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How to print a Form (Windows Forms .NET)

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As part of the development process, you typically will want to print a copy of your Windows Form. The following code example shows how to print a copy of the current form by using the CopyFromScreen method.

Example

To run the example code, add two components to a form with the following settings:

Object Property\Event Value
Button Name Button1
Click Button1_Click
PrintDocument Name PrintDocument1
PrintPage PrintDocument1_PrintPage

The following code is run when the Button1 is clicked. The code creates a Graphics object from the form and saves its contents to a Bitmap variable named memoryImage. The PrintDocument.Print method is called, which invokes the PrintPage event. The print event handler draws the memoryImage bitmap on the printer page's Graphics object. When the print event handler code returns, the page is printed.

namespace Sample_print_win_form1
{
    public partial class Form1 : Form
    {
        Bitmap memoryImage;
        public Form1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }

        private void Button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            Graphics myGraphics = this.CreateGraphics();
            Size s = this.Size;
            memoryImage = new Bitmap(s.Width, s.Height, myGraphics);
            Graphics memoryGraphics = Graphics.FromImage(memoryImage);
            memoryGraphics.CopyFromScreen(this.Location.X, this.Location.Y, 0, 0, s);

            printDocument1.Print();
        }

        private void PrintDocument1_PrintPage(
           System.Object sender,
           System.Drawing.Printing.PrintPageEventArgs e)
        {
            e.Graphics.DrawImage(memoryImage, 0, 0);
        }
    }
}

Public Class Form1
    
    Dim memoryImage As Bitmap

    Private Sub Button1_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
         
        Dim myGraphics As Graphics = Me.CreateGraphics()
        Dim s As Size = Me.Size
        memoryImage = New Bitmap(s.Width, s.Height, myGraphics)
        Dim memoryGraphics As Graphics = Graphics.FromImage(memoryImage)
        memoryGraphics.CopyFromScreen(Me.Location.X, Me.Location.Y, 0, 0, s)
        
        PrintDocument1.Print()
        
    End Sub

    Private Sub PrintDocument1_PrintPage(
        ByVal sender As System.Object, 
        ByVal e As System.Drawing.Printing.PrintPageEventArgs) Handles PrintDocument1.PrintPage

        e.Graphics.DrawImage(memoryImage, 0, 0)
        
    End Sub
End Class

Robust programming

The following conditions may cause an exception:

  • You don't have permission to access the printer.

  • There's no printer installed.

.NET security

To run this code example, you must have permission to access the printer you use with your computer.

See also