Printing Smart
First observed in 1970, Earth Day began as a
nationwide grassroots demonstration
to celebrate the natural wonders of our planet.
With this year's date approaching (April 22), it
is appropriate to consider ways we all can
decrease paper consumption when printing from
the computer.
As more and more
great information is available on the Web and in
the Library's databases, we see more and more
printing. When people are getting the
information they need, that's great.
Unfortunately, we
see a lot of paper waste. Approximately
one-fourth of all pages printed in Parkland Library
are immediately discarded. This includes
"orphan pages" at the end of print jobs, and
whole documents that are just left lying on the
printer.
Think Before You Print
Do you really need
a hard copy? Would you print this if it cost 10
cents a page? Can you e-mail or save documents
to disk to view later? Print only what you
need.
WHEN YOU DO
NEED TO PRINT, USE THESE TIPS:
Web Printing
from Internet Explorer
Print
Preview.
Go to File >
Print Preview to see how the pages will be laid
out. Often, the last page doesn't contain real
content; it's just footer, links, or even ads. Print only the pages that contain the content
you need.
Decrease Font Size.
Go to View > Text
Size, and try "smaller" or "smallest." Web
designers sometimes make font bigger so that it
will be easy to read on the screen, but smaller
print is just as legible when printed. This can
make quite a difference if there are several
pages with a lot of text you want to print.
Printing from MS Word
Eliminate "Orphan" Pages.
In the course of editing your work, sometimes
blank pages, or pages with just a couple
lines get inserted in the middle or at the end
of your document. Do a print preview to
identify formatting problems, and correct them
before you print.
Power Point
Printing
Print Handouts instead of Slides.
Go to File > Print. In the "Print what" portion of the dialog box (1.
below), the default is slides. Choose
handouts instead, and you can print up to nine
slides per page. Since power points often have
a large font and lots of white space, printing
six per page is usually quite legible. Printing
three per page (2.
below) will give you lines next to the slides to
write notes.
Acrobat
Printing
Use Acrobat’s Print Icon.
When you access a .pdf file
from within a web browser, it opens up an
Acrobat Reader window. A new printer icon
(circled in red below) appears within that window, and you must use
that to print the .pdf file.
Using File > Print
or the print icon on the standard toolbar will
usually just cause a blank page to be printed.
Be Patient.
Acrobat jobs take longer to print
out. Getting impatient and clicking the print
button a second time wastes paper.
The Parkland
Library is Committed to Reducing Paper Waste.
Do you have other
ideas for reducing paper waste? Send them to
rdossett@parkland.edu, and we'll feature
them in future issues of our newsletter.
-- Raeann Dossett,
Information Services and Outreach Librarian
|