[Tfug] postscript & ghostscript printing issue

[bpoag at comcast.net]

Hi Christ,

Nice to be able to talk to you via email versus prayer. Before I continue, a quick question -- I've always wondered--What was that whole transfiguration thing about? 

You might want to have a closer look at what arguments you pass ghostscript. I'm guessing there's probably some sort of scaling function buried in the manpage.

Good luck with humanity, btw. 

Cheers,
Bowie

 -------------- Original message ----------------------
From: christ <skeptikos at gmail.com>
> Hi, can someone advise me on how to troubleshoot a
> printing issue.
> 
> The gist of it is that in an effort to work around
> a system crash when I try to use cups, I decided to
> try to set up printing the old-fashioned way on my
> FreeBSD system. In the freebsd handbook, this
> involves getting your printer to first print raw
> text files, and then creating filters to print 
> everything else.
> 
> The printer is an Hp LaserJet 4L parallel printer
> and by way of a very simple filter I've eliminated
> the stair step effect when printing raw text files.
> 
> So the raw text files work, and now it's time to
> configure my printer to print everything else. 
> I thought I'd start with PostScript files.
> 
> By using GhostScript:
> gs -sDEVICE=ljet4 -sOutputFile=%pipe%lpr ~/toPrint/output.ps
> 
> I can get my printer to print an AbiWord document
> that was printed to the PostScript file output.ps.
> The problem is that it doesn't print it correctly.
> 
> Instead of printing the document the way I had created
> it, it prints out really big, and actually runs off the
> page.
> 
> Thinking this might have to do with paper size, I
> tried to troubleshoot this by running ps2pdf and
> looking at the properties of the resulting pdf
> document, which showed the document to be 8.5x11.
> 
> So now I don't know what else to look at. I also
> thought it might have to do with page orientation,
> but that wouldn't explain the fact that the fonts
> print bigger.
> 
> Any way, I feel like I'm really close, and would
> love to be able to say that I managed to do this,
> so any help/guidance will really be appreciated
> and will let me hold on to my 4 pages/minute laser
> printer for a little longer ^_^
> 
> Chris
> 
> 
> -- 
> christ <skeptikos at gmail.com>
> 
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