Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!yale!eagle!rsilverman
From: rsilverman@eagle.wesleyan.edu
Newsgroups: comp.lang.postscript
Subject: Re: Using a postscript printer for previewing?
Message-ID: <4626@eagle.wesleyan.edu>
Date: 6 Dec 89 10:10:41 GMT
References: <POLLACK.89Dec4133944@toto.cis.ohio-state.edu>
Distribution: comp
Lines: 24

In article <POLLACK.89Dec4133944@toto.cis.ohio-state.edu>, pollack@toto.cis.ohio-state.edu (Jordan B Pollack) writes:
> 
> It seems like it might be possible, in principle, to get a cheap and
> accurate postscript previewer given you already have postscript in a
> printer.
> 
> ...
> 
> Does anyone have any pointers to it having been done already in some
> PD or commercial product, or advice on potential problems (including
> why, if its impossible) besides the slowness of serial transmission
> speed? 
> 
> Jordan

Jordan,

There is a commercial product that does this: Lasertalk, by Emerald City
Software.  The problem is that the standard PostScript language does not
provide any means of accessing the frame buffer directly, to read out the
rendered image.  Lasertalk accomplishes it with a bit of encrypted code
licensed from Adobe.

				Richard Silverman