jbr@key.COM (Jeff Rubin) (12/18/90)
I have just put together the setup OzTeX -> Freedom of Press Light -> DeskWriter (with driver version 2). I printed the OzTeX manual (whose DVI file came with OzTeX 1.3) with OzTeX without any changes (it assumed a default paper size of A4). I ran the resulting postscript file into Freedom of Press Light 3.0 and output to the DeskWriter which contained 8 1/2" x 11" paper. Things looked reasonably good except that the printing started less than 1/8 " from the top of the paper. This greatly surprised me since the DeskWriter Owner's manual specifies the imageable area for a U.S. letter sized page to be 8" x 10.16". I believe it leaves equal space at the top and bottom, so it shouldn't have been able to print within the top 0.42" of the page. The imageable area for an A4 sized page leaves an even greater top margin. I called HP's tech support and asked how this could happen and all they could suggest is that somehow a "suppress perforation skip" command was being issued. According to this representative, HP does not offer a programmer's manual for the DeskWriter. I have not yet called Freedom of Press' publisher. Can anyone guess how this was accomplished? Does Freedom of Press use the DeskWriter driver or does it bypass it? Is it possible to make other programs (e.g., Word) print closer to the top of the page? -- Jeff -------------------------------------------------------------------------- jbr@amdahl.key.com ..!amdahl!key!jbr
jack@Taffy.rice.edu (Jack W. Howarth) (12/18/90)
In article <2348@key.COM> jbr@key.com () writes: >I have just put together the setup OzTeX -> Freedom of Press Light -> >DeskWriter (with driver version 2). I printed the OzTeX manual (whose >DVI file came with OzTeX 1.3) with OzTeX without any changes (it assumed >a default paper size of A4). I ran the resulting postscript file into >Freedom of Press Light 3.0 and output to the DeskWriter which contained >8 1/2" x 11" paper. Things looked reasonably good except that the printing >started less than 1/8 " from the top of the paper. > >This greatly surprised me since the DeskWriter Owner's manual specifies >the imageable area for a U.S. letter sized page to be 8" x 10.16". I >believe it leaves equal space at the top and bottom, so it shouldn't >have been able to print within the top 0.42" of the page. The imageable >area for an A4 sized page leaves an even greater top margin. > >I called HP's tech support and asked how this could happen and all they >could suggest is that somehow a "suppress perforation skip" command >was being issued. According to this representative, HP does not offer >a programmer's manual for the DeskWriter. > >I have not yet called Freedom of Press' publisher. > >Can anyone guess how this was accomplished? Does Freedom of Press use >the DeskWriter driver or does it bypass it? Is it possible to make other >programs (e.g., Word) print closer to the top of the page? > >-- Jeff >-------------------------------------------------------------------------- >jbr@amdahl.key.com >...!amdahl!key!jbr Jeff, I believe that FOP 3.0 has a bug in one of the PS init files which can be fixed by correcting it. Contact FOP's publisher. Jack Howarth
robertt@hp-vcd.HP.COM (Bob Taylor) (12/20/90)
The DeskWriter driver limits letter sized paper to 8" (.5" top margin and .5" bottom margin) so that programs that center to the imageable area of the page (most notably PowerPoint) have centered output on the DeskWriter. The mechanism can actually print up to about 1/10" from the top of the page. FOP, depending on how it is configured, may or may not be using the HP DeskWriter driver. My guess is that in your case, it isn't, hence the problem. The reason the HP DW driver makes this limit is that the printer can not physically print on the bottom half inch of the page. In the Mac environment, we had to make a choice - either have a symmetrical imageable area and have documents from all apps. center correctly (which we chose) or to have an assymetrical imageable area and allow printing higher than .5" on the page. bob taylor HP Vancouver
stevem@hp-vcd.HP.COM (Steve Miller) (12/20/90)
>FOP, depending on how it is configured, may or may not be using the HP >DeskWriter driver. Correct, Freedom Of The Press drives the DeskWriter directly and therefor, fully controls how and where data (ie dots) are placed on the page. Steven Miller Vancouver Division Hewlett Packard
john@newave.UUCP (John A. Weeks III) (12/20/90)
In article <2348@key.COM> jbr@key.com () writes: > I have just put together the setup OzTeX -> Freedom of Press Light -> > DeskWriter (with driver version 2). BTW, I just bought Freedom Of The Press Light based upon the net discussion a few weeks back. Running on an Epson EPL-6000, it seems to work really well, and the output quality is much better than the MacPrint 1.2 driver (in LaserJet emulation mode). Only drawback is that I have to break down an buy a meg of RAM for the printer. It occasionally gives me a memory error in high definition mode about 3/4 of the way down the page. The automatic printing is a bit of a kluge--you have to fool the Chooser into thinking that you have an AppleTalk LaserWriter. And since the EPL-6000 driver only works with the modem port, AppleTalk usage is out (I don't need AppleTalk, but some users might). I printed a few things using Command-K, and a few more things that I saved from comp.lang.postscript, and everything seemed to print as expected. Most files took about 1.5 minutes to print (using a IIsi), although a few of the small examples printed in 20 seconds and one example with lots of fonts seemed to take about 5 minutes for the first page. If you like to hack around with postscript and occasionally want to print very high quality documents, I recomend FOP-Light. Because of the speed factor, it wouldn't work well in a production environment. But for those of us who cannot afford a postscript printer... -john- -- =============================================================================== John A. Weeks III (612) 942-6969 john@newave.mn.org NeWave Communications ...uunet!rosevax!tcnet!wd0gol!newave!john ===============================================================================