[comp.lang.postscript] Printing Postscript Files from a Mac on a Unix system

steele@mountaindew.rtp.dg.com (Michael Steele) (06/14/91)

Under System 7.0 on the Macintosh I have created a Postscript file 
which I then uploaded to our DECstation and sent to our Laserwriter IINTX.

Since the Laserwriter hasn't been initialized with a Macintosh, it dies
on special macros in the Postscript file.  I believe these macros are
defined in the included file, AppleDict, and the Laserwriter doesn't 
have AppleDict installed in memory.  Is there a way to include the
AppleDict when creating the postscript file?  Or is there a way to put it
on the DECstation so that the DECstation can initialize the printer?
-- 
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
  Michael Steele		steele@dg-rtp.dg.com or mikes@catt.ncsu.edu
  Data General Corporation -- Building the finest Workstations in Industry
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

kevina@apple.com (Kevin Andresen) (06/15/91)

In article <1991Jun13.172702.9085@dg-rtp.dg.com> 
steele@mountaindew.rtp.dg.com (Michael Steele) writes:
> Under System 7.0 on the Macintosh I have created a Postscript file 
> which I then uploaded to our DECstation and sent to our Laserwriter 
IINTX.
> 
> Since the Laserwriter hasn't been initialized with a Macintosh, it dies
> on special macros in the Postscript file.  I believe these macros are
> defined in the included file, AppleDict, and the Laserwriter doesn't 
> have AppleDict installed in memory.  Is there a way to include the
> AppleDict when creating the postscript file?  Or is there a way to put it
> on the DECstation so that the DECstation can initialize the printer?

If you captured the file using the new LaserWriter 7.0 driver, the 
LaserPrep initialization should be there; that is, AppleDict should be 
defined in the prologue of the PS file and nobody needs to "initialize" 
the printer first.  What kind of errors are you getting?

--Kevin Andresen [kevina@apple.com]
"You took the wind right out of my sails/It must be luff/It must be luff"

macman@wpi.WPI.EDU (Chris Silverberg) (06/16/91)

In an article steele@mountaindew.rtp.dg.com (Michael Steele) rambles:

>Since the Laserwriter hasn't been initialized with a Macintosh, it dies
>on special macros in the Postscript file.  I believe these macros are
>defined in the included file, AppleDict, and the Laserwriter doesn't 
>have AppleDict installed in memory.

I'm not so sure this is the problem. I am under the impression that the
system 7 laserwriter driver no longer leaves the laser prep information
in the printer. In other words, it's sent with every print job.

As a result, printing to just and printer shouldn't be a problem since it
no longer has to have the Macintosh initialization.

I print postscript files to a Postscript clone printer on our unix system
at school.  Before system 7, I used to have a lot of problems. Macps did
a nice job, but the system 7 drivers seem to handle making generic
postscript files a LOT better. (This has been my experience anyway).

- Chris


 
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elliott@veronica.cs.wisc.edu (James Elliott) (06/16/91)

People who do this kind of printing regularly may want to keep their
eyes open for StripFonts, a package I just posted to comp.sys.mac.archive
and comp.binaries.mac; it can greatly speed up the uploading of Mac
PostScript files by stripping out the fonts and ProcSets from them; a
library of these is gradually built up on the UNIX side so that each
font and ProcSet needs to be uploaded only once and then never again...

If the postings seem to be taking too long, you can also get at
StripFonts by anonymous ftp to my machine, veronica.cs.wisc.edu. Look
in the directory src/stripfonts.
--
Jim Elliott		      "Like a bridge he'll come between us, not a wall"
elliott@veronica.cs.wisc.edu