Not too long ago, one could take an OpenOffice/LibreOffice document under any Linux distro, choose print, and then print the PostScript output to a disk file. This is no longer possible.
Is there any way to install a plain old PostScript driver and pipe the output to disk?
For the avoidance of doubt: I need a true PostScript file with plain ASCII PostScript instructions that can be manipulated from a script. Therefore pdf2ps is of no use. It only "PS-ifies" the PDF, but leaves binary data in binary format, which is of no use.
So... to reiterate, I need get the PostScript printer stream from LibreOffice/OpenOffice document and put it in a PostScript file. I have not found such a driver.
All hints/tips appreciated.
What you observe is also true for Mac OS X: you can now enable or disable "PDF as the standard print job format".
To change it back to PostScript:
Open the menu and go to File -> Preferences... -> LibreOffice -> Print.
Locate the entry 'PDF as standard print job format'.
Make sure this entry does NOT have the checkbox ticked.
Click 'OK'.
Now the standard print job format should be set back to PostScript.
Here is a screenshot (from LibreOffice 4.4 on OS X):
Related
I have a GoDEX RT700i printer (203 DPI) and I want to print barcodes in Linux (Ubuntu 16.04)
The barcodes I have are in PDF format. There is a 8 digit number below the barcode.
In Windows, there is no problem with GoDEX drivers. The barcodes and the number are printed perfectly.
Note: If I print the PDF from google chrome it looks fine, but if I print the PDF from Adobe Acrobat Reader, it looks like in Linux.
In Linux, when I print the barcode, the digits of the number are okay, same as Windows, and the height of the bars is okay too, but the width of every bar is bigger than the displayed in the pdf.
How can I fix this?
Here a photo of the printed barcodes
The left one has printed in Linux and the right one has printed in Windows.
There is some additional information:
For Linux I have compiled and installed the GoDEX driver for CUPS and then I have added the printer via AppSocket/HP JetDirect with the IP and Port (9100).
Then, I select the PPD file godex-rt-700i.ppd
These two lines are in the ppd file. Maybe they are related with the problem:
TTRasterizer: Type42
*cupsFilter: "application/vnd.cups-raster 50 rastertoezpl"
When I send the print order, I realized that there are 3 filters for the job:
pdftopdf (application/pdf to application/vnd.cups-pdf, cost 66)
gstoraster (application/vnd.cups-pdf to application/vnd.cups-raster, cost 99)
rastertoezpl (application/vnd.cups-raster to printer/GODEX-RT700i, cost 50)
In the rastertoezpl.c file I saw that there is a function (GDXCompress) that compress the output lines for Godex printer. I thought that maybe the compression affects somehow to the barcode and I tried to deactivate that function (CompBuffer = NULL) and recompile the driver, but that didn't fix anything.
These are the outputs of every filter:
All files (original and intermediate outputs)
When I send the original PDF file to print, these 2 files are generated by cups in /var/spool/cups/:
d00122-001 (pdf)
c00122 (unknown)
1. pdftopdf (/usr/lib/cups/filter/pdftopdf):
/usr/lib/cups/daemon/cups-exec -g 7 -n 0 -u 7 none /usr/lib/cups/filter/pdftopdf MY_PRINTER 122 my_user 00000378 1 "PageSize=Custom.56.69x65.20 Collate ColorModel=Grayscale Duplex=None job-uuid=urn:uuid:7f84fc46-1965-35d2-6a72-e2e73ab0264b job-originating-host-name=localhost date-time-at-creation= date-time-at-processing= time-at-creation=1488464765 time-at-processing=1488464765" /var/spool/cups/d00122-001 > output_pdf2pdf.pdf
output_pdf2pdf.pdf (pdf)
2.gstoraster (/usr/lib/cups/filter/gstoraster):
/usr/lib/cups/daemon/cups-exec -g 7 -n 0 -u 7 none /usr/lib/cups/filter/gstoraster MY_PRINTER 122 my_user 00000378 1 "PageSize=Custom.56.69x65.20 Collate ColorModel=Grayscale Duplex=None job-uuid=urn:uuid:7f84fc46-1965-35d2-6a72-e2e73ab0264b job-originating-host-name=localhost date-time-at-creation= date-time-at-processing= time-at-creation=1488464765 time-at-processing=1488464765"
output_gstoraster.ras (ras)
This file can be opened by rasterview program
3.rastertoezpl (/usr/lib/cups/filter/rastertoezpl):
/usr/lib/cups/daemon/cups-exec -g 7 -n 0 -u 7 none /usr/lib/cups/filter/rastertoezpl MY_PRINTER 122 my_user 00000378 1 "PageSize=Custom.56.69x65.20 Collate ColorModel=Grayscale Duplex=None job-uuid=urn:uuid:7f84fc46-1965-35d2-6a72-e2e73ab0264b job-originating-host-name=localhost date-time-at-creation= date-time-at-processing= time-at-creation=1488464765 time-at-processing=1488464765"
It doesn't create any file. It sends the printer orders directly to the printer
Versions:
Ghostscript = GPL Ghostscript 9.18 Artifex Software
cups = 2.1.3-4
pdftopdf = cups-filters 1.8.3-2ubuntu3.1
Which versions of the various components are you using (CUPS, pdftpdf and Ghostscript) ?
Have you checked the intermediate file produced from pdftopdf to see what that PDF file looks like ?
Have you examined the CUPS raster produced from gstoraster to see if it is correct ?
Exactly how big a difference are we discussing ? A pixel, an inch ? Bear in mind that this is apparently a 203 dpi device, so a pixel is quite a lot.
Given that there are 3 stages in the pipeline the first thing you should do is attempt to isolate which step is causing your problem. First capture the output at every stage; the PDF resulting from pdftopdf, then the CUPS raster file resulting from gstoraster. You can examine each of these individually to see if they show your problem. If they do not then the problem must arise from the final step 'rastertoezpl' and you'll need someone who knows that code. Otherwise you'll be able to decide whether the problem is the pdftopdf step, or the gstoraster step. In any event you can then ask for specific help.
Its most unlikely that the content of the PPD file has any impact here (other than specifying the final filter required to drive the printer). Of course, without seeing the original file, its hard to tell, possibly the barcode is a TrueType font.....
[edit]
Well I still can't see a Ghostscript command line in your question. I'm not able to run CUPS and I can't build RasterView either since it requires a bunch of dependencies I simply don't have.
However, I can run it to TIFF. The result is the same as your photo when the resolution is low enough.
Your problem is the one described in comments 17 and 18 in the bug thread I posted in my comment below. The PostScript (and PDF) imaging model says that when any part of a pixel is touched, that whole pixel is rendered to the output.
Your PDF draws the barcodes as a series of (vector) rectanlges, using co-ordinates and sizes which are not precisely aligned on the underlying pixels of the device.
If you use Adobe Acrobat and 'save as' TIFF you will see exactly the same problem there (you need to set the resolution of the output to 203 dpi using the 'Settings' button on the 'save as' dialog).
There is a long discussion on the bug thread about this, there are a number of possible solutions;
Write the PostScript (or PDF) so that the co-ordinates are precisely clamped to the device grid. This may be difficult to do, especially if you run the file through pdf2pdf.
Draw the bars by first drawing a big rectangle, then draw the spaces between bars as white.that might make the bars 'skinny' but they won't merge. If the printer is thermal then the thermal spread will reduce the effect.
Generate the barcode as an image instead of vectors. Images don't follow the 'any part of pixel rule', they use 'centre of pixel' instead, which may give (at least slightly) better results.
Use a barcode font. Fonts also use a different method for drawing, because if you reduce the font size it quickly turns into a series of black blobs if you use any part of pixel.
Basically, you are trying to draw shapes to a tolerance which simply isn't possible on a low-resolution device like this, when using PostScript/PDF.
I want to view some ansi-art on the linux local-console. (my setup:raspberry pi3 / newest raspbian - no x11)
i've tried many different settings in raspi-config, dpkg-reconfigure console-setup, /etc files, environment vars but i had no luck yet. do i need a special pcf font to get it working?
a reliable way to enable it for remote terminals would also be great.
thanks in advance
It depends on what your data uses (see chart). Codes 0..31 are a problem unless you have a program that can map those codes to a printable value (as noted in Why does showconsolefont have different output in tmux?, the showconsolefont program does this mapping of 0..31).
Most of the usable fonts for the Linux console are "psf" fonts: having a header which tells which Unicode values each glyph corresponds to. Using that, along with a known character set (cp437), you could convert the data or "play" it using an application which knows how to do this:
You could convert it using iconv or recode, or
The line-drawing (128..255) could be done using luit in a UTF-8 console.
Is there an equivalent solution to grab selected text in OS X as 'xsel -o' works for Linux?
Just need the current selection so I can use the text in shell script.
Cheers,
Erik
You can probably install xsel on MacOS. (UPDATE: According to Arkku's comment, that will only work if you have the X11 server running and synchronized to the OS X pasteboard.)
If not, a quick Google search turns up pbcopy / pbpaste, which apparently is pre-installed.
Link: https://github.com/raymontag/keepassc/issues/59
The Linux tool xsel is not required as pbcopy and pbpaste are Apple command line utilities that provide this functionality and are installed by default on macOS.
From the manual page (man pbcopy):
pbcopy, pbpaste - provide copying and pasting to the pasteboard (the
Clipboard) from command line
pbcopy takes the standard input and places it in the specified pasteboard. If no pasteboard is specified, the general
pasteboard will be
used by default. The input is placed in the pasteboard as plain text data unless it begins with the Encapsulated PostScript
(EPS) file
header or the Rich Text Format (RTF) file header, in which case it is placed in the pasteboard as one of those data types.
pbpaste removes the data from the pasteboard and writes it to the standard output. It normally looks first for plain text data
in the
pasteboard and writes that to the standard output; if no plain text data is in the pasteboard it looks for Encapsulated PostScript;
if no
EPS is present it looks for Rich Text. If none of those types is present in the pasteboard, pbpaste produces no output.
To copy filename.txt to the clipboard, use the following:
pbcopy < filename.txt
I would like to print a file containing text with ANSI escapes.
Here is file content (generated with bash script):
\033[1m bold message example \033[0m
normal font message
When printing file to screen in terminal, it works nice:
cat example.txt
shows:
bold message example
normal font message
But my problem when I try to send it to a printer:
lp example.txt
prints:
1mbold message example2m
normal font message
Is there a way to print this file correctly ? Maybe with groff (can be used to print a styled man page), but I did not manage to get anything efficient with it...
Maybe a2ps might be able to handle that (but I am not sure, you should try).
And I would rather suggest changing the way you get such a file with ANSI escapes (that is, also provide some alternative output format).
I mean that the program producing such a file (or such an output) could instead produce a more printable output (perhaps by generating some intermediate form, e.g. LaTeX, or Lout, or groff or HTML format, then forking the appropriate command to print it. That program could also generate directly PDF thru libharu or poppler, etc....)
Also, it might depend upon your printer, and the driver.
I'm looking for a command line tool for Linux that will allow me to convert UTF-8 plain text files to various formats. My problem is that I'm working on a secure company-specific flavour of Linux, so the tool can't rely on other packages, such as Open Office, being present. Does anyone know of such a tool?
Gnu a2ps allows you convert from anything to postscript (designed for printing). Not exactly what you want but if you have utilites to display postscript files, you can convert them into pdf.
Another option is Gnu enscript which "converts text to Postscript, HTML or RTF with syntax highlighting". I'm not sure if it supports UTF-8.
Conversion into doc will be harder since it's a closed format. But I have in the past cheated by creating an HTML file with inline css and then renaming it to .doc. Worked back in the early 2000s. DOn't know about now.