Chrome: window.print() print dialogue opens only after page reload (javascript)

Question

I am facing a really weird problem. I am calling window.print() from a javascript file. This is working fine in Safari, IE, Firefox... and until two hours ago it worked in Chrome, too. (Version 29.0.1547.57)

I did not change anything essential in my javascript file (really - I just removed some comments...), but what now happens is really weird: In Chrome, the print dialogue does not open when window.print() is called. Nothing happens. But then, when I press reload, the print dialogue opens immediately.

The behaviour in the other browser did not change. And while debugging in Chrome I can see that window.print() is called as expected and the script goes on after that. Only the print dialogue is not shown until pressing reload.

Has anybody ever experienced something like that? I also tried to call window.print() in setTimeout(), but this did not change anything. When I debug the content of the page which shall be printed appears to be perfectly loaded.

I am sorry to ask, but I did not find anything while researching. Any help would be appreciated!

Thank you!

Answer 1

Wasiim is right, there is a Chrome bug where window.print() does not work when there is a <video> tag in the DOM. I solved it by calling this function:

function printPage() {     window.print();      //workaround for Chrome bug - https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=141633     if (window.stop) {         location.reload(); //triggering unload (e.g. reloading the page) makes the print dialog appear         window.stop(); //immediately stop reloading     }     return false; } 

Answer 2

From my experience this is due to continued background traffic, e.g. ajax calls and the like that prevent Chrome from feeling the that page is loaded completely. The reload breaks all traffic and thus the print dialog pops up. This is a particular gotcha in Visual Studio 2013 where BrowserLink continually ticks away in the background. This can be tested by disabling BrowserLink via the setting below:

<configuration>     <appSettings>         <add key="vs:EnableBrowserLink" value="false"/>     </appSettings> </configuration>