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From: wln@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (William L Nussbaum)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.comm
Subject: Re: Pass Through Printing (was Re: MacTerminal 3.0)
Message-ID: <1990Nov9.002205.11624@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu>
Date: 9 Nov 90 00:22:05 GMT
References: <ts351ddcfa@visix.com> <-4x2g2.388@smurf.sub.org> <ttearnwqqa@visix.com>
Sender: news@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu (The Daily News)
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In article <ttearnwqqa@visix.com> amanda@visix.com (Amanda Walker) writes:
>In article <-4x2g2.388@smurf.sub.org> urlichs@smurf.sub.org
>(Matthias Urlichs) writes:
>>Guess what your VTxxx emulator does?
>>Right -- it translates bytes into pictures.
>
>Right.  So does the line printer emulator :).  The actual emulation is not
>the problem...
>
>>Would it be that much harder to emulate a FX80?
>>Emulating a LaserJet would probably be overkill, but while you're at it... ;-)
>
>If printer grafports really were just like any other grafports, then this
>would in fact be the obvious way to do it.  This is exactly what the
>imaging part of the printer emulation does, in fact.  However, printer
>grafports do not necessarily like being open for indefinite periods of time.
>The print manager also tends to eat memory (especially for a high-resolution
>Quickdraw printer, for example).  This is why all of the methods I listed
>(except for straight echoing to the serial port) save up the data and then
>print it in one shot.  As I said, it's not the emulation of any particular
>printer that's hard; it's the strategy for deciding when and how to actually
>print the page images.

... Wouldn't it be possible to determine the information needed to prepare a
grafport, and then build a PICT or offscreen grafport and subsequently
copy that data into a printer grafport?  I know it's a little
convoluted, but that seems as if it would open and close the printer
grafport relatively quickly?

| William illiam Lee Nussbaum, Jr.
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