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Originally, the material in this article appeared as 6 different pieces in various issues of the Kernal Chronicles - the newsletter of the Commodore Users of Edmonton (CUE) User Group. I took these articles and put them into this one article which was printed in the July 1998 Commodore MaiLink - Newsletter of Meeting 64/128 Users Through The Mail.

Laser Printing
by Bruce Thomas

Over the past 10 years I have used many methods to get my GEOS files to print on a PostScript Laser Printer. I will try to provide as many details here as possible so that you can see how easy the process is and the variety of methods available to use. Don't feel that not owning one of these printers is reason not to use one. From GEOS, there is no better method of getting your documents onto paper.

First things first. You can use an RS-232 modem interface cable and a null modem cable. This connection is required to use geoPubLaser or geoLaser in their original form. The programs support 1200 and 9600 baud communication.

Here are the printer settings I used. In GEOLaser or GEOPubLaser select 9600 BAUD for transfer rate. Set the printer for 9600 also along with Postscript Batch files, RS-232 interface, 8 data bits and 1 stop bit. Parity at Mark and Xon/Xoff for Flow Control.

I used this connection method for about a year at a computer store a club member managed. After they stopped stocking the C-64 I borrowed another friend's SX-64 and continued to use the display NEC Laser (at the time this was a $6000 printer!).

When the store closed I had to find another method. Another club member had a PostScript Laser at work. I was able to get a version of 'Publaser that would work with the PS.Patch(2.0) program and printed a couple of test files to disk. These were uploaded to the club BBS. Dave d-loaded the files at work where he printed them (straight Postscript seq. files can be dumped from the IBM to the Laser - copy filename lpt1).

This process was used until Dave got a program called Disk2Disk so our process changed. I would drop a 1541 disk off at Dave's house and he used his Amiga with Disk2Disk to read the file and save it to an Amiga disk. He would then copy the file to an IBM disk using DOS2DOS, take that to work and read it into a Mac IIfx and send it to the Mac Laserwriter. Presto, hard copy.

One thing that must be noted is that you absolutely must have the properly matched versions of geoPublish and geoPubLaser. If you don't your printout will be very messed up. I have had files print where text, continued from one page to the next, just repeats the first page, where graphic images override the text and where no text appears at all. To be sure that you have the proper versions follow these guidelines:

For geoPublish dated 10/8/87 use geoPubLaser dated 3/10/88. For geoPublish dated 10/4/88 (two disk version) use geoPubLaser dated 10/25/86. With the properly matched versions your output will be fine. If you create a document with one version of geoPublish and later edit it with the other version you must still use the geoPubLaser that matches the 'Publish first used to create the document. To be safe, once you get a matched set don't use the other version. It is best to use the two-disk gP as it fixes a number of bugs such as no access to DA's after printing and text problems in long documents.

The Nov. '91 issue of Compute's Gazette featured an article on getting your files printed by a Mac or IBM hooked to a PostScript laser. While I have covered a lot of this info already (patching 'Publaser and modem transfers) it is not only a Mac or IBM that can print your files. In fact - you don't even need a PostScript equipped Laser Printer!

Most of you probably know that geoLaser and geoPubLaser are designed to print to a Postscript- equipped Laser and are probably wondering if I've lost my mind but it is true...

NO POSTSCRIPT, NO PROBLEM!

The June '91 issue of INPUT (an Edmonton produced computer news magazine) featured an article on Page 9, by Nancy Lorieau (a CUE member), on Amiga DTP utilities. Reading through this I was intrigued by the file called Post 1.6 . This is a POSTSCRIPT Interpreter that prepares the page in the computer memory and then sends it to the printer. The output is top-quality (I tried this method once) on HP compatible printers and is said to give good output on dot-matrix. You need an Amiga with at least 1MB of RAM and ARP library (v39+) and the ConMan (v1.3+) shell. Check your local Amiga User Group or BBS for the necessary files.

After a while my friend Dave didn't have access to the Laser at work. I found a copy shop that did publishing and you could access their computers and printers for a fee. I used their IBMs as well as their Macs. At one point they upgraded their Mac Operating System and I had problems the next time I went to print. It seems that System 7.1 of the Mac operating system won't recognize files on IBM formatted disks properly. If the disk has been read in a System 7.0 environment first, the files show up, but 7.1 will not see the icons otherwise. Luckily, they had a couple of machines that did not get the system upgrade so I just used them.

My childrens' elementary school bought some Macs for their computer lab and got an Apple Laserwriter as well. Having this equipment so close to home seemed like the perfect excuse to buy some new equipment myself. After receiving the final issue of RUN magazine I picked up an FD-2000 drive from CMD. I also ordered Big Blue Reader so that I could transfer my files to IBM disks by myself. What I needed, though, was a program for the Macs so they could read IBM formatted disks.

I got lucky and was able to pick up a second hand copy of the program and loaded that on one of the computers at the school. I could now transfer my files to an IBM disk at home and take them to the school to dump to the Apple LaserWriter with a MAC. On the newer MACs the ability to read IBM disks is built-in so the extra program isn't required.

I have used 300 dpi Lasers, 600 dpi Lasers and a 1200 dpi Lasermaster printer. All produce excellent results due to the use of PostScript.

In addition to geoPublish and geoPubLaser a copy of PS.Patch(2.0) is required to patch the geoPubLaser program to save files to disk rather than sending them to a printer. Verifying that your files are OK with WrongIsWrite (WiW) prior to trudging off to the printer comes in handy. Run WiW on your PostScript file to convert it to geoWrite format. Scan the file and ensure that all of your text is present. Errors can be corrected here as well but be careful not to do too much in case the formatting gets ruined. Convert the file back to TRUE ASCII with WiW and you are off.

GeoPublish comes with 5 Laser Fonts identified by names beginning with 'LW-'. For best output on a PostScript Laser use these fonts in your documents. The geoLaser (for geoWrite files) and geoPubLaser programs substitute the Laser's own internal fonts for the LW fonts during printing (know which fonts are in the laser you will use). There are a total of 11 LW fonts available for GEOS users (LW-Galey and LW-Zapf are the same but Zapf looks better on the screen). Dale Sidebottom has a Laser Lover's disk available that includes all of the LW fonts plus lots of good information and a useful program (PostPrint) for printing PostScript files directly to a laser. Regular GEOS fonts will print on a Laser but remain at the normal 80 dpi resolution of GEOS like this sentence using Durant 12 point from the FontPack Plus.