>If you wish to print 'invisibly' from MS Word, why not use Word automation?

While I haven't tried it with Word, I know that printing with Excel using OLE Automation still produces the printing dialog. I have a feeling that's the issue here and would apply regardless of how printing was initiated.

The reason, for example, that using the ShellExecute() function with the print verb and the SW_HIDE parameter produces the dialog is the same as why an automation server, even if not displayed, shows one as well. The dialog isn't produced necessarily by the application, but rather by winspool.