Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!ndcheg!kellow
From: kellow@ndcheg.cheg.nd.edu (John Kellow)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: How come I can't send ^Z through LPT1: ?
Message-ID: <1174@ndcheg.cheg.nd.edu>
Date: 23 Mar 90 21:04:51 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: Dep't of Chemical Eng., Univ. of Notre Dame
Lines: 28


I've come across an unexpected problem.  I wrote a program on a Sun
that would print a color image on the inkjet printer connected to my
PC, so the output file is basically binary image data with some escape
sequences thrown in.  I transferred the output over to the PC and then
tried to print it using print (i.e. print foo.bar).  The first few
lines printed fine, then it stopped.  I tried 'copy foo.bar prn:' (and
lpt1:), and it did the same thing.   After spending a lot of time
going through hex dumps, I realized things were getting messed up
where there was a ^Z character.  When I changed it to something
else, then the file printed fine.  But I shouldn't have to do this -
if the data happens to be a ^Z, then its a ^Z.  So how can I properly
send a binary file to the printer?

As far as I can tell, its not the printer, its DOS.  I tried this
simple test: from basica I type 'lprint "abc"chr$(26)"def"' and I get on
the printer "abcdef", but when I put the same thing in a file and try
to print it from DOS I just get "abc". I thought ^Z meaning end of
file went out with CP/M.

If anybody has any suggestions or knows what I'm doing wrong, please
let me know.  If anyone posts a response, I'd also appreciate it if
you could mail be a copy - our news system has been having a lot of
problems lately and I don't want to miss anything.  Thanks.


John Kellow
kellow@ndcheg.cheg.nd.edu