jnp@daimi.UUCP (J|rgen N|rgaard) (03/21/86)
Does anybody know of printer-drivers for the Macintosh
which produces REAL Postscript. I've been told that
Apple's own driver, the LaserWriter produces kind of
Postscript but not "the real thing".
Please mail me any suggestions or pointers.
By the way: Has the device-driver section in "Inside Macintosh"
been revised lately, my manual pages are dated "6/11/84" ???
Thanks in advance
J|rgen N|rgaard
e-mail: ....{seismo!}mcvax!diku!daimi!jnpsumacc@uwmacc.UUCP (Rick Keir) (03/27/86)
> ... I've been told that >Apple's own driver, the LaserWriter produces kind of >Postscript but not "the real thing". This is *not* true. The LaserWriter printer is a "real" Postscript printer; the Laserwriter driver produces "real" Postscript. Perhaps the confusion is that the mapping between QuickDraw commands and their Postscript equivalents is not always perfect. Microsoft Chart is the best known offender in this regard: I've seen many graphs where the connecting lines were present, but the data points were gone. -- Rick Keir -- MicroComputer Information Center, Rm 3130 MACC 1210 West Dayton St/U Wisconsin Madison/Mad WI 53706 {allegra, ihnp4, seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!sumacc (OR) uwvax!uwmacc!rick
korn@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU (Peter "Arrgh" Korn) (03/29/86)
In article <2063@uwmacc.UUCP> sumacc@uwmacc.UUCP (Rick Keir) writes: >> ... I've been told that >>Apple's own driver, the LaserWriter produces kind of >>Postscript but not "the real thing". > >This is *not* true. The LaserWriter printer is a "real" Postscript >printer; the Laserwriter driver produces "real" Postscript. > I'm sorry, but what you said here is *not* true. The LaserWriter printer is a real PostScript printer, true enough; but the LaserWriter printer driver that a macintosh uses doesn't produce TRUE PostScript code. Rather it produces a half-way code that the faster 68000 on the LaserWriter completely decodes, according to the instructions in a file called "LaserPrep", which the mac always downloads previous to printing the first time. The exception to this is Aldus Pagemaker, which has yet a third coding scheme-->this is why there is a file called Aldus Prep. One could argue (read "flame") that the two taken together constitute "real" Postscript. My answer: you take the file generated by your mac (and created on disk by holding down command-F while printing) and try to find each and every instruction listed therein in a Pagemaker manual. What is unfortunate is that there isn't (yet...) a program that will take the *Prep file and the command-f'd output and come up with the true Pagemaker code that one could very easily modify (as, to my knowledge, there is no manual outside of apple that explains all the commands they use in their pseudo-pagemaker language). Well, 'nuff said. ----- Peter Korn korn@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU {dual,decvax,sdcsvax}!ucbvax!korn
bart@reed.UUCP (Bart Massey) (03/29/86)
In article <12759@ucbvax.UUCP> korn@ucbvax.UUCP (Peter "Arrgh" Korn) writes: > ... > I'm sorry, but what you said here is *not* true. The LaserWriter printer > is a real PostScript printer, true enough; but the LaserWriter printer > driver that a macintosh uses doesn't produce TRUE PostScript code. Rather > it produces a half-way code that the faster 68000 on the LaserWriter > completely decodes, according to the instructions in a file called > "LaserPrep", which the mac always downloads previous to printing the > first time. The exception to this is Aldus Pagemaker, which has yet > a third coding scheme-->this is why there is a file called Aldus Prep. > > One could argue (read "flame") that the two taken together constitute > "real" Postscript. My answer: you take the file generated by your > mac (and created on disk by holding down command-F while printing) and try to > find each and every instruction listed therein in a Pagemaker manual. I think you mean "PostScript" rather than "PageMaker" above and below, don't you? One certainly could argue that both files are "real PostScript". What do you mean by half-way code? The Prep files just contain a set of PostScript procedures... The file itself just calls those procedures as part of its code. You're going to claim that if you have a C program split into two files, the second one isn't "real C code", because all of its calls aren't in K&R ?? > What is unfortunate is that there isn't (yet...) a program that will take > the *Prep file and the command-f'd output and come up with the true > Pagemaker code that one could very easily modify (as, to my knowledge, there > is no manual outside of apple that explains all the commands they use > in their pseudo-pagemaker language). Try opening the Prep file as a text file, and reading it. Bart Massey ..tektronix!reed!bart