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Print Selection option unavailable in Thunderbird?

  • 2 iimpendulo
  • 2 inale ngxaki
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  • Impendulo yokugqibela ngu Bryan

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In all my text/richtext/html programs, including Firefox, the option to print only selected portions of a document exists. But in Thunderbird it seems to be unavailable. I was running build 38.5.0 and just updated to 38.5.1 and rebooted to see whether that fixed it (it didn't). I see the behavior (described below) on two PC laptops, one running win7 and one running win8.1. The behavior is identical for both machines and for selection of any of three different printers, either cabled or wirelessly networked. It also persists when I run Thunderbird with all Add-ons disabled (see at bottom for a list).

Say I'm viewing an email and I use the mouse to select (highlight) a range of text. When I press ctrl-p the standard compact Print dialog appears, and in the Print Range group the option Selection is grayed out – unavailable. The same thing happens if I use the Print command on the File menu or the Print button in the Print Preview window. The behavior is the same whether I'm viewing an email in the preview pane (below the list of emails in a folder or inbox) or whether I'm viewing an email in its own tab (full-screen, as it were).

I can see while the Print dialog is open that my selection on the email is still there, as it is when I close the Print dialog.

While I can work around this with copy&paste into a text or Word document, my wife's not so skilled. She remembers this feature working once upon a time. Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thank you, Bryan

PS. Add-ons: The only extension listed is Lightning 4.0.5.2, currently disabled. The only plugins that were active were Shockwave Flash 20.0.0.286 and Adobe Acrobat 11.0.14.16, both currently disabled.

In all my text/richtext/html programs, including Firefox, the option to print only selected portions of a document exists. But in Thunderbird it seems to be unavailable. I was running build 38.5.0 and just updated to 38.5.1 and rebooted to see whether that fixed it (it didn't). I see the behavior (described below) on two PC laptops, one running win7 and one running win8.1. The behavior is identical for both machines and for selection of any of three different printers, either cabled or wirelessly networked. It also persists when I run Thunderbird with all Add-ons disabled (see at bottom for a list). Say I'm viewing an email and I use the mouse to select (highlight) a range of text. When I press ctrl-p the standard compact Print dialog appears, and in the Print Range group the option Selection is grayed out – unavailable. The same thing happens if I use the Print command on the File menu or the Print button in the Print Preview window. The behavior is the same whether I'm viewing an email in the preview pane (below the list of emails in a folder or inbox) or whether I'm viewing an email in its own tab (full-screen, as it were). I can see while the Print dialog is open that my selection on the email is still there, as it is when I close the Print dialog. While I can work around this with copy&paste into a text or Word document, my wife's not so skilled. She remembers this feature working once upon a time. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you, Bryan PS. Add-ons: The only extension listed is Lightning 4.0.5.2, currently disabled. The only plugins that were active were Shockwave Flash 20.0.0.286 and Adobe Acrobat 11.0.14.16, both currently disabled.

All Replies (2)

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It has always been the case that, by default, TB prints the selected portion of a message. That's what works here, i.e. if a portion of a message is selected, then File/Print Preview, only the selection appears in the preview window.

Did you try it in safe mode (hold Shift when you launch TB)? Safe mode involves more than disabling add-ons.

The 'default' behaviour may not work with all printer drivers, so there is an add-on that explicitly includes the option to 'print just selected part of a message'; this may solve your problem.

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Thanks so much. That approach works, even on my old faithful HP LaserJet 1300. Best regards, Bryan