johnth@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu (John Thurtell) (03/10/87)
....
I have a couple of question about how to work with printers on the amiga.
1) How do I get data which would normally be sent to the printer redirected
to a file? ie I want to print on a preferences supported printer which
is not attached to my computer so I would like to be able to generate a
file with the correct <esc> codes etc which I could move and dump. How
do I reassign the printer output to a file?
2) I want to be able to print out files using different fonts. This should
be easy but does not seem to be so. I guess the note pad does such a poor
job because it thinks of a page of text as a picture. To get good looking
text you need to think about it a bit differently. (?) (Have I missed
something? Can the notepad print clean text? How?) Anyway I think I can
generate the appropriate binary code to print in different fonts but I would
like to do this in a general way through preferences so that if I change
printers I don't need to change my routines. I want to know if I can get
pref. to put my printer into graphics mode and then send it the the exact
pixel representation I send to it. No interpretation, no scaling,...
I'll do all of that.
3) Can somebody tell me what the structure of the graphics font library is.
I've been playing with writing a letter to the screen, reading the bits
off the screen and translating them into resolution appropriate to my
printer. It would be faster if I could just read the bitmap out of the
library. How do I do it?
4) Why has this not been done befor? Am I the only one who wants to be able
to print in different fonts? How about a simple program that takes a notepad document, fixes the resolution and prints it out. It should be a one or two
evening hack for somebody with all the manuals. (hint hint, I don't have
all the manuals yet and I won't have the time for a few months anyway.)
John Thurtell | A day without computers is
| like a day without ...? hm
johnth@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu | I can't remember a day without
p8ty@cornellf.bitnet | computers.wpd@athena.mit.edu (William P Doyle) (03/10/87)
-----------<<<<<>>>>>----------- (a baby line eater) In article <379@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> johnth@batcomputer.UUCP (John Thurtell) writes: >I have a couple of question about how to work with printers on the amiga. >... >4) Why has this not been done befor? Am I the only one who wants to be able > to print in different fonts? How about a simple program that takes a notepad document, fixes the resolution and prints it out. It should be a one or two > evening hack for somebody with all the manuals. (hint hint, I don't have > all the manuals yet and I won't have the time for a few months anyway.) > >John Thurtell | A day without computers is Along the same lines, how about a "tool" that would allow users to utilize special features of their printers? (Perhaps this already exists?) I am thinking specifically of proportional fonts, downloadable fonts, etc... that I have on my ImageWriterII. It would be nice to buy a fancy printer and to be able to use it as a "fancy" printer instead of a "virtual" printer (virtual = "all printers are the same").