Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!apple!agate!shelby!msi.umn.edu!noc.MR.NET!gacvx2.gac.edu!scott From: scott@next-5.gac.edu (Scott Hess) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Re: BAD NEWS FOR MAC -> NEXT PEOPLE Message-ID: Date: 1 Dec 90 21:53:17 GMT References: <1040@toaster.SFSU.EDU> <36428@cup.portal.com> Organization: Gustavus Adolphus College Lines: 74 Nntp-Posting-Host: next-5.gac.edu In-reply-to: mingo@cup.portal.com's message of 1 Dec 90 18:50:29 GMTLines: 74 In article <36428@cup.portal.com> mingo@cup.portal.com (Charles Hawkins Mingo) writes: >Maybe you should rephrase this as "PLEASE decide on a graphic interchange >standard _compatible_with_what_I_want_to_interchange_ NOW". I believe >TIFF _is_ a graphic interchange standard, _much_ more so than QuickDraw >or PICT, that much is for certain, because it's not proprietary (the >specs are widely published). Maybe you should learn a bit more about the mac before expressing an opinion. PICT and QuickDraw specs were published five years ago (Tech Note #21), when NeXT was just a glimmer in Steve's eye. But, you might add, TIFF was specifically designed to be used as an independant interchange format. Tag Image File Format, and from the specification memorandum: This memorandum has been prepared jointly by Aldus and Microsoft in conjunction with leading scanner vendors and other interesting parties. Which sounds to me like a standard, eh? I very much doubt that Apple had this in mind when they created PICT and QuickDraw. NeXT had nothing to do with the defining of TIFF, but they use it because it is an "industry" standard, at least to the point where most programs on the Mac and PC which are designed to handle bitmap images handle TIFF images just fine. Now, for an answer to your problem (sorry, I should really have put this in my first post, it just didn't occur to me): Get pbmplus off the internet. This set of utilities allows you to convert between a wide range of bitmap formats. From the manual pages: NAME picttopbm - convert a PICT file into a portable bitmap SYNOPSIS picttopbm [-extraskip ] [pictfile] DESCRIPTION Reads a PICT file as input. Produces a portable bitmap as output. Note that PICT is a drawing format, not an image format, so this program interprets a very small subset of the opera- tors. However, this subset includes the operators used by such programs as SuperPaint and AppleScan when writing out bitmap images so it's not totally useless. ... and NAME pgmtops - convert a portable graymap into Encapsulated PostScript SYNOPSIS pgmtops [-rle] [-scale ] [] DESCRIPTION Reads a portable graymap as input. Produces Encapsulated PostScript as output. [It's trivial to convert pbm to pgm]. I have a version which writes NeXT-acceptable eps files (Preview doesn't complain about them with my version). I don't think there's a pgmtotiff in the package itself, but I think I've seen one floating around the internet somewhere . . . And all this runs swell on the NeXT. -- scott hess scott@gac.edu Independent NeXT Developer (Stuart) GAC Undergrad (Horrid. Simply Horrid. I mean the work!)