[thelist] Prevent Printing

Carl Meyer cjmeyer at npcc.net
Tue Mar 23 12:34:03 CST 2004


hi Rob,

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004, Rob Smith wrote:
> Ah.. here we go. When does this NOT work?
> 
> <style type="text/css">
> @media print {BODY {display:none}}
> </style>

When I turn stylesheets off, when I use lynx or wget, when I copy/paste your
content into my favorite text editor, when I grab a screenshot and print
that, when I view source and print the content from there... the options are
endless.  As others have said, if you send your content to a client machine,
the data is on that machine.  It's a fallacy to think that you have any
control over what happens once the data has passed over the wire. 
Stylesheets and all that are simply display suggestions which the client is
free to ignore.

I know you're just asking for technical advice, but I guarantee that the
only thing you are going to accomplish with any of this is to irritate a lot
of users.  Anyone with an ounce of determination will be able to print your
page, once they finish swearing at you for trying to make their life
difficult.

The best suggestion you've been given is to use all Flash.  Even that is
vulnerable to a captured screenshot, and of course has all kinds of
accessibility issues besides.

HTH

Carl



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