Most websites are not optimized for printing. So when you print one from your browser, you often end up with more pages than you need (like an entire page with nothing but the copyright notice on it) or a page full of advertisements that are a real waste of your very expensive tri-color cartridge.

To save you ink, paper, and headaches, here are some suggestions for printing out web pages. I'm using Firefox to illustrate the tips, but they also apply to Internet Explorer.

Use the print-friendly option.

Many larger sites provide this option, where you get a page that contains mainly text and sometimes limited graphics. Look for an icon that says Print or Print-Friendly.

Here's an example. The image on the left shows one New York Times op-ed printed from the actual web page, while the one on the right is the same story after clicking the Print button. (The latter actually had one additional page, but it's still easier to read and uses almost no color ink.)

Note that some sites (like this one) don't have a Print-Friendly icon; however, the page is set up so that it still only prints the main content of the page. You'll know if this is the case by following the next suggestion.

Use the Print Preview feature.

Some sites don't offer a print-friendly option. For example (cough, cough), one of my other blogs: Embrace Adventure. In these cases, Print Preview (under the File menu) is a great option to see what you're going to end up with.

The screenshot at right shows what the second page would be if I printed one of my entries from that blog. Since there's nothing useful on that page, I can choose to simply print Page 1 in the Print dialog box.

As mentioned above, T4L does provide a print-friendly version of each page. If you do a Print Preview of this page, for example, the first page will look like the image below.

Print a selection.

While Print Preview lets you see if entire pages can be deleted, it doesn't help with content within a page. Fortunately, browsers also offer the option to simply print whatever you select on the page. Simply click and drag to highlight the sections you want, and then pick Selection in the Print dialog. (Note: Highlighting content on a web page is tricky sometimes, especially if the selection begins with text or an object that is a hyperlink, so you may have to try a few times to get what you want.)

Below are two screenshots from the same Embrace Adventure page I showed previously. The left-hand image is page 1 if you print the entire page and the right-hand image shows what you get if you select from the title of the post to the end of the entry. You'll see that the top banner is missing, as well as navigation and footer links.

Make a PDF first.

The Selection option above has its limitations as well. Depending on how the page is set up, you may have to include certain items in your selection that you really didn't want to print.

If you have Adobe Acrobat (not the free Reader), you can make a PDF of the page first and then use Acrobat's TouchUp Object tool (under Tools > Advanced Editing) to select various objects and delete them. Again, this has its limitations, because it depends on how objects were created in the PDF conversion process.

But here's an example of the same blog page from above with the image deleted, which will save a lot of ink. This can be a good option, for example, if you want to print out a recipe but don't need all the images interspersed with it.

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Updates

Reader Debbie added a comment that you can also reach the Print Preview function by clicking the Print icon on the browser toolbar or the arrow beside it. I'm not sure what combo of browser/operating system she's using, but my Firefox browser doesn't have the printer icon by default in the toolbar. When I add it, it doesn't have the down arrow beside it.

However, my Internet Explorer browser does have both the icon and, when I click on the down arrow, I do get the Print Preview command. If I click directly on the button, though, the page goes straight to the default printer.

Thanks for sharing this info, Debbie. It's always great to have options available, so we can each work in the way that is most comfortable for us.

Posted in How To,Printing,Web