Laser-Lovers-Request@WASHINGTON.ARPA.UUCP (07/26/86)
Info-Postscript for Laser Lovers Digest Saturday, July 26, 1986 9:01AM
Volume 1, Issue 16
Today's Topics:
LaserWriter
QED in postscript
troff font files for LW+
The popular press rides again
Modified Brian Reid's text.ps
DEC shows unannounced Postscript printer at DECUS...
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Friday, 9 May 1986 15:03:16
Subject: LaserWriter
From: "Cambridge Phoenix - CAM.PHX@CAM.ENG-ICF" <PH10%phoenix.cambridge.ac.uk@Cs.Ucl.AC.UK>
It appears that the character `bar' (ASCII code 124) in the Times-Roman
font in the LaserWriter Plus is not the same as in the original
LaserWriter. The character is shorter and fatter, though its width
is unaltered. This change is not mentioned in the update document
for the LaserWriter Plus, and seems rather gratuitous.
Philip Hazel
University of Cambridge
------------------------------
Date: Mon 5 May 86 13:28:09-EDT
From: Bill Schilit <BILL@CS.COLUMBIA.EDU>
Subject: QED in postscript
I'm trying to print the QED symbol (a small box) using scribe 1405,
mathematics10 library, and the laserwriter... but scribe tells me the
character is "unavailable". So I went to add QED to scribe's
pssymb.fon file but, surprise, QED does not exist in the laserwriter
font manuals I have!
Does anyone know if the QED symbol is available in the laserwriter
or if there is a way to make scribe print one?
- Bill
------------------------------
Subject: troff font files for LW+
Date: 14 May 86 09:07:26 PDT (Wed)
From: robs%tektools.tek.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA
Does anyone have the troff font description files that correspond
to the new fonts available in the LaserWriter Plus, or know where
they can be had ?
Robert Sleator
tektronix!tektools!robs
------------------------------
Subject: The popular press rides again
Date: 14 May 86 09:45:55 PDT (Wed)
From: Wm Leler <wm%tekchips.tek.csnet@CSNET-RELAY.ARPA>
The following quote is from the Comdex conference daily newpaper:
A laser printer development spotted by Camilo Wilson, president
of Lifetree Software, is that the Hewlett-Packard control
language is emerging as a de facto standard, ``largely because
the HP control language is non-proprietary,'' he said.
PostScript, the control language embedded in Apple's Laserwriter
printer is proprietary -- a fact that Wilson thinks is
responsible for few laser printers standardizing on PostScript.
No flames please -- I know the PostScript language is completely
non-proprietary, but apparently many people don't (and some
people don't bother to get their facts straight!). The above
quote was shown to me by a friend who works for the laser
printer division of HP. They were showing it around the office
for a good giggle.
Wm
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 May 86 17:43:38 pdt
From: micropro!kepler!mojo@lll-crg.ARPA (Morris Jones)
Subject: Modified Brian Reid's text.ps
I'm a beginning PostScript hacker, so this may not be pretty, but
it sure was fun.
This version of Brian's text.ps prints two pages side by side per
sheet of paper at 65% reduction.
I use it on my IBM in conjunction with a pair of other programs to
print listings. "tod" prints the time and date in "05:15 05/14/1986"
format. "detab" expands tabs to their proper print positions. This
is the batch file I use, called "lpr2.bat":
--------------------------------
mode com1:9600,n,8,1,p
:start
if "%1" == "" goto end
echo /header (%1 >com1
tod >com1
echo ) def >com1
cat \ps\text2.ps >com1
detab <%1 >com1
cat \ps\eof >com1
shift
goto start
:end
--------------------------------
"eof" is a one byte file containing a ^D, natch. Here's "text2.ps":
I'll put the signature here rather than after. Cheers!
Mojo
... Morris Jones, MicroPro Product Development
{lll-crg,ptsfa,dual,well,pyramid}!micropro!kepler!mojo
--------------------------------
%!-Adobe-1.0
%%Title: printfile.ps
%%Creator: Glenn Reid, Adobe Systems Incorporated
%%CreationDate: Tue Apr 22 15:35:53 1986
%%Pages: 0
%% Copyright (c) 1986 Glenn Reid and Adobe Systems Incorporated.
%% Use it, distribute it (with this message), but don't sell it.
%%
%% May 14, 1986 Modified by Morris Jones to print two pages of text
%% at 65% reduction per sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 paper.
%% mojo@kepler.UUCP micropro!kepler!mojo@lll-crg.ARPA
%%
%% This program will take miscellaneous text concatenated at its
%% end and print it in some default font. It is designed to be
%% minimal in its functionality, but flexible enough to be easily
%% adapted to other uses.
/in. {72 mul} def
/line 512 string def % for input line buffering
/buff 10 string def % for page number conversion
48.6 792 translate
270 rotate
.65 .65 scale
%% CHANGE THESE IF YOU LIKE
%% If any of these parameters are defined ahead of this file, then
%% those values will be used. A typical way to use this is to
%% allow an application to redefine some of the parameters by
%% inserting definitions ahead of this file in the print stream.
%% Examples of redefinitions look like:
%%
%% /fontname /Palatino-Roman def
%% /pointsize /13 def
%% /header (document.ps) def
%% /pagenumber false def
%% /leftmargin 36 def
%%
%% Any number (including 0) of these parameters may be defined to
%% be different from the defaults. The defaults are quite
%% reasonable for general use, and will print in 11-point Courier
%% with a 12-point Courier-Bold header (only prints a header of
%% /header string is defined by the user). Margins top, left and
%% bottom are: .75 in., .75 in., and .5 in.
%%
%% Otherwise, the following defaults will be used:
/leftmargin where not
{ /leftmargin .75 in. def } {pop} ifelse
/bottom where not
{ /bottom .5 in. def } {pop} ifelse
/startX where not
{ /startX leftmargin def } {pop} ifelse
/startY where not
{ /startY 10 in. def } {pop} ifelse
/fontname where not
{ /fontname /Courier def } {pop} ifelse
/pointsize where not
{ /pointsize 11 def } {pop} ifelse
/leading where not
{ /leading pointsize 2 add def } {pop} ifelse
/headerfontname where not
{ /headerfontname /Courier-Bold def } {pop} ifelse
/headerpointsize where not
{ /headerpointsize 12 def } {pop} ifelse
/headerfont
headerfontname findfont headerpointsize scalefont
def
/page where not
{ /page 1 def } {pop} ifelse
/pagenumber where not
{ /pagenumber true def } {pop} ifelse
% This routine will print a header at the top of each page
/printheader {
gsave
currentdict /header known {
36 10.5 in. moveto
headerfont setfont
header show
} if
pagenumber {
8 in. 10.5 in. moveto
headerfont setfont
page buff cvs show
/page page 1 add def
} if
grestore
startX startY moveto
} def
/left true def
/formfeed {
left
{
/left false def
609.2308 0 translate
}
{
showpage
/left true def
48.6 792 translate
270 rotate
.65 .65 scale
} ifelse
} def
/crlf {
leftmargin currentpoint exch pop % replace X with leftmargin
leading sub
dup bottom le
{ pop pop formfeed printheader }
{ moveto } ifelse
} def
/printfile {
line readline % read a line from the file
{ % 'if' procedure body (+boolean)
{ % 'while' procedure body
show crlf % show what's left by readline
currentfile cvlit % use as operand
line readline % and read the next line
not {exit} if % exit if no more input to be had
} loop % end of while-proc
} if
showpage % when input file is exhausted
} def % /printfile
fontname findfont pointsize scalefont setfont
printheader % execute header
currentfile cvlit % uses rest of this file as input
% everything following 'PrintFile' is treated as data, through EOF
printfile
------------------------------
Date: Thu 15 May 86 19:26:27-PDT
From: William "Chops" Westfield <BILLW@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
Subject: DEC shows unannounced Postscript printer at DECUS...
At the DALAS DECUS, the DEC printer group was running a
"Printserver 40", a 40 page-per-minute Postscript laser printer.
It looked sort of nice....
the PS40 connects to your ethernet. It contains a uVax II processor
with hardware assist for Postscript. The 40 ppm figure is based
on pages of text for which all the characters are in the font cache.
Stuff printed in black on this printer was VERY black. The thing
has several deep paper trays, holding paper sizes up to 11x17.
Now for the bad news. The uvax runs Vaxelan (Real Time VMS, sort of),
and only talks DECNET (and Maybe LAT) protocols. A lot of people
yelled at them for this, so maybe by the time the gadget is actually
anounced as a product, it will also talk something more reasonable
like TCP. So far, the formatting software only runs under VMS (but
of course it already exists for many other OSes). The thing is
supposed to be "competatively" priced, which I think means "expensive",
since there aren't any chgeap printers in that performance range.
BillW
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End of Info-Postscript for Laser Lovers Digest
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