Setting default paper size in Gnome FC5

[Marc Schwartz]

Gavin Simpson wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> How do you set the default paper size used by Gnome print dialogues in
> say Evolution and Evince? It currently defaults to US Letter but
> seeing as I am neither in the US nor have access to US Letter sized
> paper I'd like to use A4 instead. My locale is currently en_GB-UTF8
> and the printers I'm printing to are set to print to A4, and do so
> when I change the paper size in the print dialogue, but I have to do
> this everytime. Is there anywhere to change this globally in Gnome?
> 
> TIA,
> 
> Gav

Hey Gavin,

Check the output of the following in a console:

   $ locale -ck LC_PAPER

If the default paper size for en_GB is A4 (should be), you should see 
(note paper size measures in mm):

$ locale -ck LC_PAPER
LC_PAPER
height=297
width=210
...

On the other hand, if it is US LETTER, you should see:

$ locale -ck LC_PAPER
LC_PAPER
height=279
width=216
...

 From testing here on my system, which is U.S., I get the latter.

If you are properly getting A4 sizes above for the locale, then it is 
possible that your CUPS configuration for the printer(s) is overriding 
the locale default. To check it, run:

   $ printconf-gui

You will be prompted for the root password.

Select the printer in question to Edit the configuration. Then select
the "Driver Options" tab. Review the "Page Size" setting. If it is US 
Letter there, this will override the locale default. Change it to A4 and 
click OK to save the change and close the dialogue.  Then hit the Apply 
icon to affect the change in the printer setup.  Do this for each 
printer you have configured.

I presume that this basic process is unchanged in FC5 versus FC4.

HTH,

Marc Schwartz