This guide explains how to print/download any Discourse topic to PDF.
Required user level: All users
Discourse allows you to generate a PDF of a topic by using the Print topic keyboard shortcut. The shortcut for your system is noted in the keyboard shortcut reference modal that pops up when you press the ? key while browsing a Discourse site.
Most operating systems: ctrl+p
MacOS: ⌘+p
Using the shortcut will open a new browser window where you can optionally choose to print the topic as a PDF. The interface will vary by browser, but it will look something like the example below:
Discourse intercepts the keyboard shortcut and renders the print view server-side to ensure the entire topic is printed.
The same functionality can be triggered by appending /print to the end of a topic’s URL.
You can technically select the print option in your browser’s File menu as well, but you will likely need to scroll from the first post to the last post of the topic to ensure all of the posts have loaded into view.
There is a max prints per hour per user site setting that allows an admin to set a maximum number of /print page impressions per hour per user. It defaults to 5 and can be set to 0 to disable Discourse’s topic printing functionality (printing from the browser menu still works).
We still need to get these documented, but have a look at the following theme components in the mean time:
GitHub - discourse/clean-export (Adds a button to the post admin controls to print a specific post. Looks to be TL4 and Staff only. Mobile and Desktop)
GitHub - discourse/discourse-topic-print-component 3 (Adds a button to the topic timeline to perform the same action as the keyboard shortcut. Shows for all users. Desktop only.)
Are androids really that limited I mean that has been basic functional ages.
It could be narrow minded but I can’t see no point what so ever having over lapping menus. Because then Discourse should offer pure cut, copy and paste too.
But if, or I should say when, out there is systems that don’t offer pseudo printing/saving as PDF then that is needed.
Hang tight everyone, we don’t even have documentation topics for these two components at this point! Let’s save any more feedback/request for when we can get around to that. In the mean time, these are open source and MIT licensed, so you can feel free to fork and/or make a pull request if you have particularly urgent needs.