How do you print all the contents of a JPanel?????

Question

I have produced a java application and want to add printing facilities to the application.
I want the user to be able to a print a page (JPanel) which consists of JLabel's, JTextarea's and JTable's. How can this be done????
Thank you,
Yuvraj.

Answer 1

Just remember to scale the JPanel to your printer size. This is not originally my code, but I have used it and it does the trick. There are some custom changes you can pull out if you don't want/need them.
import java.awt.*;
import javax.swing.*;
import java.awt.print.*;
import java.awt.event.*;
import java.awt.font.*;
import java.awt.geom.*;
import java.util.*;
/** A simple utility class that lets you very simply print
*  an arbitrary component. Just pass the component to the
*  PrintUtilities.printComponent. The component you want to
*  print doesn't need a print method and doesn't have to
*  implement any interface or do anything special at all.
*  <P>
*  If you are going to be printing many times, it is marginally more
*  efficient to first do the following:
*  <PRE>
*    PrintUtilities printHelper = new PrintUtilities(theComponent);
*  </PRE>
*  then later do printHelper.print(). But this is a very tiny
*  difference, so in most cases just do the simpler
*  PrintUtilities.printComponent(componentToBePrinted).
public class CPrintUtilities implements Printable
  private Component componentToBePrinted;
  protected Book m_book = new Book();
  protected ArrayList m_arrayPages  = new ArrayList();
  protected double m_scaleFactorX = 1.0f;
  protected double m_scaleFactorY = 1.0f;
  protected boolean m_bShowPrintDialog = true;
  protected static PrinterJob printJob = null;
  public static void printComponent(Component c)
    new CPrintUtilities(c).print();
  public CPrintUtilities(Component componentToBePrinted)
    this.componentToBePrinted = componentToBePrinted;
  public CPrintUtilities()
  public CPrintUtilities(Book book)
    m_book = book;
  public void AddPage(Component componentToBePrinted)
     m_arrayPages.add(componentToBePrinted);
  public void SetShowPrintDialog(boolean bShowPrintDialog)
     m_bShowPrintDialog = bShowPrintDialog;
//   public void print()
   public boolean print()
      printJob = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob();
//      if(printJob.printDialog()) {
      if(m_bShowPrintDialog) {
         if(!printJob.printDialog())  {
            return false;
      try {
         // Revise the Page Format
         PageFormat format = printJob.defaultPage();
         double nMargin = 72/4;  // Inch / 4 or one quarter inch
         Paper paper = format.getPaper();
         double nHeight = paper.getHeight() - (nMargin * 2);
         double nWidth  = paper.getWidth()  - (nMargin * 2);
         double scaleFactorX = 1.0f;
         double scaleFactorY = 1.0f;
         paper.setImageableArea(nMargin,nMargin,nWidth,nHeight);
         format.setPaper(paper);
         for(int x = 0;x < m_arrayPages.size();x++) {
            componentToBePrinted = (Component)m_arrayPages.get(x);
            // Scale to print
            double nCompHeight = componentToBePrinted.getHeight();
            double nCompWidth  = componentToBePrinted.getWidth();
            if (nWidth > nCompWidth)
              scaleFactorX = nCompWidth / nWidth;
            else
              scaleFactorX = nWidth / nCompWidth;
            if (nHeight > nCompHeight)
              scaleFactorY = nCompHeight / nHeight;
            else
              scaleFactorY = nHeight / nCompHeight;
            m_scaleFactorX = scaleFactorX;
            m_scaleFactorY = scaleFactorY;
            printJob.setPrintable(this,format);
            printJob.print();
      catch(PrinterException pe) {
         CSystem.PrintDebugMessage("Error printing: " + pe);
      return true;
   public void printBook()
      PrinterJob printJob = PrinterJob.getPrinterJob();
      if (printJob.printDialog())
         try
            for(int x = 0;x < m_book.getNumberOfPages();x++)
               Printable printable = m_book.getPrintable(x);
               printJob.setPrintable(printable);
               printJob.print();
         catch(PrinterException pe)  {
            CSystem.PrintDebugMessage("Error printing: " + pe);
  public int print(Graphics g, PageFormat pageFormat, int pageIndex)
    if (pageIndex > 0)
      return(NO_SUCH_PAGE);
    else
      Graphics2D g2d = (Graphics2D)g;
      g2d.translate(pageFormat.getImageableX(), pageFormat.getImageableY());
      g2d.scale(m_scaleFactorX,m_scaleFactorY);
      disableDoubleBuffering(componentToBePrinted);
      componentToBePrinted.paint(g2d);
      enableDoubleBuffering(componentToBePrinted);
      return(PAGE_EXISTS);
  /** The speed and quality of printing suffers dramatically if
   *  any of the containers have double buffering turned on.
   *  So this turns if off globally.
   *  @see enableDoubleBuffering
  public static void disableDoubleBuffering(Component c) {
    RepaintManager currentManager = RepaintManager.currentManager(c);
    currentManager.setDoubleBufferingEnabled(false);
  /** Re-enables double buffering globally. */
  public static void enableDoubleBuffering(Component c) {
    RepaintManager currentManager = RepaintManager.currentManager(c);
    currentManager.setDoubleBufferingEnabled(true);