The page layout is set in the printer options property page, or via the options menu.
Songsheet Generator's most basic task has always been to automatically format songs on the printed page. The Page Layout setting controls how the finished songs will flow on the page. Two main layout categories are available: Discrete Cells and Flowing Columns.
Discrete Cells provide separate areas on the page that are filled by formatted songs. The cells are called "discrete" because only one song is allowed to appear in any cell. A new song will always be started in a new cell. If a song will not fit in the cell, it will spill into the next cell. If a song does not fill its cell entirely, the remaining space in the cell is left blank.
The discrete page layouts are convenient for creating overhead transparencies, songbooks, and half- or quarter-page cut-up songsheets. See the One, Two, and Four Discrete Cells per Page examples for pictures of these page layouts.
Flowing Columns provide a continuous area on the page that is filled by formatted songs. The columns are called "flowing" because more than one song may appear in any column. A new song will appear after the previous song in a column if any space is left. This is similar to the way many people produce songsheets in a word processing program. Song titles will not be orphaned in a column—if very little space is left in a column, the next song will begin in the next column.
The flowing column page layouts are useful for conserving paper, or for making songsheets where the text should be as large as possible. See the Two Flowing Columns per Page example for a picture of this page layout.
Songsheet Generator will automatically set the page orientation to Portrait for One or Four Discrete Cells per Page layouts, and for Flowing Columnar page layouts. Landscape will be automatically set for the Two Discrete Cells per Page layout. This can be overridden by the user, by using the Printer Setup command, or by changing the setting in the Print Dialog. The overridden setting will be saved until a new Page Layout is chosen. When a new Page Layout is chosen, the orientation will revert to the default for that layout. The default orientation is landscape for "2 Discrete Cells Per Page," and portrait for all other layouts.
Versions of Songsheet Generator prior to 2.0.0.11 (Windows) referred to these options as "Songs per Page." This wording was confusing, because long songs might consume more than one cell on a page, so a "Four per Page" printout could actually show only three or fewer songs. The wording of the options has been changed, and the user interface improved, to more clearly communicate the actual page layout behavior.