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Out-Printer

  • Reference
Module:
Microsoft.PowerShell.Utility

Sends output to a printer.

Syntax

Out-Printer
   [[-Name] <String>]
   [-InputObject <PSObject>]
   [<CommonParameters>]

Description

The Out-Printer cmdlet sends output to the default printer or to an alternate printer, if one is specified. Since the cmdlet doesn't have any way to configure the print job, the resulting print job uses the default settings defined for the printer.

Note

This cmdlet was reintroduced in PowerShell 7. This cmdlet is only available on Windows systems that support the Windows Desktop.

Examples

Example 1 - Send a file to be printed on the default printer

This example shows how to print a file, even though Out-Printer does not have a Path parameter.

Get-Content -Path ./readme.txt | Out-Printer

Get-Contentgets the contents of the readme.txt file in the current directory and pipes it to Out-Printer, which sends it to the default printer.

Example 2: Print a string to a remote printer

This example prints Hello, World to the Prt-6B Color printer on Server01.

"Hello, World" | Out-Printer -Name "\\Server01\Prt-6B Color"

The Name parameter selects a specific printer, rather than the default.

Example 3 - Print a help topic to the default printer

This example prints the full version of the Help topic for Get-CimInstance.

$H = Get-Help -Full Get-CimInstance
Out-Printer -InputObject $H

Get-Help gets the full version of the Help topic for Get-CimInstance and stores it in the $H variable. The InputObject parameter passes the value of $H to Out-Printer.

Parameters

-InputObject

Specifies the objects to be sent to the printer. Enter a variable that contains the objects, or type a command or expression that gets the objects.

Type:PSObject
Position:Named
Default value:None
Required:False
Accept pipeline input:True
Accept wildcard characters:False

-Name

Sends the output to the specified printer. The parameter name Name is optional.

Type:String
Aliases:PrinterName
Position:0
Default value:None
Required:False
Accept pipeline input:False
Accept wildcard characters:False

Inputs

PSObject

You can pipe any object to this cmdlet.

Outputs

None

This cmdlet returns no output.

Notes

Windows PowerShell includes the following aliases for Out-Printer:

  • lp

The cmdlets that contain the Out verb do not format objects. They just render them and send them to the specified display destination. If you send an unformatted object to an Out cmdlet, the cmdlet sends it to a formatting cmdlet before rendering it.

Out-Printer sends data to the printer, but does not emit any output objects to the pipeline. If you pipe the output of Out-Printer to Get-Member, Get-Member reports that no objects have been specified.