On Fri, 27 Sep 1996, Mr C A Rusbridge wrote:
> We have been planning (for rather too long!) a study on the impact of
> electronic journals on campus printing resources. However, yesterday I
> heard it suggested that the original problem was 'merely' due to
> non-postscript printers being used, and was being overcome as these are
> gradually replaced. If this is true, then perhaps we should not bother
> with the study.
Well I can't say I've done any tests with PDF (I never seem to come across
any; the last lot I had was a manual for a Macintosh database) but one
thing I will say is that PostScript printers may be more common on central
computing services machines (at least they are here) but there are still
lots of GDI and PCL printers being bought for desktops and small
workgroups right now. I've installed two PCL printers in the last month
for example. One reason for this is cost; a GDI laser printer can be
picked up for a couple of hundred quid from quite a few suppliers where as
a PostScript printer is usually quite a bit dearer (partly because of the
cost of the PostScript license but mainly because the GDI laser printer is
"cheating" and using the Wintel machine's Pentium to do the rendering
processing). PCL printers are also cheaper than comparable PostScript
printers on the whole, some PC software supports them and not
PostScript (we've got a CD-ROM in the library that does for example) and
the HP LaserJets are good solid machines.
If printing PostScript is a problem for PDF viewers then may I tender a
possible solution: run GhostScript as a printer filter on a UNIX box to
generate a PCL version of a PostScript page. By doing that you can even
print PostScript documents on an Epson FX-80 dot matrix (assuming you've
got the odd year or so to wait for the printer to actually print the page.
Still they were the height of sophisication in 1982).
If you don't have a UNIX box already don't worry; the UNIX box need not be
an expensive workstation or server. It can just be an old 386 running
Linux and in that case has the double advantage of also letting you print
to Novell and AppleTalk printers. What's more it can still run other
programs at the same time without doing a GPF. A great way to reuse lower
spec machines in a useful way.
Tatty bye,
Jim'll
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Jon "Jim'll" Knight, Researcher, Sysop and General Dogsbody, Dept. Computer
Studies, Loughborough University of Technology, Leics., ENGLAND. LE11 3TU.
* I've found I now dream in Perl. More worryingly, I enjoy those dreams. *
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