Solidworks 2009 Hidden Enhancements: Print Interface

It seems that every new release contains small changes to the way Solidworks functions, but doesn't seem to be documented anywhere.  Without going into the whole documentation things, here is a change in 2009 that I never saw explained everywhere.

Last week we updated all the computers to Solidworks 2009.  This morning I had a user come and ask me how to print a selection window in 2009.  Sure enough when I went to the print window in a drawing, the 'selection' option was gone.  It has been replace with the following option that is highlighted below:

Current Screen Image does exactly what it says.  Basically what ever is on your screen, gets printed.  You can zoom to the area that you want to print, and thats what you will get.  Think of it as taking a screen capture, and then printing that.  It seems like a more simple way of printing only part of a drawing.  I used to use the selection print from time to time, but haven't for quite some time.  Is this an enhancement, or a regression in your opinion?

Update: It does seem that this change is documented in the help files if you do a search for 'print range'.  Here is the description from the help file:

Current screen image. Prints the image on the screen.

As noted below by someone from Solidworks, it is there in the documentation.  I should have been a bit more clear that I was pointing out changes that don't get documented in the what's new document.  I would imagine most users look for the new changes in the 'what's new' document, as opposed to the general help files.

Comments

[Adam]

Yeah I offically hate 2009 becuase of the fact that I can't do a selection print I have been trying to figure out how to do this for weeks now becuase I could do it in 2008. I could window select an area to print it won't do it anymore with 2009

[Bob Heineman]

I am also unhappy with the removal of this feature as I used it quite often. The "new" way of doing this gives me unexpected results and I have no idea what the scale is. With the "old" way of selecting an area to print I knew what I was going to get on the print and what scale I had. This is not an enhancement from my point of view. Hope they add it back in the future.

[Donna Allman]

Thank you for reading our Documentation!

I'm happy to say that the option you referred to is indeed documented in 2009 SP0.

Search for Print range in the Help to locate the Printing Selected Drawings Sheets. The Current screen image item is listed under Print range.

[Adam Scheible]

Leaving the scale option off is a serious regression.

[Mike Puclett]

Mitch,

It does not give you a scale option which will definately be a regression to those using it. For now it seems like its just like printing a screen capture at whatever scale you happen to zoom in to.

Mike

[Mitch]

The only question I would have is this...Does it prompt you for a scale or does it scale it to fit? Atleast with a selection window you could tell it what scale to print it at.

[Mark]

Looks like the "display" option AutoCAD gives when printing. That part is an enhancement, but I see removing the "selection" (window) option as a simultaneous regression.
-Mark