Those switching to Windows 11 may have noticed that the standard printer selection dialog has changed, and in a way that almost no one likes. What looked like this thru Windows 10 ...


... now looks like this in Windows 11 ...


There are several reasons not to like the new dialog, including:

• It's difficult to navigate with just the keyboard
• The preview doesn't work

Fortunately you can restore the old version by editing the following Registry setting (HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Print\UnifiedPrintDialog\PreferLegacyPrintDialog to 1, as shown here...


That's not always convenient though, which leads to the question of whether we should add some kind of configuration option to A-Shell to automatically force it to use one version or the other. The difficulty there is that the setting affects all WIN32 Windows apps, not just A-Shell, so it's not clear that an A-Shell Printer Definition option, for example, should have an effect on other apps. It's also not clear that the option belongs in each printer definition file (since that would require updating many files), or in the MIAME.INI, or somewhere else. And in the ATE environment, note that the setting is on the client side. It would be possible for A-Shell to temporarily toggle the option and then restore it on each print request, which would eliminate the spillover concern.

Or, for those happy to just make the new dialog go away, we (or anyone) could create a handy utility to do it via a command or XCALL, to at least eliminate the hassle of manually updating the Registry.

Comments? Suggestions?

Hi Jack,

I have changed that registry key on several machines where users did not like the new dialog because they cannot simply press enter to accept the printer that is selected by default and print. It might be nice to have a way to change it from A-Shell (if possible only for A-Shell). At some print perhaps the new dialog will get better. It isn't very great right now.

Hey John - thanks for the quick feedback! I'm certainly leaning in the same direction, i.e. provide a way to change it within A-Shell but only for A-Shell. But I'm still not clear on the best way to set the option. Being able to set it once globally in the server MIAME.INI would be the simplest for the person setting the option, but it's kind of a weird place for a setting like that. And it would make it all-or-nothing for the entire site. (Who knows, maybe some users actually prefer the new dialog, or maybe will prefer it after some future improvements?)

Another idea would be to create a common print queue initialization file that worked like an automatic ++include within all the other printer PQI/INI files (assuming it existed). That would at least save you from having to update umpteen different printer init files.

Either of those approaches would still require updates to A-Shell on both the server and client (ATE) sides though, which may not be that convenient. The only way around that would be to implement it entirely within an SBX that the application called (and which then replicated itself to the client for client-side execution, if applicable). Maybe you could integrate such a call into your main menu (calling it on entrance, and then again on exit to restore the original setting), although counting on people to exit gracefully is a big assumption. Or, I suppose it could be implemented as an ALIAS to SPOOL. But for apps that spool a lot of files, all of that back-and-forth between the server and client registry seems a bit overkill too. Seems like a lot of engineering to toggle a single setting between 0 and 1!

Another idea would be to ignore the need for changes to any INI files and just unconditionally force the use of the old printer dialog version from within A-Shell/Windows and ATE printing (but always set it back to the prior setting so as to not affect any other applications). If and when there is some good reason for anyone to prefer the new version of the dialog, we could revisit the issue then.

This approach would still require updating Windows / ATE clients, but it would be just another reason among many to encourage periodic updates.

Thanks for the headsup. Is there really ANYTHING anyone PREFERS in W11??

I have also noticed a migration from other vendors to the new W11 "theme" like Chrome and now Outlook. Its all super washed out and the new "Atmos" font is really hard to read. Seems the planet has migrated to the html interface and everything seems to be designed for hand-held usage.

Maybe a good time to go against the crowd and embrace a more traditional look?

As for the printer dialog, I’ve tentatively decided to go with my last idea, i.e. force the use of the traditional dialog within A-Shell, but leave it as it was for any other apps. I don’t think it’s worth implementing a bunch of configuration options, at least until there is some reason to want to use the new dialog.

Hi Jack, sounds like a reasonable plan. I think any of your proposed solutions would be doable for us.

FYI: I installed ATE on a machine the other day and when trying to print, the new dialog would display for a few seconds and close. ATE would be frozen after this. Putting the new version in the bin directory fixed the issue (as this issue would not happen with the old dialog.) Thanks a lot!

I was about to edit a users registry when I saw this. What is the status? I will wait.

As of 7.0.1755.0, A-Shell/Windows and ATE force the use of the older-style printer dialog, so you don't need to manually adjust the Registry.

Here's the link to the relevant release notes.

This looks like it worked. Thanks again,