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From: y0001415@ws.rz.tu-bs.de (Martin Butkus)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: Printing on a DeskJet from FreeBSD
Date: 21 Sep 1995 07:30:50 GMT
Organization: TU Braunschweig, Germany
Lines: 56
Distribution: world
Message-ID: <Y0001415.95Sep21093050@malibu.ts.rz.tu-bs.de>
References: <43n7o2$1c1@gap.cco.caltech.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: rznb12.rz.tu-bs.de
In-reply-to: stan@bombay.gps.caltech.edu's message of 19 Sep 1995 20:04:18 GMT
Hi!
>>>>> """ == "Stan" <stan@bombay.gps.caltech.edu> writes:
In article <43n7o2$1c1@gap.cco.caltech.edu> stan@bombay.gps.caltech.edu ("Stan") writes:
"> there a way to get nicer output from it? [I wish I could do Postscript,
"> since I know how to use groff, but it's not possible with this printer.] I
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Install ghostscript, a free postscript interpreter. It's in the packages
and in the ports collection too (I think).
For printing I use apsfilter from
ftp://ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/pub/Linux/local/packs/APSfilter with my
HP DJ 520 and it works just fine! Don't be embarrassed by the "Linux" in the
path. You'll need ghostscript though. It uses MANY filters if they are
present on your system to print LOTS of different file formats correctly
(including DVI, Postscript and various graphics formats) just by saying "lpr
foo.bar". For a Deskjet, it will set up /etc/printcap correctly and all that
stuff.
"> looked at the man pages for dvi2xx, which said it could convert TeX dvi
"> files to PCL, but I couldn't get any useful output this way. I don't know
"> if I'm just barking up the wrong tree or what. What I tried was something
"> like:
"> # groff -Tdvi <my_input_file | dvi2lj2 > file.pcl
^^^^^^^
You mean dvilj2? I haven't found a dvi2lj2 in the TeX package. The correct
syntax for dvilj2 is "dvilj2 file.dvi" which produces "file.lj" WITHOUT
writing anything to stdout. You can't use it as a pipe. I've tried using
dvilj2 myself and it produces garbage on the DeskJet. I have the impression
that the driver tries to download the TeX fonts and then prints normal ascii
text. Maybe the download fails due to the memory constrains of the DJ (~40K
of mem) but that's just a guess. This is the output of my test run:
bash$ dvilj2 example.dvi
[1] [2]
All done, used font_storage of HP LaserJet II: 158272 Bytes
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Dynamically allocated storage: 94521 Bytes
231 characters downloaded as soft fonts
Time of complete run: 0.68 seconds, 2 page(s), 0.34 seconds/page (177.46 ppm)
158K > 40K :-|. Maybe someone who knows better could comment on this.
--
Martin Butkus >>> Live long and prosper. <<<
Phone/Fax: +49.5331.298710
Am Stadtwege 10, 38304 Wolfenbuettel, Germany