[comp.sys.amiga.tech] V1.3 Printer Drivers

daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) (03/29/88)

	No V1.3 drivers have been posted to comp.amiga.binaries!!!!!
The drivers posted there are V1.2 versions of the V1.3 drivers.  This means
that they are slower than their V1.3 counterparts BUT they work with the
V1.2 driver.  I posted them as a service to the Amiga community as these
are drivers that are unavailable under V1.2.  The drivers posted were:
HP_PaintJet, EpsonQ, Xerox_4020, and Okidata_293I.

	Purchasers of Shakespeare or ProWrite2.0 have the V1.3 device and
drivers as these products are shipping with a gamma version.

	The V1.3 upgrade pak (or whatever we decide to call it) will
hopefully be available in the near future (May ???).

	This posting is in responce to the INCORRECT posting that the
drivers in comp.amiga.binaries are V1.3 drivers.

	Thank-you for your support!  Regards, David Berezowski

sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) (03/31/88)

Posting-Front-End: GNU Emacs 18.47.1 of Sun Aug  2 1987 on linus (berkeley-unix)



In article <3544@cbmvax.UUCP> daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) writes:

> 	Purchasers of Shakespeare or ProWrite2.0 have the V1.3 device and
> drivers as these products are shipping with a gamma version.
> 
> 	The V1.3 upgrade pak (or whatever we decide to call it) will
> hopefully be available in the near future (May ???).

For those of us who have the gamma versions from ProWrite2.0 or
Shakespeare, would it be possible for someone to post docs on the new
capabilities of the 1.3 drivers?  ProWrite 2.0 came with a new version
of Preferences that shows a whole bunch of new options for printing,
but unfortunately the ProWrite manual didn't document all of them.


Steven Litvintchouk
MITRE Corporation
Burlington Road
Bedford, MA  01730

Fone:  (617)271-7753
ARPA:  sdl@mitre-bedford.arpa
UUCP:  ...{cbosgd,decvax,genrad,ll-xn,mit-eddie,philabs,utzoo}!linus!sdl

	"Those who will be able to conquer software will be able to
	 conquer the world."  -- Tadahiro Sekimoto, president, NEC Corp.

papa@pollux.usc.edu (Marco Papa) (03/31/88)

In article <28116@linus.UUCP| sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) writes:
|In article <3544@cbmvax.UUCP| daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) writes:
|| 	Purchasers of Shakespeare or ProWrite2.0 have the V1.3 device and
|| drivers as these products are shipping with a gamma version.
|| 	The V1.3 upgrade pak (or whatever we decide to call it) will
|| hopefully be available in the near future (May ???).
|
|For those of us who have the gamma versions from ProWrite2.0 or
|Shakespeare, would it be possible for someone to post docs on the new
|capabilities of the 1.3 drivers?  ProWrite 2.0 came with a new version
|of Preferences that shows a whole bunch of new options for printing,
|but unfortunately the ProWrite manual didn't document all of them.

Until the 1.3 Upgrade Pak becomes available, the best docs are included in the
latest AmigaMail (Jan/Feb 88).

-- Marco Papa

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
uucp:...!pollux!papa       BIX:papa       ARPAnet:pollux!papa@oberon.usc.edu

 "There's Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Diga!" -- Leo Schwab [quoting Rick Unland]
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) (04/01/88)

In article <28116@linus.UUCP> sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) writes:
>For those of us who have the gamma versions from ProWrite2.0 or
>Shakespeare, would it be possible for someone to post docs on the new
>capabilities of the 1.3 drivers? 

Well, I have Shakespeare (which is a great program for page layout) and 
have been playing with the 1.3 drivers for both Shakespeare and Deluxe
Paint II. The good news is that from now on there is zero problem in 
getting any deluxe paint picture to print the way you expect it to on
the printer. Using Deluxe Paint in 960 X 600 mono gives me crisp 1:1
printouts on the Epson FX-286e (half page) (full page would be 960 X 1200
which the printer.device can handle but Dpaint can't). I usually do
my own dithering as well. Since the Epson is printing at 240 DPI the actual
pixels being printed are 2 X 2 pixels. And if you choose 'Anti-Aliasing'
it can improve on the diagonals a bit too. Shakespeare gives me the best
combined text and image outputs on my printer. Some of this is attributable
to the new printer device and thus *any* page layout program will benefit.

I think that if you were one of those people complaining that your friends
'Mac' printouts on the ImageWriter looked better than anything you could
do on the Amiga you will be pleasantly suprised at the turn about. You
see the ImageWrite is stuck at 80 DPI or some such number, whereas the
Amiga will print at what ever resolution you can send to the printer. 
In many cases this will be higher than 80 DPI.


--Chuck McManis
uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis   BIX: cmcmanis  ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com
These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.

daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) (04/03/88)

In article <28116@linus.UUCP> sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) writes:
>
>For those of us who have the gamma versions from ProWrite2.0 or
>Shakespeare, would it be possible for someone to post docs on the new
>capabilities of the 1.3 drivers?  ProWrite 2.0 came with a new version
>of Preferences that shows a whole bunch of new options for printing,
>but unfortunately the ProWrite manual didn't document all of them.
>

                V1.3 Preferences (Preliminary)
                ----------------

	The new Preferences program has a 2nd printer graphic screen.
The gadgets and their descriptions are as follows:

Gadget      Description
------      -----------

Density   1-7 - the user density is SPECIAL_DENSITY1 thru SPECIAL_DENSITY7
                and it OVERRIDES whatever density the application program
                has selected.  You can use this to assure a certain
                density.  The lower the density the faster the print times
                (on those printers with multiple densities).

Center Image    turns on/off horizontal centering of the picture on the
                paper.  This options overrides the Left Offset value.

Scaling     Fraction - normal scaling (default).
            Integer  - every dot on the screen is guarenteed to appear as an
                       even number of dots on the printer both in the x and
                       y dimension.  ie. if your source picture is 320x200,
                       the printed picture width will be either 320, 640,
                       960, etc. dots wide and 200, 400, 600, etc. dots
                       high.  THIS IS THE OPTION TO USE WHEN YOU ARE TRYING
                       TO PRINT A PICTURE THAT CONTAINS THIN VERTICAL AND
                       HORIZONTAL LINES (LIKE A GRID).  The actual size of
                       the printed picture will be the size you asked for
                       scaled up/down to the nearest multipe of the width
                       and height of the picture.  When you do this you
                       completely override the aspecting feature of the
                       printer device.  ie. it is possible to get a
                       (slightly) distorted (non aspect ratio correct)
                       picture.  THIS OPTION IS ALSO USEFULL IF YOU ARE
                       PRINTING OUT BIT-IMAGE TEXT (LIKE IN NOTEPAD) AS
                       THE FONTS WONT BE DISTORTED DUE TO FRACTIONAL SCALING.

Color Correction - this option selectively tries to match all shades of
                   either red (R), green (G), or blue (B) from the screen
                   to the printer.  Initially the printer device can
                   print all the 4096 colors of the Amiga on a printer.
                   However, as color correction is applied the total
                   number of printed colors is reduced to a low of 3172.
                   To see the effect of this option, print out a picture
                   with solid red, green, and blue shades twice, once
                   with this option on, and once with it off.  Now compare
                   the two pictures with the screen display; the results
                   should be obvious.

LeftOffset         - offsets the printed picture horizontally in increments
                   of tenths of an inch.  The 'Center Image' option (above)
                   disables this option.

Dithering       Ordered - color intensities on the printer are formed using
                          an 'ordered' dither method.  This is the default.
                HalfTone - color intensities on the printer are formed
                           using a 'halftone' dither method.  This
                           technique is similar to the one used in
                           newspapers and comic books and works best on
                           high density printers (> 150 dots/inch).
                F/S - color intensities on the printer are formed using the
                      'Floyd-Steinberg' error distribution method.  This
                      option (currently) slows down the printing by a factor
                      of two as it has to analyse each pixel before printing.
                      Note that this option automatically turns off
                      smoothing as they can not be used in conjunction
                      with each other.

MaxWidth        - limits the width of the printed picture in tenths / inch.
MaxHeight       - limits the height of the printed picture in tenths / inch.
<-Limits->      - this gadget determines how the above 'limits' are to be
                  interpreted as follow:
                IGNORE - the limits are to be IGNORED.  The printed picture's
                         size is bounded by the old standbye of:
                         width = 
                         (right margin - left margin + 1) / chars per inch.
                         height = 
                         lines per page / lines per inch.
                         This option is here to remain compatible with
                         pre V1.3 software and is the default.
                BOUNDED - the printed picture's size is BOUNDED by
                          MaxWidth and MaxHeight.  ie. if you want the
                          printed picture to be no bigger than 4 x 5
                          (but it could be smaller), set MaxWidth to 40,
                          MaxHeight to 50, and select BOUNDED.  This option
                          is here so that you don't have to change the
                          text settings (margins, lines per page, etc.)
                          everytime you do a graphic print.
                ABSOLUTE - MaxWidth and MaxHeight are taken to be ABSOLUTE
                           values.  The printed picture's size is no
                           longer bounded rather it will absolutely be
                           the size specified here.  ie. If you want the
                           printed picture to be exactly 4.0 x 5.0 inches;
                           set MaxWidth to 40, MaxWidth to 50, and select
                           ABSOLUTE.  When you do this you completely
                           override the aspecting feature of the printer
                           device.  ie. it is possible to get a (very)
                           distorted (non aspect ratio correct) picture.
                           Setting one (but not both) of the dimensions to
                           zero aspect ratio corrects that dimension. ie.
                           If you set MaxWidth to 40 and MaxHeight to 0,
                           then the printed picture will be 4.0 inches wide
                           and as tall as it needs to be in order to be
                           aspect ratio correct.  If both of the dimensions
                           are zero then the printed picture will be the
                           printer's maximum dots wide and as tall as it
                           needs to be in order to be aspect ratio correct.
                PIXELS - MaxWidth and MaxHeight are taken to be absolute
                         values in printer PIXELS and not tenths of an inch!
                         The same rules for 'ABSOLUTE' (MaxWidth = 0 and
                         MaxHeight = 0) apply here.
              MULTIPLY - MaxWidth and MaxHeight are used to MULTIPLY the
                         source picture's width and height.  ie. If you
                         specified a MaxWidth of 2 and a MaxHeight of 4,
                         the printed picture would be 2x the source picture's
                         width pixels wide and 4x the source picture's
                         height pixels high.  Thus if the source picture
                         were 320 x 200, the printed picture would be
                         640 (320 x 2) pixels wide and 800 (200 x 4) pixels
                         high.  The same rules for 'ABSOLUTE' (MaxWidth = 0
                         and MaxHeight = 0) apply here.  Ths same benefits
                         that apply to INTEGER scaling are valid here.

Smoothing       - attempts to smooth diagonal lines.  This option (currently)
                  slows down the printing by a factor of two as it has to 
                  analyze each pixel (and its closest neighbours) before
                  printing.  This option is best suited for use with programs
                  that do graphic dumps of text (like ProWrite, PageSetter,
                  CityDesk, Publisher 1000, NotePad, etc.).
                  Note that this option automatically turns off
                  Floyd-Steinberg dithering (and selects Ordered dithering)
                  as they can not be used in conjunction with each other.


	Regards, David Berezowski

sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) (04/05/88)

Posting-Front-End: GNU Emacs 18.47.1 of Sun Aug  2 1987 on linus (berkeley-unix)



In article <3566@cbmvax.UUCP> daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) writes:

> 
> 		V1.3 Preferences (Preliminary)
> 		----------------
>     [ rest of article deleted]
> 
> 	Regards, David Berezowski

Thanx, David, that was very helpful!

By the way, the latest issue of "Amiga Sentry" has an article on
some of the new features of Workbench 1.3 (including the new printer
drivers).  

Steven Litvintchouk
MITRE Corporation
Burlington Road
Bedford, MA  01730

Fone:  (617)271-7753
ARPA:  sdl@mitre-bedford.arpa
UUCP:  ...{cbosgd,decvax,genrad,ll-xn,mit-eddie,philabs,utzoo}!linus!sdl

	"Those who will be able to conquer software will be able to
	 conquer the world."  -- Tadahiro Sekimoto, president, NEC Corp.

daveb@cbmvax.UUCP (Dave Berezowski) (04/07/88)

In article <28403@linus.UUCP> sdl@linus.UUCP (Steven D. Litvintchouk) writes:
>
>By the way, the latest issue of "Amiga Sentry" has an article on
>some of the new features of Workbench 1.3 (including the new printer
>drivers).  
>
	Yes, but bear in mind that they were looking at a pre-release
version. (more minor goodies in store, hint, hint).