Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!apple!rutgers!ucsd!ucsdhub!esosun!seismo!uunet!pcrat!rick
From: rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: PostScript Conspiracy
Keywords: Bigger Slower More $$$
Message-ID: <567@pcrat.UUCP>
Date: 2 Sep 88 10:24:21 GMT
References: <565@pcrat.UUCP> <4208@adobe.COM>
Reply-To: rick@pcrat.UUCP (Rick Richardson)
Organization: PC Research, Inc., Tinton Falls, NJ
Lines: 74

In article <4208@adobe.COM> greid@ondine.UUCP (Glenn Reid) writes:
>>   (Remember, I'm a pic/troff user)
>> Yeah, there are some nice features to PostScript.  But is it really
>> worth the extra delay and cost?  The bottom line is to keep
>> the printer and me busy.  And I'm not busy if I don't have my
>> document to read and mark up.

>    * Can you print at 150, 400, 600, 1270, or 2540 dots-per-inch?

Can't see why not.  The document source file can be processed
for any printer, in theory. 99.94% of the time, I'd never want
to print at a higher resolution.  For final publication, yes.
So then I convert for that printer.  Could even be PostScript
at that point.

>    * Can you print in full color?

My text formatter (troff) doesn't support color, so whether the output is
in PostScript or PCL, it won't be color.  I suppose you could pass
a postprocessor specific command for color through troff (as is done
for bitmap merging).  Then the question is: does the physical printer
do color.  No.  So the color command would be ignored.

>    * Can you print on 11x17 paper? or on 18x24 inch RC paper?

Entirely a physical printer question. Has nothing to do with the
printer language.  I can't get 18x24 paper to go through the
(canon engine based) PostScript printer or the HP.

>    * Can you print full page halftoned images?

I can print anything that can be digitized or converted to 300 dpi
resolution (the resolution of canon engines).

>    * Can you send your print files across the country as electronic mail?

Yes, either send the source, or the uuencoded PCL, either of which
are likely to be smaller than the PostScript.

>    * Can you import graphics from a drawing program into a word processor?
>    * Can you merge a Macintosh illustration into output from troff?

No problem there.  I don't have a Mac, but I merge PC Paintbrush drawings
all the time. ".BM drawing.pcx pcx 300 L" sticks 300DPI drawing.pcx in my
document at the left margin, with text flowing around to the right.

>PostScript is not a "point product", it is a total solution.

I really can't argue that PostScript is not feature rich.  It is.
I can't argue with the fact that PostScript files are like P-code.
They are.  If I was running a typesetter shop I'd like all the
customers to send documents in one format.  PostScript is decent
for this.

What I argue with is that it is being pushed as a "total solution"
for everybody.  Which it isn't.  Because it doesn't meet
the two critical requirements for a large segment of the market:

	1) willingness to pay
	2) comparable or better performance to the ad hoc solution

In retrospect, not meeting item 1) saved me from PostScript.
If 1) had been met, I would probably own a PostScript printer
right now.  And be complaining about 2).  And I would be told
that I need the latest, faster, more expensive, PostScript based
printer to get the performance I desire.

I'd now be on the road of the upwardly mobile, with a lot of
folks who use the terms VM, SNA, and ...PostScript...
-- 
		Rick Richardson, PC Research, Inc.
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