suhler@im4u.UUCP (Paul A. Suhler) (12/23/87)
I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a reboot in between. I think that his comments apply to a previous poster's comments about '0's at the start and end of lines after switching from LW to IW. (I'd seen it, too.) He said that the Chooser does not re-initialize the serial port; that's only done at reboot or startup time. He said that Apple intended for you to use only one kind of device on the serial port in between reboots. Hey, Apple, this is a bug! I have a modem on the modem port, an IW on the printer port, and I like to be able to hop into LW to create PostScript files for uploading. Any chance of a fix? Thanks. -- Paul Suhler suhler@im4u.UTEXAS.EDU 512-474-9517/471-3903
king@entropy.ms.washington.edu (Jim King) (01/05/88)
In article <2470@im4u.UUCP>, suhler@im4u.UUCP (Paul A. Suhler) writes: > I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to > turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a > reboot in between. I think that his comments apply to a previous > poster's comments about '0's at the start and end of lines after > switching from LW to IW. (I'd seen it, too.) > > He said that the Chooser does not re-initialize the serial port; > that's only done at reboot or startup time. He said that Apple > intended for you to use only one kind of device on the serial > port in between reboots. > > Hey, Apple, this is a bug! I have a modem on the modem port, > an IW on the printer port, and I like to be able to hop into > LW to create PostScript files for uploading. Any chance of a fix? Yes it is a bug and an annoying one, but creating a PostScript file is done in an absurd manner anyway. Maybe this is a good time to propose a more user-friendly method for generating Postscript files. The cryptic clover-key method is a real pain; it is easy to forget and impossible for new users to guess (sounds like another well-known brand of PC!). It also gives your file a dumb name. Why not have a "printer driver" accessible from the Chooser (like the Glue software) that if chosen would save a Postscript file instead of really printing. There should then be a dialog box so you can name the PostScript file and so you could check whether you wanted the header file prepended or not. Alternatively, there could be a PS option in the Print Dialog box. But there should be some visible Mac-like way of generating a PostScript file. And there seems to be no reason at all that such an option should depend on the state of the serial port, since the stuff is not going to the serial port anyway. Is it possible to write a CDEV that will do this without waiting for Apple? > Thanks. > -- > Paul Suhler suhler@im4u.UTEXAS.EDU 512-474-9517/471-3903 Jim King uucpnet address: uw-beaver!uw-entropy!king Internet (arpanet) address: king@entropy.ms.washington.edu Bitnet address: king%entropy.ms.washington.edu@beaver.cs.washington.edu James King Dept of Math Univ of Washington Seattle, WA 98195
planting@colby.WISC.EDU ( W. Harry Plantinga) (01/05/88)
>> Chooser does not re-initialize the serial port; >> that's only done at reboot or startup time.... Apple >> intended for you to use only one kind of device on the serial >> port in between reboots. >> >> Hey, Apple, this is a bug! I have a modem on the modem port, >> an IW on the printer port, and I like to be able to hop into >> LW to create PostScript files for uploading. Any chance of a fix? >Why not have a "printer driver" accessible from the Chooser (like the >Glue software) that if chosen would save a Postscript file instead of >really printing. There's another thing about printing that really annoys me. There are options that can be chosen in the print dialog that affect the way the page looks. For example, in Word, selecting "fractional widths" makes more text fit on each line. However, having fractional widths selected also makes the program run many times slower. So what do I have to do to preview a paper that is to be printed with fractional widths? Select print, select fractional widths, and hit "ok." Then try to cancel the printing before anything gets printed. This is ridiculous. I have to start a printing and abort it just to see how the paper will look printed out?
brion@hounx.UUCP (B.FEINBERG) (01/06/88)
Some recent postings by suhler@im4u.UUCP (Paul A. Suhler) and !uw-entropy!king (king @ UW MathStat, Seattle) discussed problems creating postscript files using the laserwriter drivers on the Mac. Some excerpts include: >> I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to >> turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a >> reboot in between. >> >> Hey, Apple, this is a bug! I have a modem on the modem port, >> an IW on the printer port, and I like to be able to hop into >> LW to create PostScript files for uploading. Any chance of a fix? >Yes it is a bug and an annoying one, but creating a PostScript file >is done in an absurd manner anyway. Maybe this is a good time to >propose a more user-friendly method for generating Postscript files. >The cryptic clover-key method is a real pain; it is easy to forget >and impossible for new users to guess (sounds like another well-known >brand of PC!). > >Why not have a "printer driver" accessible from the Chooser (like the >Glue software) that if chosen would save a Postscript file instead of >really printing. > >Alternatively, there could be a PS option in the Print Dialog box. First, a trick that helps (somewhat). Get a copy of the old control panel that included the option of turning Appletalk on and off. Rename it using Resedit to something like "Old Control Panel," (so you can still have the new control panel available). Before accessing the chooser to select the laserwriter, fist turn on Appletalk using the Old Control Panel. Make sure your Imagewriter II is turned off or it may go crazy thinking it is talking to Appletalk (doesn't seem to be a problem with the IW 1 however). This trick doesn't always work (sometimes the Mac still refuses to turn on Appletalk) but I've usually been able to get things working (sometimes it helps to designate the port for the Imagewriter as the modem port before trying to turn on Appletalk). Secondly, I'd like to vehemently support the discussion about how warped the method of generating postscript is. Besides being totally non-Mac like, I've wasted countless hours trying to get the generated postscript to print. Apple's scheme of downloading a dictionary of macros to the laserwriter makes life very difficult for Laserwriters not on Appletalk networks. Our Laserwriter sits off a datakit network connected to Unix VAXes. We have no trouble printing postscript files generated with troff on Unix, but printing the Mac generated postscript files is not easy. Downloading the header file (using the Cntl-k trick) didn't seem to work but eventually we found the modified header files created by Brian Powell brian@sally.utexas.edu and Ron Hitchens hitchens@sally.utexas.edu that can be prepended to the normal postscript (Cntl-f) for printing on the laserwriter. This all worked okay (we had some trouble with the Laserwriter 4.0 driver and only used the 3.1 driver) until we purchased a non-Apple postscript printer. Despite days of work, I still can't print most documents on this new printer. Everything works fine when the non-Apple printer is on an Appletalk network, but downloading the generated postscript works only on the simplest files. Apple's decision to permanently load the dictionary in the Laserwriter suffers another problem. It forces all users on an Appletalk network to use a single Laserwriter driver. Although I have no personal experience with this, I suspect problems might arise if the Appletalk Laserwriter is shared with non-Mac machines generating postscript. At the least, the dictionary takes up valuable Laserwriter memory in this shared environment. With Apple's push for "connectivity," their inherent assumption that both the Mac and the Laserwriter sit on a common Appletalk network is quite limiting. Postscript has the capability to define completely self-contained printing commands that should be machine independent. In fact, the programs from Powell and Hitchens prepend commands to the Cntl-f generated postscript to create a self-contained unit (the macros are only defined for that single print job). Agreeably, some time is saved if the dictionary is permantly installed in the Laserwriter, and there is also the issue of downloading fonts to the Laserwriter. Apple's approach has some merits, but the user should still be able to generate EASILY (i.e. what we normally expect from a Mac) device independent, totally self-contained postscript files. In addition to making it easier to print on non-Appletalk Laserwriters and non-Apple postscript printers, this would also simplify the process of importing postscript descriptions into other programs - for example to print a Mac generated figure in a troff or TeX file on a Unix machine. Well, that is my 2 cents worth. Brion Brion Feinberg (201) 949-5665 uucp: ihnp4!hounx!brion arpa: "ihnp4!hounx!brion"@decwrl.dec.com
darin@apple.UUCP (Darin Adler) (01/06/88)
In article <4964@spool.cs.wisc.edu> planting@colby.WISC.EDU ( W. Harry Plantinga) writes: > There's another thing about printing that really annoys me. There are > options that can be chosen in the print dialog that affect the way the > page looks. For example, in Word, selecting "fractional widths" makes > more text fit on each line. However, having fractional widths > selected also makes the program run many times slower. So what do I > have to do to preview a paper that is to be printed with fractional > widths? Select print, select fractional widths, and hit "ok." Then > try to cancel the printing before anything gets printed. > > This is ridiculous. I have to start a printing and abort it just to > see how the paper will look printed out? What you describe here is a misfeature in Word. Normally, any options that affect how the page looks are in the "Page Setup..." dialog, rather than the "Print..." dialog. Microsoft made a serious mistake by moving some of these options into the Print dialog, requiring the ridiculous technique above. Carefully-written applications (and those which do not customize the printing dialogs) will not exhibit this kind of problem. -- Darin Adler, Apple Computer AppleLink:Adler4 UUCP: {sun,voder,nsc,mtxinu,dual}!apple!darin CSNET: darin@Apple.com
spector@suvax1.UUCP (Mitchell Spector) (01/07/88)
In article <696@entropy.ms.washington.edu>, king@entropy.ms.washington.edu (Jim King) writes: > In article <2470@im4u.UUCP>, suhler@im4u.UUCP (Paul A. Suhler) writes: > > I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to > > turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a > > reboot in between.... > > He said that the Chooser does not re-initialize the serial port; > > that's only done at reboot or startup time. He said that Apple > > intended for you to use only one kind of device on the serial > > port in between reboots. > > > > Hey, Apple, this is a bug! I have a modem on the modem port, > > an IW on the printer port, and I like to be able to hop into > > LW to create PostScript files for uploading. Any chance of a fix? > > Paul Suhler suhler@im4u.UTEXAS.EDU 512-474-9517/471-3903 > Yes it is a bug and an annoying one, but creating a PostScript file > is done in an absurd manner anyway. Maybe this is a good time to > propose a more user-friendly method for generating Postscript files. > [Proposed new method for generating Postscript files.] > uucpnet address: uw-beaver!uw-entropy!king > Internet (arpanet) address: king@entropy.ms.washington.edu > Bitnet address: > king%entropy.ms.washington.edu@beaver.cs.washington.edu > James King > Dept of Math > Univ of Washington > Seattle, WA 98195 Here's another (perhaps more common) reason for needing to switch from ImageWriter to LaserWriter after the ImageWriter has been used, without having to reboot. A lot of people use Microsoft Word to write a document for printing on a LaserWriter, although the computer they're working on has only an ImageWriter. If you use the Chooser to select LaserWriter, Word will then format your document on the screen as it will appear when printed on the LaserWriter. (Formatting differs on the two printers. For example, page breaks appear in different locations.) The way Chooser is currently set up, you have to reboot before doing this if you've used the ImageWriter for anything at all since the last boot. Moreover, if you print a draft on the ImageWriter, you have to reboot if you want to continue editing using LaserWriter formatting. (Of course, you could put your ImageWriter on the modem port if you don't have a modem. But if you have both an ImageWriter and a modem, you're out of luck.) This is an annoying bug which I hope Apple will fix. -- Mitchell Spector |"Give me a Dept. of Computer Science & Software Eng., Seattle Univ.| ticket to Path: ...!uw-beaver!uw-entropy!dataio!suvax1!spector | Mars!!" or: dataio!suvax1!spector@entropy.ms.washington.edu | -- Zippy the Pinhead
levin@bbn.COM (Joel B Levin) (01/08/88)
In article <888@suvax1.UUCP> spector@suvax1.UUCP (Mitchell Spector) writes: :In article <696@entropy.ms.washington.edu>, king@entropy.ms.washington.edu :(Jim King) writes: : :> In article <2470@im4u.UUCP>, suhler@im4u.UUCP (Paul A. Suhler) writes: : :> > I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to :> > turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a :> > reboot in between.... : : Here's another (perhaps more common) reason for needing to switch from :ImageWriter to LaserWriter after the ImageWriter has been used, without :having to reboot. : : A lot of people use Microsoft Word to write a document for printing on a :LaserWriter, although the computer they're working on has only an ImageWriter. :If you use the Chooser to select LaserWriter, Word will then format your :document on the screen as it will appear when printed on the LaserWriter. : ... As far as I can determine, the major difference is the width of the page. This is certainly so for MacDraw and other applications that can print to either device. The quick/dirty solution to your problem: leave it set to ImageWriter, and use Tall Adjusted (I know, this is tricky in Word 3+). The lines and pages will now be broken at the same place as they would for the Laserwriter at 100%, and no Choosing is necessary. /JBL -- UUCP: {harvard, husc6, etc.}!bbn!levin ARPA: levin@bbn.com
holt@apple.UUCP (Bayles Holt) (01/15/88)
Reply to 11369,...
: I'd talked to an Apple engineer about how the Chooser refuses to
: turn on AppleTalk after the ImageWriter has been used without a
: reboot in between.
I understand from the engineer working on the ImageWriter drivers that
the bug has been located and fixed. It is not a bug in the Chooser, but
instead is a bug in the driver. The fix should appear in the next
version of the ImageWriter driver.
--Nik Bhatt
--AppleLink address: BHATT1
:w