories( ${KDE4_INCLUDES} )
kde4_add_executable(printhelloworld printtest.cpp)
target_link_libraries(printhelloworld ${KDE4_KDEPRINT_LIBS})

[edit] Make and Run

Then do:

cmake .
make
./printhelloworld

[edit] With KDE 3

Quite easy:

gcc printtest.cpp -o print -I/usr/lib/qt3/include \
-I/opt/kde3/include -L/opt/kde3/lib \
-L/usr/lib/qt3/lib  -lqt-mt -lkdeprint

[edit] See also

• Point your konqueror to kde:kprinter