Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
Len Lawrence wrote: On Sun, 09 Mar 2003 19:59:46 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Are you working with M9.0 No, 8.2, but 9.0 has the broken Fontmap link. The msfonts directory is one I created to store downloaded MS TrueType fonts. I think that my Fontmap was resurrected from Fontmap.GS in the installed Ghostscript tree. And, yes, the 5.50 is the cause of the broken link. It should be 6.53 in Mandrake 8.2, possibly 8.80 in your case. OK, So I'm beginning to get the general drift of all this . So when you add additional fonts to an app. no matter that it has it, it still needs for ghostscript to have a set of matching fonts to enable it to process the printfile correctly. Is this correct ? John -- John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Thu, 6 Mar 2003 09:33:05 + Anne Wilson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Thursday 06 Mar 2003 9:03 am, John Richard Smith wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: Thanks for your comments John. I agree that printing is a complex issue which probably explains why LX Format has not replied. If in two years research I have not been able to find an explanation of how CUPS deals with PostScript fonts then they probably cannot afford the time to follow up my query. It is obviously not something anybody can answer off the top of their head. So I will continue poking around. Thanks also for the information re PCL5 and PCL3. I had not come across that. The printer is an HP Deskjet 940C by the way. HP deskjet940C ought to be supported, most of the HP inkjet printers are. I have an old HP670C which works quite well, but is a very noisy shake rattle and roll printer, compared to my Lexmark Z51 + Z52's. I would be surprized if HP 940C is not supported, or have I misunderstood, perhaps it does work but you need more fonts ? IIRC the 940 is a slower version of the 990, which I use. I have no problems per se, but different programs have different capabilities in handling fonts and complex layouts. Have you tried the same output in a different package? It would tell you, perhaps, whether that is the source of your problem. Oddly enough I find OO.o better on my system than SO6 in handling these things. Agreed. Importing TrueType fonts into OO.o seemed easier than in StarOffice. -- Len Lawrence -- Never argue with a fool -- people might not be able to tell the difference. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Sunday 09 March 2003 01:51 am, Len Lawrence wrote: Then, edit the Fontmap file. Insert the following line in the end section, using tabs as separators, not spaces: /Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571 The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name. e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont The line %%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic appears in the document header. I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution to this problem. Time to get a life I think. Are you in a position to test this on 9.1. It needs to be done quickly. -- Greg Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Sun, 09 Mar 2003 19:51, Len Lawrence wrote: On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: all snipped -- Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and so here is my best try, -- snip snip snip -- Ladies, Gentleman, and script kiddies. Done it! Retreading old ground, I discovered the exact prescription to allow ghostscript to locate the new fonts for postscript files. Since gv was unable to render them either, I figured that it was purely a ghostscript problem - nothing to do with CUPS. GS finds the font resources in the ghostscript and Type1 directories under /usr/share/fonts/defaults. Indexing is performed through a Fontmap file in ./ghostscript, but in Mandrake 8.2 and 9.0 this is a bad link, pointing to lib/Fontmap.GS in the ghostscript installation directories. This was probably the case with 8.1 also, and may be carried into 9.1. The link references the wrong (older) version of Ghostscript. Anyway, I repaired that link and carried out the following operations (using Verdana-BoldItalic as an example): cd /usr/share/fonts/msfonts # Generate Type1 fonts from TrueType ./ttf2pt1 -e verdanaz.ttf verdanaz # Copy the font metric file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.afm /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript # Copy the ASCII font file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.pfa /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript cd /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript Then, edit the Fontmap file. Insert the following line in the end section, using tabs as separators, not spaces: /Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571 The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name. e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont The line %%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic appears in the document header. I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution to this problem. Time to get a life I think. Simple, what weed am i smokin'. I do not understand f a about what you wrote, except i recognise a full stop at the end of every sentence. Seeing as you have just become the authority on the matter could you slow this down to about half speed. Then poke it on a web space and post a link to it. Else, give it to me direct, at half speed. I will post it on a website for you. -- Michael Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Sun, 9 Mar 2003 06:58:55 -0500 Greg Meyer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Sunday 09 March 2003 01:51 am, Len Lawrence wrote: Then, edit the Fontmap file. Insert the following line in the end section, using tabs as separators, not spaces: /Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571 The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name. e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont The line %%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic appears in the document header. I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution to this problem. Time to get a life I think. Are you in a position to test this on 9.1. It needs to be done quickly. Sorry Greg. I am not uptodate yet. Waiting for the wrinkles in 9.1 to be ironed out before buyig it. My preferred system is 8.2 at present. -- Len Lawrence -- Never argue with a fool -- people might not be able to tell the difference. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Sun, 09 Mar 2003 19:59:46 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Michael Adams wrote: On Sun, 09 Mar 2003 19:51, Len Lawrence wrote: On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: all snipped -- Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and so here is my best try, -- snip snip snip -- Ladies, Gentleman, and script kiddies. Done it! Retreading old ground, I discovered the exact prescription to allow ghostscript to locate the new fonts for postscript files. Since gv was unable to render them either, I figured that it was purely a ghostscript problem - nothing to do with CUPS. GS finds the font resources in the ghostscript and Type1 directories under /usr/share/fonts/defaults. yep found those. Indexing is performed through a Fontmap file in ./ghostscript, /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript/Fontmap, does not exist in my M9.0 OS Unable to run the command specified. The file or directory file:/usr/share/ghostscript/5.50/Fontmap.GS does not exist. but in Mandrake 8.2 and 9.0 this is a bad link, pointing to lib/Fontmap.GS in In mine it points to, ./././ghostscript/5.50/Fontmap.GS the ghostscript installation directories. This was probably the case with 8.1 also, and may be carried into 9.1. The link references the wrong (older) version of Ghostscript. I should change 5.50 to , what is it, 8.80, I think ? Anyway, I repaired that link and carried out the following operations (using Verdana-BoldItalic as an example): cd /usr/share/fonts/msfonts no such directory /usr/share/fonts/9x15.pcf.gz /usr/share/fonts/bitmap/ /usr/share/fonts/console8x16.pcf.gz /usr/share/fonts/default/ /usr/share/fonts/elmar_scalable/ /usr/share/fonts/otf/ /usr/share/fonts/ttf/ /usr/share/fonts/afms/ /usr/share/fonts/chinese/ /usr/share/fonts/console8x8.pcf.gz /usr/share/fonts/elmar/ /usr/share/fonts/fonts.dir /usr/share/fonts/override/ # Generate Type1 fonts from TrueType ./ttf2pt1 -e verdanaz.ttf verdanaz # Copy the font metric file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.afm /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript # Copy the ASCII font file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.pfa /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript cd /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript Then, edit the Fontmap file. /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript/Fontmap is empty Insert the following line in the end section, using tabs as separators, not spaces: /Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571 The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name. e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont The line %%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic appears in the document header. I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution to this problem. Time to get a life I think. Are you working with M9.0 ? No, 8.2, but 9.0 has the broken Fontmap link. The msfonts directory is one I created to store downloaded MS TrueType fonts. I think that my Fontmap was resurrected from Fontmap.GS in the installed Ghostscript tree. And, yes, the 5.50 is the cause of the broken link. It should be 6.53 in Mandrake 8.2, possibly 8.80 in your case. -- John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Len Lawrence -- Never argue with a fool -- people might not be able to tell the difference. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Sun, 9 Mar 2003 22:56:45 +1300
Michael Adams [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Sun, 09 Mar 2003 19:51, Len Lawrence wrote:
On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 +
John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Len Lawrence wrote:
all snipped --
Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and
so here is my best try,
-- snip snip snip --
Ladies, Gentleman, and script kiddies. Done it! Retreading old
ground, I discovered the exact prescription to allow ghostscript to
locate the new fonts for postscript files. Since gv was unable to
render them either, I figured that it was purely a ghostscript problem
- nothing to do with CUPS. GS finds the font resources in the
ghostscript and Type1 directories under /usr/share/fonts/defaults.
Indexing is performed through a Fontmap file in ./ghostscript, but in
Mandrake 8.2 and 9.0 this is a bad link, pointing to lib/Fontmap.GS in
the ghostscript installation directories. This was probably the case
with 8.1 also, and may be carried into 9.1. The link references the
wrong (older) version of Ghostscript. Anyway, I repaired that link
and carried out the following operations (using Verdana-BoldItalic as
an example):
cd /usr/share/fonts/msfonts
# Generate Type1 fonts from TrueType
./ttf2pt1 -e verdanaz.ttf verdanaz
# Copy the font metric file to ghostscript
cp verdanaz.afm /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript
# Copy the ASCII font file to ghostscript
cp verdanaz.pfa /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript
cd /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript
Then, edit the Fontmap file. Insert the following line in the end
section, using tabs as separators, not spaces:
/Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571
The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the
name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the
postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document
generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name.
e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont
The line
%%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic
appears in the document header.
I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution
to this problem. Time to get a life I think.
Simple, what weed am i smokin'. I do not understand f a about what you wrote,
except i recognise a full stop at the end of every sentence.
Seeing as you have just become the authority on the matter could you slow
this down to about half speed. Then poke it on a web space and post a link to
it. Else, give it to me direct, at half speed. I will post it on a website
for you.
I'll get back to you on this Michael. And believe me, I'm no expert.
Not many people ever have the need to examine PostScript files or look
inside the standard printing interfaces. PostScript itself is a dialect
of Forth, which only programmers need to know about, a stack based language
which I remember vaguely from my lab days testing stepper motors. AFAIK it
deals with two stacks, commands and data and comes with a dictionary of
prewritten commands and definitions. When loaded it becomes the operating
system and can be extended at will. Everything is in Reverse Polish notation,
which makes it a little difficult to read.
Straying off the point a bit here. Will be in touch. Always short of time.
24/7 care for my wife, stuck in a wheelchair with MS.
--
Len Lawrence
--
Never argue with a fool -- people might not be able to tell the difference.
--
Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft?
Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: all snipped -- Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and so here is my best try, -- snip snip snip -- Ladies, Gentleman, and script kiddies. Done it! Retreading old ground, I discovered the exact prescription to allow ghostscript to locate the new fonts for postscript files. Since gv was unable to render them either, I figured that it was purely a ghostscript problem - nothing to do with CUPS. GS finds the font resources in the ghostscript and Type1 directories under /usr/share/fonts/defaults. Indexing is performed through a Fontmap file in ./ghostscript, but in Mandrake 8.2 and 9.0 this is a bad link, pointing to lib/Fontmap.GS in the ghostscript installation directories. This was probably the case with 8.1 also, and may be carried into 9.1. The link references the wrong (older) version of Ghostscript. Anyway, I repaired that link and carried out the following operations (using Verdana-BoldItalic as an example): cd /usr/share/fonts/msfonts # Generate Type1 fonts from TrueType ./ttf2pt1 -e verdanaz.ttf verdanaz # Copy the font metric file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.afm /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript # Copy the ASCII font file to ghostscript cp verdanaz.pfa /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript cd /usr/share/fonts/default/ghostscript Then, edit the Fontmap file. Insert the following line in the end section, using tabs as separators, not spaces: /Verdana-BoldItalic (verdanaz.pfa) ; % 5066571 The font alias at the beginning of the line must match exactly the name held in the font files and it is this which should appear in the postscript file itself with the findfont directive. Your document generator should handle this automatically if given the correct name. e.g. /Verdana-BoldItalic findfont 14 scalefont ISOEncode setfont The line %%DocumentNeededResources: font Verdana-BoldItalic appears in the document header. I feel a bit of a fool for taking so long to find such a simple solution to this problem. Time to get a life I think. -- Len Lawrence -- Never argue with a fool -- people might not be able to tell the difference. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
Len Lawrence wrote: On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: Thanks for your comments John. I agree that printing is a complex issue which probably explains why LX Format has not replied. If in two years research I have not been able to find an explanation of how CUPS deals with PostScript fonts then they probably cannot afford the time to follow up my query. It is obviously not something anybody can answer off the top of their head. So I will continue poking around. Thanks also for the information re PCL5 and PCL3. I had not come across that. The printer is an HP Deskjet 940C by the way. HP deskjet940C ought to be supported, most of the HP inkjet printers are. I have an old HP670C which works quite well, but is a very noisy shake rattle and roll printer, compared to my Lexmark Z51 + Z52's. I would be surprized if HP 940C is not supported, or have I misunderstood, perhaps it does work but you need more fonts ? John -- John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Thursday 06 Mar 2003 9:03 am, John Richard Smith wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: Thanks for your comments John. I agree that printing is a complex issue which probably explains why LX Format has not replied. If in two years research I have not been able to find an explanation of how CUPS deals with PostScript fonts then they probably cannot afford the time to follow up my query. It is obviously not something anybody can answer off the top of their head. So I will continue poking around. Thanks also for the information re PCL5 and PCL3. I had not come across that. The printer is an HP Deskjet 940C by the way. HP deskjet940C ought to be supported, most of the HP inkjet printers are. I have an old HP670C which works quite well, but is a very noisy shake rattle and roll printer, compared to my Lexmark Z51 + Z52's. I would be surprized if HP 940C is not supported, or have I misunderstood, perhaps it does work but you need more fonts ? IIRC the 940 is a slower version of the 990, which I use. I have no problems per se, but different programs have different capabilities in handling fonts and complex layouts. Have you tried the same output in a different package? It would tell you, perhaps, whether that is the source of your problem. Oddly enough I find OO.o better on my system than SO6 in handling these things. Anne -- Registered Linux User No.293302 Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
Len Lawrence wrote: The importing fonts to CUPS saga continues. Please bear with me - this has turned into quite an essay. There must be somebody here who understands how CUPS references Type1 fonts. I have a problem which has resisted solution for well over two years now. No help from the CUPS documentation, which comes in eleven volumes, nor from www.linuxprinting.org, or from any other source. Linux Format Magazine has refused to respond to two enquiries about this, nor has anybody on this list responded to previous pleas for help. I post this in the hope that some expert might be browsing the list and willing to shine a little light on this shadowy corner of the UNIX world. Any answer needs to be useful in the context of Mandrake and portable from 8.2 to 9.* - I gather that there has been a recent change in the way that CUPS and Ghostscript interact. My specific problem is adding more typefaces to PostScript files generated from one of my home grown applications; i.e. the file might reference Andale Mono, Verdana, Tahoma, Densmore or whatever. Yes, I do have a Window$ licence, OS not installed. These are all available to X and to OpenOffice.org but not apparently to CUPS, and CUPS does not appear to have a regular mechanism for importing fonts. Presumably everything has to be done by hand. I have converted the TrueType fonts to Type1 .pfb files and placed these in the /usr/share/cups/fonts directory under the names, for example Verdana, AndaleMono, Verdana-Bold, etc, in imitation of the existing font names (and restarted CUPS) but they still print as the default Courier typeface. The default set of fonts are listed in the PPD file in /etc/cups/ppd but it is not clear how font information should be added to this file. The meaning of the various fields is not documented. This may all be nonsense. Maybe the font files should go somewhere in the Ghostscript font path together with fonts.dir, fonts.scale and fonts.alias files. I really don't have a clue. Before I sign off, this is my impression of how CUPS works: lpr - CUPS - GS filter PPD || || pstoraster - driver | | spooler? - printer This again may be wrong. Please correct me somebody. In words; a postscript file, for instance, is given to lpr aka lpr-cups which passes it on to Ghostscript for filtering (if it were raw text it would be converted to PostScript format). If the printer is not PostScript capable, the file is fed to the rasterization section which generates a bitmap of the printed page. This then goes to a printer specific driver which converts it into a series of graphics commands native to the printer. The driver may consult the PPD file for defined or allowed options as well and the result is delivered to the spooler which stores it on disk for a while before it, or some other daemon, dumps it to the printer. Somewhere in there the system must try to locate the font resource specified in the PostScript file, but where exactly, and what form does the resource take? All this has taken up far more than the 3.5 minutes I have to spare each day (and I am not kidding) so help would be appreciated and would surely be of interest to other members of the list. Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and so here is my best try, The natural output of Linux print commands is in Printer Control Language 5 (PCL5) , while most dos inkjet printers rastorize the image files in Printer Control Language 3 (PCL3) to accomodate this problem Ghostscript converts PCL5 to PCL3. To speak of ghostscript as drivers is something of a misnomer, as it's a conversion programme. Your dos inkjet printer has a rastor image processor chip in PCL3 and a certain amount of buffer as well but as I understand it the control of the page setup is what PPD does. LPD is the local printer daemon and generates the PCL5 image file , I think? and the image file is processed through to ghostscript where the conversion to PCL3 is accomplished, using so called backend filters. Somewhere in all this is Foomatic , which I have never yet come across an explanation of. John -- John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
On Wed, 05 Mar 2003 10:54:11 + John Richard Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Len Lawrence wrote: The importing fonts to CUPS saga continues. Please bear with me - this has turned into quite an essay. --- big snip Understanding linux printer setup is not easy, and so here is my best try, The natural output of Linux print commands is in Printer Control Language 5 (PCL5) , while most dos inkjet printers rastorize the image files in Printer Control Language 3 (PCL3) to accomodate this problem Ghostscript converts PCL5 to PCL3. To speak of ghostscript as drivers is something of a misnomer, as it's a conversion programme. Your dos inkjet printer has a rastor image processor chip in PCL3 and a certain amount of buffer as well but as I understand it the control of the page setup is what PPD does. LPD is the local printer daemon and generates the PCL5 image file , I think? and the image file is processed through to ghostscript where the conversion to PCL3 is accomplished, using so called backend filters. Somewhere in all this is Foomatic , which I have never yet come across an explanation of. Thanks for your comments John. I agree that printing is a complex issue which probably explains why LX Format has not replied. If in two years research I have not been able to find an explanation of how CUPS deals with PostScript fonts then they probably cannot afford the time to follow up my query. It is obviously not something anybody can answer off the top of their head. So I will continue poking around. Let's see, at 3.5 minutes a day, I might be getting somewhere by 2025. You can all look forward to my article on printing and font handling in LX Format then g. Thanks also for the information re PCL5 and PCL3. I had not come across that. The printer is an HP Deskjet 940C by the way. The PPD file contains a list of default fonts which is reflected in a set of .pfb files in /usr/share/cups/fonts. It should be possible to use these two resources to add new fonts - not clear how though. Any changes seem to be ignored by CUPS. It is not even possible to get it to accept a change in the default typeface, say from Courier to Helvetica. Cheers mate -- Len Lawrence -- Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don't recognize them. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
[newbie] CUPS: importing fonts
The importing fonts to CUPS saga continues. Please bear with me - this has turned into quite an essay. There must be somebody here who understands how CUPS references Type1 fonts. I have a problem which has resisted solution for well over two years now. No help from the CUPS documentation, which comes in eleven volumes, nor from www.linuxprinting.org, or from any other source. Linux Format Magazine has refused to respond to two enquiries about this, nor has anybody on this list responded to previous pleas for help. I post this in the hope that some expert might be browsing the list and willing to shine a little light on this shadowy corner of the UNIX world. Any answer needs to be useful in the context of Mandrake and portable from 8.2 to 9.* - I gather that there has been a recent change in the way that CUPS and Ghostscript interact. My specific problem is adding more typefaces to PostScript files generated from one of my home grown applications; i.e. the file might reference Andale Mono, Verdana, Tahoma, Densmore or whatever. Yes, I do have a Window$ licence, OS not installed. These are all available to X and to OpenOffice.org but not apparently to CUPS, and CUPS does not appear to have a regular mechanism for importing fonts. Presumably everything has to be done by hand. I have converted the TrueType fonts to Type1 .pfb files and placed these in the /usr/share/cups/fonts directory under the names, for example Verdana, AndaleMono, Verdana-Bold, etc, in imitation of the existing font names (and restarted CUPS) but they still print as the default Courier typeface. The default set of fonts are listed in the PPD file in /etc/cups/ppd but it is not clear how font information should be added to this file. The meaning of the various fields is not documented. This may all be nonsense. Maybe the font files should go somewhere in the Ghostscript font path together with fonts.dir, fonts.scale and fonts.alias files. I really don't have a clue. Before I sign off, this is my impression of how CUPS works: lpr - CUPS - GS filter PPD || || pstoraster - driver | | spooler? - printer This again may be wrong. Please correct me somebody. In words; a postscript file, for instance, is given to lpr aka lpr-cups which passes it on to Ghostscript for filtering (if it were raw text it would be converted to PostScript format). If the printer is not PostScript capable, the file is fed to the rasterization section which generates a bitmap of the printed page. This then goes to a printer specific driver which converts it into a series of graphics commands native to the printer. The driver may consult the PPD file for defined or allowed options as well and the result is delivered to the spooler which stores it on disk for a while before it, or some other daemon, dumps it to the printer. Somewhere in there the system must try to locate the font resource specified in the PostScript file, but where exactly, and what form does the resource take? All this has taken up far more than the 3.5 minutes I have to spare each day (and I am not kidding) so help would be appreciated and would surely be of interest to other members of the list. -- Len Lawrence -- Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don't recognize them. -- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
