I have a requirement where my client want to install a custom "Print to File" printer (apparently MS has an SDK for this?). They want to be able to install this as a kind of "application" so that if someone chooses to print to this printer, they have to answer a few questions, and the file gets "printed" to a path of our choosing. (we will then do some other things with the file such as rename it and SFTP it)
I have tried googling, looking for things such as "customize print to file" and I have found nothing. Does anyone have any experience with this and can give me a kick in the right direction?
EDIT: I would rather have a c# oriented solution but I am willing to take anything right now.
Edit 2: The idea is for this "custom print driver" is for a document imaging company to provide an easy method for their customers to store/archive documents. The idea, is that the customer, if they want to store/archive a document, they would print, from standard windows applications such as Word, Excell, Acrobat Reader, Web Pages, etc., to the "company X" printer driver. When doing so, the document would get "printed" to a file in a specific location that another application (which has a filewatcher service on it, which would rename it and send it to the SFTP server), knows to watch. The document that is printed to the file, should ideally also be able to come out on paper (AKA just like normal). When printing to the "Custom print driver", we also need to have a form filled in which would provide meta-tags for the archiving system, which would also be uploaded to the document imaging system.
I am not looking to recreate a printing application, nor am I looking to add "printing" into a custom application. This needs to work at the Windows level.
I have no problems with the SFTP, FileWatcher, Alchemy integration (the document archiving application) or the document renaming portion. It's the "custom print driver" that I am having issues with. This is all compounded by the fact that when installing the application, I need to automatically install the "custom print driver", and configure it during the install process. Essentially the solution needs to be installed as a printer available under "My Printers" and should be available for any type of document, Word, Excell, PDF, etc. Oh, and it needs to be availabe for XP, Vista, and Windows 7 . . . . :(
Thanks in advance for everyones help. I have a feeling that this one is going to be a doozy :(