Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!voder!pyramid!infmx!cortesi
From: cortesi@infmx.UUCP (David Cortesi)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.postscript
Subject: Re: Help with eroff and postscript
Message-ID: <1927@infmx.UUCP>
Date: 26 Jul 89 23:25:12 GMT
References: <374@gizzmo.UUCP> <1893@infmx.UUCP> <1032@esatst.yc.estec.nl>
Reply-To: cortesi@infmx.UUCP (David Cortesi)
Organization: Informix, Menlo Park, Ca. U.S.A.
Lines: 41

In article <1032@esatst.yc.estec.nl> arne@esatst.UUCP (Arne Lundberg) writes:
>In article <1893@infmx.UUCP> cortesi@infmx.UUCP (David Cortesi) writes:
>>Chapter 2 of the eroff manual a while I called Elan tech support and was
>>given this undocumented gimmick:
>>      \!!prologcode@pathname...
>>By the way, since this IS undocumented, don't blame me if they drop
>>it next release - but for now it works pretty well.
>
>They have not dropped it, they changed the syntax to
>	\X'prologcode@pathname'
>and DOCUMENTED it. This is based on EROFF Release 2.2 for Unix.

Not quite.  I am familiar with the three documented ways of putting
postscript into eroff output, as given in chapter 2 of the manual for
eroff 2.2.  They are:

	\X'code="any postscript one-liner"'
	\X'code@pathname_of_ps_code_file'
	\X'prologcode@pathname_of_ps_defs_file'

I have used the first two successfully; they are for in-line code. 
The third, for defining new functions in the header, will not work for me;
no matter where in the source file or macro libraries I put it, it returns
the error message:

	Warning: PostScript prolog code must be at beginning of file
	Code @ "pathname_from_command"  ignored

After struggling with it, I called the ever-helpful Elan tech support
crew, and was given the undocumented escape code \!!prologcode@pathname
as a work-around.  It worked where the \X escape did not.  I repeat,
I have no assurance that Elan means to support this, or document it,
or fix \X'prologcode', or what.  If \X works for you, you should use it. 
If not, you can try \!! .

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