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1 *print.txt* For Vim version 7.2. Last change: 2008 Apr 30
4 VIM REFERENCE MANUAL by Bram Moolenaar
7 Printing *printing*
9 1. Introduction |print-intro|
10 2. Print options |print-options|
11 3. PostScript Printing |postscript-printing|
12 4. PostScript Printing Encoding |postscript-print-encoding|
13 5. PostScript CJK Printing |postscript-cjk-printing|
14 6. PostScript Printing Troubleshooting |postscript-print-trouble|
15 7. PostScript Utilities |postscript-print-util|
16 8. Formfeed Characters |printing-formfeed|
18 {Vi has None of this}
19 {only available when compiled with the |+printer| feature}
21 ==============================================================================
22 1. Introduction *print-intro*
24 On MS-Windows Vim can print your text on any installed printer. On other
25 systems a PostScript file is produced. This can be directly sent to a
26 PostScript printer. For other printers a program like ghostscript needs to be
27 used.
29 Note: If you have problems printing with |:hardcopy|, an alternative is to use
30 |:TOhtml| and print the resulting html file from a browser.
32 *:ha* *:hardcopy* *E237* *E238* *E324*
33 :[range]ha[rdcopy][!] [arguments]
34 Send [range] lines (default whole file) to the
35 printer.
37 On MS-Windows a dialog is displayed to allow selection
38 of printer, paper size etc. To skip the dialog, use
39 the [!]. In this case the printer defined by
40 'printdevice' is used, or, if 'printdevice' is empty,
41 the system default printer.
43 For systems other than MS-Windows, PostScript is
44 written in a temp file and 'printexpr' is used to
45 actually print it. Then [arguments] can be used by
46 'printexpr' through |v:cmdarg|. Otherwise [arguments]
47 is ignored. 'printoptions' can be used to specify
48 paper size, duplex, etc.
50 :[range]ha[rdcopy][!] >{filename}
51 As above, but write the resulting PostScript in file
52 {filename}.
53 Things like "%" are expanded |cmdline-special|
54 Careful: An existing file is silently overwritten.
55 {only available when compiled with the |+postscript|
56 feature}
57 On MS-Windows use the "print to file" feature of the
58 printer driver.
60 Progress is displayed during printing as a page number and a percentage. To
61 abort printing use the interrupt key (CTRL-C or, on MS-systems, CTRL-Break).
63 Printer output is controlled by the 'printfont' and 'printoptions' options.
64 'printheader' specifies the format of a page header.
66 The printed file is always limited to the selected margins, irrespective of
67 the current window's 'wrap' or 'linebreak' settings. The "wrap" item in
68 'printoptions' can be used to switch wrapping off.
69 The current highlighting colors are used in the printout, with the following
70 considerations:
71 1) The normal background is always rendered as white (i.e. blank paper).
72 2) White text or the default foreground is rendered as black, so that it shows
73 up!
74 3) If 'background' is "dark", then the colours are darkened to compensate for
75 the fact that otherwise they would be too bright to show up clearly on
76 white paper.
78 ==============================================================================
79 2. Print options *print-options*
81 Here are the details for the options that change the way printing is done.
82 For generic info about setting options see |options.txt|.
84 *pdev-option*
85 'printdevice' 'pdev' string (default empty)
86 global
87 This defines the name of the printer to be used when the |:hardcopy| command
88 is issued with a bang (!) to skip the printer selection dialog. On Win32, it
89 should be the printer name exactly as it appears in the standard printer
90 dialog.
91 If the option is empty, then vim will use the system default printer for
92 ":hardcopy!"
94 *penc-option* *E620*
95 'printencoding' 'penc' String (default empty, except for:
96 Windows, OS/2: cp1252,
97 Macintosh: mac-roman,
98 VMS: dec-mcs,
99 HPUX: hp-roman8,
100 EBCDIC: ebcdic-uk)
101 global
102 Sets the character encoding used when printing. This option tells VIM which
103 print character encoding file from the "print" directory in 'runtimepath' to
104 use.
106 This option will accept any value from |encoding-names|. Any recognized names
107 are converted to VIM standard names - see 'encoding' for more details. Names
108 not recognized by VIM will just be converted to lower case and underscores
109 replaced with '-' signs.
111 If 'printencoding' is empty or VIM cannot find the file then it will use
112 'encoding' (if VIM is compiled with |+multi_byte| and it is set an 8-bit
113 encoding) to find the print character encoding file. If VIM is unable to find
114 a character encoding file then it will use the "latin1" print character
115 encoding file.
117 When 'encoding' is set to a multi-byte encoding, VIM will try to convert
118 characters to the printing encoding for printing (if 'printencoding' is empty
119 then the conversion will be to latin1). Conversion to a printing encoding
120 other than latin1 will require VIM to be compiled with the |+iconv| feature.
121 If no conversion is possible then printing will fail. Any characters that
122 cannot be converted will be replaced with upside down question marks.
124 Four print character encoding files are provided to support default Mac, VMS,
125 HPUX, and EBCDIC character encodings and are used by default on these
126 platforms. Code page 1252 print character encoding is used by default on
127 Windows and OS/2 platforms.
129 *pexpr-option*
130 'printexpr' 'pexpr' String (default: see below)
131 global
132 Expression that is evaluated to print the PostScript produced with
133 |:hardcopy|.
134 The file name to be printed is in |v:fname_in|.
135 The arguments to the ":hardcopy" command are in |v:cmdarg|.
136 The expression must take care of deleting the file after printing it.
137 When there is an error, the expression must return a non-zero number.
138 If there is no error, return zero or an empty string.
139 The default for non MS-Windows or VMS systems is to simply use "lpr" to print
140 the file: >
142 system('lpr' . (&printdevice == '' ? '' : ' -P' . &printdevice)
143 . ' ' . v:fname_in) . delete(v:fname_in) + v:shell_error
145 On MS-Dos, MS-Windows and OS/2 machines the default is to copy the file to the
146 currently specified printdevice: >
148 system('copy' . ' ' . v:fname_in . (&printdevice == ''
149 ? ' LPT1:' : (' \"' . &printdevice . '\"')))
150 . delete(v:fname_in)
152 On VMS machines the default is to send the file to either the default or
153 currently specified printdevice: >
155 system('print' . (&printdevice == '' ? '' : ' /queue=' .
156 &printdevice) . ' ' . v:fname_in) . delete(v:fname_in)
158 If you change this option, using a function is an easy way to avoid having to
159 escape all the spaces. Example: >
161 :set printexpr=PrintFile(v:fname_in)
162 :function PrintFile(fname)
163 : call system("ghostview " . a:fname)
164 : call delete(a:fname)
165 : return v:shell_error
166 :endfunc
168 Be aware that some print programs return control before they have read the
169 file. If you delete the file too soon it will not be printed. These programs
170 usually offer an option to have them remove the file when printing is done.
171 *E365*
172 If evaluating the expression fails or it results in a non-zero number, you get
173 an error message. In that case Vim will delete the file. In the default
174 value for non-MS-Windows a trick is used: Adding "v:shell_error" will result
175 in a non-zero number when the system() call fails.
177 This option cannot be set from a |modeline| or in the |sandbox|, for security
178 reasons.
180 *pfn-option* *E613*
181 'printfont' 'pfn' string (default "courier")
182 global
183 This is the name of the font that will be used for the |:hardcopy| command's
184 output. It has the same format as the 'guifont' option, except that only one
185 font may be named, and the special "guifont=*" syntax is not available.
187 In the Win32 GUI version this specifies a font name with its extra attributes,
188 as with the 'guifont' option.
190 For other systems, only ":h11" is recognized, where "11" is the point size of
191 the font. When omitted, the point size is 10.
193 *pheader-option*
194 'printheader' 'pheader' string (default "%<%f%h%m%=Page %N")
195 global
196 This defines the format of the header produced in |:hardcopy| output. The
197 option is defined in the same way as the 'statusline' option. If Vim has not
198 been compiled with the |+statusline| feature, this option has no effect and a
199 simple default header is used, which shows the page number. The same simple
200 header is used when this option is empty.
202 *pmbcs-option*
203 'printmbcharset' 'pmbcs' string (default "")
204 global
205 Sets the CJK character set to be used when generating CJK output from
206 |:hardcopy|. The following predefined values are currently recognised by VIM:
208 Value Description ~
209 Chinese GB_2312-80
210 (Simplified) GBT_12345-90
211 MAC Apple Mac Simplified Chinese
212 GBT-90_MAC GB/T 12345-90 Apple Mac Simplified
213 Chinese
214 GBK GBK (GB 13000.1-93)
215 ISO10646 ISO 10646-1:1993
217 Chinese CNS_1993 CNS 11643-1993, Planes 1 & 2
218 (Traditional) BIG5
219 ETEN Big5 with ETen extensions
220 ISO10646 ISO 10646-1:1993
222 Japanese JIS_C_1978
223 JIS_X_1983
224 JIS_X_1990
225 MSWINDOWS Win3.1/95J (JIS X 1997 + NEC +
226 IBM extensions)
227 KANJITALK6 Apple Mac KanjiTalk V6.x
228 KANJITALK7 Apple Mac KanjiTalk V7.x
230 Korean KS_X_1992
231 MAC Apple Macintosh Korean
232 MSWINDOWS KS X 1992 with MS extensions
233 ISO10646 ISO 10646-1:1993
235 Only certain combinations of the above values and 'printencoding' are
236 possible. The following tables show the valid combinations:
238 euc-cn gbk ucs-2 utf-8 ~
239 Chinese GB_2312-80 x
240 (Simplified) GBT_12345-90 x
241 MAC x
242 GBT-90_MAC x
243 GBK x
244 ISO10646 x x
246 euc-tw big5 ucs-2 utf-8 ~
247 Chinese CNS_1993 x
248 (Traditional) BIG5 x
249 ETEN x
250 ISO10646 x x
252 euc-jp sjis ucs-2 utf-8 ~
253 Japanese JIS_C_1978 x x
254 JIS_X_1983 x x
255 JIS_X_1990 x x x
256 MSWINDOWS x
257 KANJITALK6 x
258 KANJITALK7 x
260 euc-kr cp949 ucs-2 utf-8 ~
261 Korean KS_X_1992 x
262 MAC x
263 MSWINDOWS x
264 ISO10646 x x
266 To set up the correct encoding and character set for printing some
267 Japanese text you would do the following; >
268 :set printencoding=euc-jp
269 :set printmbcharset=JIS_X_1983
271 If 'printmbcharset' is not one of the above values then it is assumed to
272 specify a custom multi-byte character set and no check will be made that it is
273 compatible with the value for 'printencoding'. VIM will look for a file
274 defining the character set in the "print" directory in 'runtimepath'.
276 *pmbfn-option*
277 'printmbfont' 'pmbfn' string (default "")
278 global
279 This is a comma-separated list of fields for font names to be used when
280 generating CJK output from |:hardcopy|. Each font name has to be preceded
281 with a letter indicating the style the font is to be used for as follows:
283 r:{font-name} font to use for normal characters
284 b:{font-name} font to use for bold characters
285 i:{font-name} font to use for italic characters
286 o:{font-name} font to use for bold-italic characters
288 A field with the r: prefix must be specified when doing CJK printing. The
289 other fontname specifiers are optional. If a specifier is missing then
290 another font will be used as follows:
292 if b: is missing, then use r:
293 if i: is missing, then use r:
294 if o: is missing, then use b:
296 Some CJK fonts do not contain characters for codes in the ASCII code range.
297 Also, some characters in the CJK ASCII code ranges differ in a few code points
298 from traditional ASCII characters. There are two additional fields to control
299 printing of characters in the ASCII code range.
301 c:yes Use Courier font for characters in the ASCII
302 c:no (default) code range.
304 a:yes Use ASCII character set for codes in the ASCII
305 a:no (default) code range.
307 The following is an example of specifying two multi-byte fonts, one for normal
308 and italic printing and one for bold and bold-italic printing, and using
309 Courier to print codes in the ASCII code range but using the national
310 character set: >
311 :set printmbfont=r:WadaMin-Regular,b:WadaMin-Bold,c:yes
312 <
313 *popt-option*
314 'printoptions' 'popt' string (default "")
315 global
316 This is a comma-separated list of items that control the format of the output
317 of |:hardcopy|:
319 left:{spec} left margin (default: 10pc)
320 right:{spec} right margin (default: 5pc)
321 top:{spec} top margin (default: 5pc)
322 bottom:{spec} bottom margin (default: 5pc)
323 {spec} is a number followed by "in" for inches, "pt"
324 for points (1 point is 1/72 of an inch), "mm" for
325 millimeters or "pc" for a percentage of the media
326 size.
327 Weird example:
328 left:2in,top:30pt,right:16mm,bottom:3pc
329 If the unit is not recognized there is no error and
330 the default value is used.
332 header:{nr} Number of lines to reserve for the header.
333 Only the first line is actually filled, thus when {nr}
334 is 2 there is one empty line. The header is formatted
335 according to 'printheader'.
336 header:0 Do not print a header.
337 header:2 (default) Use two lines for the header
339 syntax:n Do not use syntax highlighting. This is faster and
340 thus useful when printing large files.
341 syntax:y Do syntax highlighting.
342 syntax:a (default) Use syntax highlighting if the printer appears to be
343 able to print color or grey.
345 number:y Include line numbers in the printed output.
346 number:n (default) No line numbers.
348 wrap:y (default) Wrap long lines.
349 wrap:n Truncate long lines.
351 duplex:off Print on one side.
352 duplex:long (default) Print on both sides (when possible), bind on long
353 side.
354 duplex:short Print on both sides (when possible), bind on short
355 side.
357 collate:y (default) Collating: 1 2 3, 1 2 3, 1 2 3
358 collate:n No collating: 1 1 1, 2 2 2, 3 3 3
360 jobsplit:n (default) Do all copies in one print job
361 jobsplit:y Do each copy as a separate print job. Useful when
362 doing N-up postprocessing.
364 portrait:y (default) Orientation is portrait.
365 portrait:n Orientation is landscape.
366 *a4* *letter*
367 paper:A4 (default) Paper size: A4
368 paper:{name} Paper size from this table:
369 {name} size in cm size in inch ~
370 10x14 25.4 x 35.57 10 x 14
371 A3 29.7 x 42 11.69 x 16.54
372 A4 21 x 29.7 8.27 x 11.69
373 A5 14.8 x 21 5.83 x 8.27
374 B4 25 x 35.3 10.12 x 14.33
375 B5 17.6 x 25 7.17 x 10.12
376 executive 18.42 x 26.67 7.25 x 10.5
377 folio 21 x 33 8.27 x 13
378 ledger 43.13 x 27.96 17 x 11
379 legal 21.59 x 35.57 8.5 x 14
380 letter 21.59 x 27.96 8.5 x 11
381 quarto 21.59 x 27.5 8.5 x 10.83
382 statement 13.97 x 21.59 5.5 x 8.5
383 tabloid 27.96 x 43.13 11 x 17
385 formfeed:n (default) Treat form feed characters (0x0c) as a normal print
386 character.
387 formfeed:y When a form feed character is encountered, continue
388 printing of the current line at the beginning of the
389 first line on a new page.
391 The item indicated with (default) is used when the item is not present. The
392 values are not always used, especially when using a dialog to select the
393 printer and options.
394 Example: >
395 :set printoptions=paper:letter,duplex:off
397 ==============================================================================
398 3. PostScript Printing *postscript-printing*
399 *E455* *E456* *E457* *E624*
400 Provided you have enough disk space there should be no problems generating a
401 PostScript file. You need to have the runtime files correctly installed (if
402 you can find the help files, they probably are).
404 There are currently a number of limitations with PostScript printing:
406 - 'printfont' - The font name is ignored (the Courier family is always used -
407 it should be available on all PostScript printers) but the font size is
408 used.
410 - 'printoptions' - The duplex setting is used when generating PostScript
411 output, but it is up to the printer to take notice of the setting. If the
412 printer does not support duplex printing then it should be silently ignored.
413 Some printers, however, don't print at all.
415 - 8-bit support - While a number of 8-bit print character encodings are
416 supported it is possible that some characters will not print. Whether a
417 character will print depends on the font in the printer knowing the
418 character. Missing characters will be replaced with an upside down question
419 mark, or a space if that character is also not known by the font. It may be
420 possible to get all the characters in an encoding to print by installing a
421 new version of the Courier font family.
423 - Multi-byte support - Currently VIM will try to convert multi-byte characters
424 to the 8-bit encoding specified by 'printencoding' (or latin1 if it is
425 empty). Any characters that are not successfully converted are shown as
426 unknown characters. Printing will fail if VIM cannot convert the multi-byte
427 to the 8-bit encoding.
429 ==============================================================================
430 4. Custom 8-bit Print Character Encodings *postscript-print-encoding*
431 *E618* *E619*
432 To use your own print character encoding when printing 8-bit character data
433 you need to define your own PostScript font encoding vector. Details on how
434 to define a font encoding vector is beyond the scope of this help file, but
435 you can find details in the PostScript Language Reference Manual, 3rd Edition,
436 published by Addison-Wesley and available in PDF form at
437 http://www.adobe.com/. The following describes what you need to do for VIM to
438 locate and use your print character encoding.
440 i. Decide on a unique name for your encoding vector, one that does not clash
441 with any of the recognized or standard encoding names that VIM uses (see
442 |encoding-names| for a list), and that no one else is likely to use.
443 ii. Copy $VIMRUNTIME/print/latin1.ps to the print subdirectory in your
444 'runtimepath' and rename it with your unique name.
445 iii. Edit your renamed copy of latin1.ps, replacing all occurrences of latin1
446 with your unique name (don't forget the line starting %%Title:), and
447 modify the array of glyph names to define your new encoding vector. The
448 array must have exactly 256 entries or you will not be able to print!
449 iv. Within VIM, set 'printencoding' to your unique encoding name and then
450 print your file. VIM will now use your custom print character encoding.
452 VIM will report an error with the resource file if you change the order or
453 content of the first 3 lines, other than the name of the encoding on the line
454 starting %%Title: or the version number on the line starting %%Version:.
456 [Technical explanation for those that know PostScript - VIM looks for a file
457 with the same name as the encoding it will use when printing. The file
458 defines a new PostScript Encoding resource called /VIM-name, where name is the
459 print character encoding VIM will use.]
461 ==============================================================================
462 5. PostScript CJK Printing *postscript-cjk-printing*
463 *E673* *E674* *E675*
465 VIM supports printing of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean files. Setting up VIM
466 to correctly print CJK files requires setting up a few more options.
468 Each of these countries has many standard character sets and encodings which
469 require that both be specified when printing. In addition, CJK fonts normally
470 do not have the concept of italic glyphs and use different weight or stroke
471 style to achieve emphasis when printing. This in turn requires a different
472 approach to specifying fonts to use when printing.
474 The encoding and character set are specified with the 'printencoding' and
475 'printmbcharset' options. If 'printencoding' is not specified then 'encoding'
476 is used as normal. If 'printencoding' is specified then characters will be
477 translated to this encoding for printing. You should ensure that the encoding
478 is compatible with the character set needed for the file contents or some
479 characters may not appear when printed.
481 The fonts to use for CJK printing are specified with 'printmbfont'. This
482 option allows you to specify different fonts to use when printing characters
483 which are syntax highlighted with the font styles normal, italic, bold and
484 bold-italic.
486 No CJK fonts are supplied with VIM. There are some free Korean, Japanese, and
487 Traditional Chinese fonts available at:
489 http://examples.oreilly.com/cjkvinfo/adobe/samples/
491 You can find descriptions of the various fonts in the read me file at
493 http://examples.oreilly.com/cjkvinfo/adobe/00README
495 Please read your printer documentation on how to install new fonts.
497 CJK fonts can be large containing several thousand glyphs, and it is not
498 uncommon to find that they only contain a subset of a national standard. It
499 is not unusual to find the fonts to not include characters for codes in the
500 ASCII code range. If you find half-width Roman characters are not appearing
501 in your printout then you should configure VIM to use the Courier font the
502 half-width ASCII characters with 'printmbfont'. If your font does not include
503 other characters then you will need to find another font that does.
505 Another issue with ASCII characters, is that the various national character
506 sets specify a couple of different glyphs in the ASCII code range. If you
507 print ASCII text using the national character set you may see some unexpected
508 characters. If you want true ASCII code printing then you need to configure
509 VIM to output ASCII characters for the ASCII code range with 'printmbfont'.
511 It is possible to define your own multi-byte character set although this
512 should not be attempted lightly. A discussion on the process if beyond the
513 scope of these help files. You can find details on CMap (character map) files
514 in the document 'Adobe CMap and CIDFont Files Specification, Version 1.0',
515 available from http://www.adobe.com as a PDF file.
517 ==============================================================================
518 6. PostScript Printing Troubleshooting *postscript-print-trouble*
519 *E621*
520 Usually the only sign of a problem when printing with PostScript is that your
521 printout does not appear. If you are lucky you may get a printed page that
522 tells you the PostScript operator that generated the error that prevented the
523 print job completing.
525 There are a number of possible causes as to why the printing may have failed:
527 - Wrong version of the prolog resource file. The prolog resource file
528 contains some PostScript that VIM needs to be able to print. Each version
529 of VIM needs one particular version. Make sure you have correctly installed
530 the runtime files, and don't have any old versions of a file called prolog
531 in the print directory in your 'runtimepath' directory.
533 - Paper size. Some PostScript printers will abort printing a file if they do
534 not support the requested paper size. By default VIM uses A4 paper. Find
535 out what size paper your printer normally uses and set the appropriate paper
536 size with 'printoptions'. If you cannot find the name of the paper used,
537 measure a sheet and compare it with the table of supported paper sizes listed
538 for 'printoptions', using the paper that is closest in both width AND height.
539 Note: The dimensions of actual paper may vary slightly from the ones listed.
540 If there is no paper listed close enough, then you may want to try psresize
541 from PSUtils, discussed below.
543 - Two-sided printing (duplex). Normally a PostScript printer that does not
544 support two-sided printing will ignore any request to do it. However, some
545 printers may abort the job altogether. Try printing with duplex turned off.
546 Note: Duplex prints can be achieved manually using PS utils - see below.
548 - Collated printing. As with Duplex printing, most PostScript printers that
549 do not support collating printouts will ignore a request to do so. Some may
550 not. Try printing with collation turned off.
552 - Syntax highlighting. Some print management code may prevent the generated
553 PostScript file from being printed on a black and white printer when syntax
554 highlighting is turned on, even if solid black is the only color used. Try
555 printing with syntax highlighting turned off.
557 A safe printoptions setting to try is: >
559 :set printoptions=paper:A4,duplex:off,collate:n,syntax:n
561 Replace "A4" with the paper size that best matches your printer paper.
563 ==============================================================================
564 7. PostScript Utilities *postscript-print-util*
566 7.1 Ghostscript
568 Ghostscript is a PostScript and PDF interpreter that can be used to display
569 and print on non-PostScript printers PostScript and PDF files. It can also
570 generate PDF files from PostScript.
572 Ghostscript will run on a wide variety of platforms.
574 There are three available versions:
576 - AFPL Ghostscript (formerly Aladdin Ghostscript) which is free for
577 non-commercial use. It can be obtained from:
579 http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/
581 - GNU Ghostscript which is available under the GNU General Public License. It
582 can be obtained from:
584 ftp://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/ghost/gnu/
586 - A commercial version for inclusion in commercial products.
588 Additional information on Ghostscript can also be found at:
590 http://www.ghostscript.com/
592 Support for a number of non PostScript printers is provided in the
593 distribution as standard, but if you cannot find support for your printer
594 check the Ghostscript site for other printers not included by default.
597 7.2 Ghostscript Previewers.
599 The interface to Ghostscript is very primitive so a number of graphical front
600 ends have been created. These allow easier PostScript file selection,
601 previewing at different zoom levels, and printing. Check supplied
602 documentation for full details.
604 X11
606 - Ghostview. Obtainable from:
608 http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/gv/
610 - gv. Derived from Ghostview. Obtainable from:
612 http://wwwthep.physik.uni-mainz.de/~plass/gv/
614 Copies (possibly not the most recent) can be found at:
616 http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/gv/
618 OpenVMS
620 - Is apparently supported in the main code now (untested). See:
622 http://wwwthep.physik.uni-mainz.de/~plass/gv/
624 Windows and OS/2
626 - GSview. Obtainable from:
628 http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/gsview/
630 DOS
632 - ps_view. Obtainable from:
634 ftp://ftp.pg.gda.pl/pub/TeX/support/ps_view/
635 ftp://ftp.dante.de/tex-archive/support/ps_view/
637 Linux
639 - GSview. Linux version of the popular Windows and OS/2 previewer.
640 Obtainable from:
642 http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/gsview/
644 - BMV. Different from Ghostview and gv in that it doesn't use X but svgalib.
645 Obtainable from:
647 ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/apps/graphics/viewers/svga/bmv-1.2.tgz
650 7.3 PSUtils
652 PSUtils is a collection of utility programs for manipulating PostScript
653 documents. Binary distributions are available for many platforms, as well as
654 the full source. PSUtils can be found at:
656 http://knackered.org/angus/psutils
658 The utilities of interest include:
660 - psnup. Convert PS files for N-up printing.
661 - psselect. Select page range and order of printing.
662 - psresize. Change the page size.
663 - psbook. Reorder and lay out pages ready for making a book.
665 The output of one program can be used as the input to the next, allowing for
666 complex print document creation.
669 N-UP PRINTING
671 The psnup utility takes an existing PostScript file generated from VIM and
672 convert it to an n-up version. The simplest way to create a 2-up printout is
673 to first create a PostScript file with: >
675 :hardcopy > test.ps
677 Then on your command line execute: >
679 psnup -n 2 test.ps final.ps
681 Note: You may get warnings from some Ghostscript previewers for files produced
682 by psnup - these may safely be ignored.
684 Finally print the file final.ps to your PostScript printer with your
685 platform's print command. (You will need to delete the two PostScript files
686 afterwards yourself.) 'printexpr' could be modified to perform this extra
687 step before printing.
690 ALTERNATE DUPLEX PRINTING
692 It is possible to achieve a poor man's version of duplex printing using the PS
693 utility psselect. This utility has options -e and -o for printing just the
694 even or odd pages of a PS file respectively.
696 First generate a PS file with the 'hardcopy' command, then generate a new
697 files with all the odd and even numbered pages with: >
699 psselect -o test.ps odd.ps
700 psselect -e test.ps even.ps
702 Next print odd.ps with your platform's normal print command. Then take the
703 print output, turn it over and place it back in the paper feeder. Now print
704 even.ps with your platform's print command. All the even pages should now
705 appear on the back of the odd pages.
707 There a couple of points to bear in mind:
709 1. Position of the first page. If the first page is on top of the printout
710 when printing the odd pages then you need to reverse the order that the odd
711 pages are printed. This can be done with the -r option to psselect. This
712 will ensure page 2 is printed on the back of page 1.
713 Note: it is better to reverse the odd numbered pages rather than the even
714 numbered in case there are an odd number of pages in the original PS file.
716 2. Paper flipping. When turning over the paper with the odd pages printed on
717 them you may have to either flip them horizontally (along the long edge) or
718 vertically (along the short edge), as well as possibly rotating them 180
719 degrees. All this depends on the printer - it will be more obvious for
720 desktop ink jets than for small office laser printers where the paper path
721 is hidden from view.
724 ==============================================================================
725 8. Formfeed Characters *printing-formfeed*
727 By default VIM does not do any special processing of |formfeed| control
728 characters. Setting the 'printoptions' formfeed item will make VIM recognize
729 formfeed characters and continue printing the current line at the beginning
730 of the first line on a new page. The use of formfeed characters provides
731 rudimentary print control but there are certain things to be aware of.
733 VIM will always start printing a line (including a line number if enabled)
734 containing a formfeed character, even if it is the first character on the
735 line. This means if a line starting with a formfeed character is the first
736 line of a page then VIM will print a blank page.
738 Since the line number is printed at the start of printing the line containing
739 the formfeed character, the remainder of the line printed on the new page
740 will not have a line number printed for it (in the same way as the wrapped
741 lines of a long line when wrap in 'printoptions' is enabled).
743 If the formfeed character is the last character on a line, then printing will
744 continue on the second line of the new page, not the first. This is due to
745 VIM processing the end of the line after the formfeed character and moving
746 down a line to continue printing.
748 Due to the points made above it is recommended that when formfeed character
749 processing is enabled, printing of line numbers is disabled, and that form
750 feed characters are not the last character on a line. Even then you may need
751 to adjust the number of lines before a formfeed character to prevent
752 accidental blank pages.
754 ==============================================================================
755 vim:tw=78:ts=8:ft=help:norl: