c8748411@cc.nu.oz (06/05/90)
Greetings ....... I need some help. Does anybody out there know how to write a printer driver? What I want to do is to have a printer driver that has all the information sent to it from whatever package and then, rather than do all the tricky convert-to-specific-printer stuff, it saves it all as ascii file. That way I can do my work, print it out, divert the output onto disk, get that file to my mate who, say, might have a very lovely colour printer (the bastard) and he can print my file out from CLI. Sounds smashing what? So, if you can help, please, PLEASE get back to me. Thankyou. The GAMMA Play.
matth@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU (Matthew Hannigan) (06/05/90)
In article <1846.266b88f7@cc.nu.oz> c8748411@cc.nu.oz writes: > > What I want to do is to have a printer driver that has all the >information sent to it from whatever package and then, rather than do all >the tricky convert-to-specific-printer stuff, it saves it all as ascii file. >That way I can do my work, print it out, divert the output onto disk, get that >file to my mate who, say, might have a very lovely colour printer (the bastard) >and he can print my file out from CLI. > Sounds smashing what? Certainly does. Good news is that such a program is on the 1.3 workbench disk -- called CMD. There is a version on some fish disk as well, if you don't have WB1.3. -Matt
andy@cbmvax.commodore.com (Andy Finkel) (06/05/90)
In article <1846.266b88f7@cc.nu.oz> c8748411@cc.nu.oz writes: > What I want to do is to have a printer driver that has all the >information sent to it from whatever package and then, rather than do all >the tricky convert-to-specific-printer stuff, it saves it all as ascii file. >That way I can do my work, print it out, divert the output onto disk, get that >file to my mate who, say, might have a very lovely colour printer (the bastard) >and he can print my file out from CLI. > All you need is CMD, found on your workbench disk. This utility intercepts the output to the parallel or serial.device (your choice) and puts it into a file in binary form. Then you can print it on some other amiga by copying it to PAR: or SER: andy -- andy finkel {uunet|rutgers|amiga}!cbmvax!andy Commodore-Amiga, Inc. "Not everything worth doing is worth doing well." Any expressed opinions are mine; but feel free to share. I disclaim all responsibilities, all shapes, all sizes, all colors.
frankjr@Neon.Stanford.EDU (Frank AnthonyJr Busalacchi) (06/05/90)
c8748411@cc.nu.oz writes: >Greetings ....... > I need some help. Does anybody out there know how to write a >printer driver? I do believe that the includes and autodocs have a section on printer drivers. If not, I know that the programmers handbook II by SYBEX has all the information for creating a printer driver. Hope I helped some people... Frank
mcmahan@netcom.UUCP (Dave Mc Mahan) (06/06/90)
In a previous article, andy@cbmvax (Andy Finkel) writes: >In article <1846.266b88f7@cc.nu.oz> c8748411@cc.nu.oz writes: >> What I want to do is to have a printer driver that has all the >>information sent to it from whatever package and then, rather than do all >>the tricky convert-to-specific-printer stuff, it saves it all as ascii file. >>That way I can do my work, print it out, divert the output onto disk, get that >>file to my mate who, say, might have a very lovely colour printer (the bastard) >>and he can print my file out from CLI. >> > >All you need is CMD, found on your workbench disk. This utility >intercepts the output to the parallel or serial.device (your >choice) and puts it into a file in binary form. Then you >can print it on some other amiga by copying it to PAR: or SER: I have seen this method posted, and it will work with one minor addition. The original poster wanted non-printer specific stuff. With the CMD program, the stuff captured has already been turned into printer codes for the specific printer installed via Preferences (assuming the program is dumping using the preferences options and not some built-in printer drivers). I think the addition of the following would make this idea work. Before dumping the image to the printer, go get a copy of your friend's printer driver that he uses and install it. Use preferenes to select this new type of printer, and THEN dump the image to the printer using the CMD program to re-route the data to a file. In this manner, you will have a file containing all the proper escape and control sequences for the desired printer, and just copying the file to the PAR: device on the friend's computer should cause the image to come out properly. Failure to use his printer driver in the first place will lead to (probably) incorrect results. This method still does NOT give you a printer independent dump file, but it will be correct for the desired printer. So, what do you think? Is it a plan? >andy finkel {uunet|rutgers|amiga}!cbmvax!andy -dave
new@udel.EDU (Darren New) (06/06/90)
In article <12833@netcom.UUCP> mcmahan@netcom.UUCP (Dave Mc Mahan) writes: >With the CMD program, the >stuff captured has already been turned into printer codes for the specific >printer installed via Preferences Is there not a way to capture the output to PRT:? I kind of remembered someone saying CMD could do this, but I looked at the docs and it does not say so. If you are going to PRT: (instead of printer.device) maybe you could assign PRT: to a file or maybe "assign PRT: remove" and then assign to a file. Of course, graphics dumps won't work. Im not at my Amiga, so I can't try this now. --Darren