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Trademarks
----------
Amiga is a registered trademark of Commodore-Amiga, Inc.
Kickstart is a registered trademark of Commodore-Amiga, Inc.
Workbench is a registered trademark of Commodore-Amiga, Inc.
PostScript is a trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated.
PageStream is a registered trademark of Soft-Logik Publishing Co.
Professional Page is a trademark of Gold Disk Inc.
AGFA, Compugraphic and Intellifont is a registered trademark of AGFA
All other trademarked product and company names used herein are
used for identification purposes only. No infringement of
trademarks is intended. Trademarks remain property of the
trademark holder.
Warranty, Registration, Support and Upgrades
--------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1992 Wolf Faust. All rights reserved. All
distribution- and marketing rights to the software (driver) are
vested in Canon Europa N.V.
The driver has been provided to you strictly 'as is', without
warranty of any kind. In no event shall Canon and/or Faust be
held liable for any loss or damages arising out of any action,
from whatever source, concerning the use or inability to use the
driver.
For obtaining a copy of the driver, or for more information about
Amiga driver, please contact your local Canon representative.
Following driver revisions have been made:
22.07.91 Version 1.1
27.11.91 Version 1.2 Version for Commodore
+ set presentation highlight removed for BJ300/330 printers
09.12.91 Version 1.3 Further changes for the BJ300 made
20.04.92 Version 3.0 major update:
+ arXon support added + new WB paper sizes added
+ I' accent fixed + CanonBeep option added
+ CanonTime option added + CanonResX option added
+ CanonConv option added + CanonTab option added
+ CanonPerf option added + CanonTop option added
+ CanonForm option added + CanonFont option added
+ FontShop program added + CanonPref program added
+ Report program added + aTBCALL command fixed
+ Check for MemCpy() fixed + MemCpy()/MemClr() improved
+ most text style commands changed
for download font usage
01.06.92 Version 4
- changes in the documentation
- a small bug in MemCpy() fixed, causing chars to appear in
dark graphics
- misaligned slider in CanonPref fixed
Thanks to
---------
Several people were involved during the writing of the driver and
documentation. To all of them, thank you! Also I would like to
thank all the people who registered the previous driver release.
Without their support and letters, this driver surely wouldn't
exist. Keep on supporting the Amiga community!
Contents
--------
This disk contains a printer driver for use with the Canon BJ10
,BJ10ex and BJ20 printers and Commodore Amiga computers. Note,
there are special driver version available for the BJ130,300,330,
LBP and BJC printers!
The following files are included on the disk:
"CanonBJ10" - The printer driver revision 3
"FontShop" - A KS 2.0 (or higher) font download program
"CanonPref" - A KS 2.0 (or higher) driver preferences program
"Install" - Workbench install program for the CanonBJ10 driver
"Report" - A report program telling your preferences/driver settings
"Readme" - The documentation file (and/or printed manual)
Highlights of the CanonBJ10 driver
----------------------------------
- automatic font download to the printer
- builtin support for the arXon electronic centronic switch box
- very fast graphic dumps
- automaticly uses improved code for 68020/30 processors if available
- fully supports WB 1.3, 2.0 and 2.1(!)
- all margins are definable
- paper size is freely definable
- comes with an extra KS 2.0 preferences program for controlling the driver
- install program supplied
- font download program
- full documentation (should be normal, but it's not!)
- free definable tab stops
- free definable greyscale conversion
- job end signal
System requirements
-------------------
The CanonBJ driver is compatible with the entire family of Amiga
computers. These include the A500, A500+, A600, A1000, A2000,
A2500, A2500/30 and A3000 computers. The driver was designed to
run under Workbench versions 1.3, 2.0 and 2.1. The CanonPref and
FontShop program was designed to run under Workbench 2.0 and 2.1.
The CanonBJ10 driver was designed for the Canon BJ10e, BJ10ex and
BJ20 printers.
Installation
------------
1. Setup and connect your BJ-10 as described in the BJ-10 Users
Manual.
2. Set the printers DIP Switches as follows:
Switch Function Setting
1 Auto Sheet Feeder As Appropriate
2 Graphics image density As Appropriate
3 Automatic Line Feed OFF
4 Page length On Europe/Australia / OFF USA
5 Character Set ON
6 Automatic carriage return OFF
7 Alternat graphics mode OFF
8 buffer/download memory OFF (for font download: ON!)
9 Code page OFF
10 Printer control mode ON
3. Boot your Amiga with your usual System Disk
4. Insert the Canon Driver Disk and select the appropriate
"Drawer" for the printer.
5. Double Click on the "Install" program. The "Install" program
will copy the driver on to the system disk.
If there is not enough free disk space to install the
printer driver a requester will pop up saying so. In this
case free up some disk space on your system disk by
deleting unused files.
If you are a CLI user, simply copy the driver into your
"devs:printers" directory
6. Start Preferences on your system disk (if you own Kickstart
2.0 use the printer preference program). Select the CanonBJ10
driver and adjust all other preference parameters to your
environment. See your system manual for more information
about the preference program.
7. In case you use Workbench 2.0 (or higher) use the mouse to drag
the FontShop and CanonPref icon into your Workbench prefs
drawer. If your Workbench disk does not allow this because
no space is left on disk, you can simply drag the programs
to any other wanted drawer.
8. Start the CanonPref program if you are using Workbench 2.0 (or
higher). Adjust all parameters to your wanted environment.
Note: the install program will erase any previously installed
CanonBJ10 drivers without asking you so. Also note that the
Commodore CanonBJ10 driver is a subset of this driver and because
of this, you get all the functions of the Commodore driver and
even more.
Workbench Preferences
---------------------
While the Workbench preferences program is described in detail in
your system manual, there are three settings which belong to the
driver documentation:
Density:
The driver supported graphic densities:
Density X-DPI Y-DPI X*Y-DPI
1 360 360 129600
2 180 180 32400
3 120 360 43200
4 180 360 64800
5 240 360 86400
6 360 180 64800
7 360 360 129600
The desired density can be selected in Preferences or in case you
use Workbench 2.0 "PrinterGfx". Most application programs also
allow you to select the density before doing a graphic dump. This
setting overrides temporarily the preferences density setting.
Paper Size:
Under Workbench 2 and 2.1 (or later) this driver supports the new
introduced papersizes. Anyway, DIN A4 users may select the Letter
paper size instead of DIN A4 to print a DIN A4 letter (2804
dots wide) in the highest resolution (2880 dots wide).
PaperType:
A papertype of SINGLE will eject a sheet with a Form Feed after
every print. Form Feed after a graphic dump is sent according to
the SPECIAL_NOFORMFEED flag. You can use the FANFOLD papertype
setting to force several dumps to appear on the same page. Also,
if you need to run InitPrinter often, you may choose the papertype
FANFOLD to avoid printing empty pages.
Note: if an aRIN (initialize) or an aRIS (reset) command gets
sent, the printer will eject the printed page even if your
PaperType is FANFOLD. Also note, aRIN is automaticly sent after
loading the driver into memory the first time.
The Driver in detail
--------------------
Now that you have installed and adjusted the driver, printer and
preference setting, there are some details you should know when
using the driver.
This driver automatically checks for the processor in use
(68000,68010 or 68020,68030,68040) and optimizes the print
routines accordingly. Because of this, there is no need for a
special .020 version of the driver in order to get the most out of
your turbo amiga.
Aborting printing may often leave the printer in an unknown
status. This causes erronious printing on the next dump. In case
you abort printing, also switch your printer off and on. Also run
InitPrinter in order to bring back the printer in a known status.
The driver supports the unique Amiga commands shown below:
Name Escape sequence Function Defined By
aRIS ESCc reset ISO
aRIN ESC#1 initialize Amiga
aIND ESCD lf ISO
aNEL ESCE return,lf ISO
aSGR0 ESC[0m normal char set ISO
aSGR4 ESC[4m underline on ISO
aSGR24 ESC[24m underline off ISO
aSGR1 ESC[1m boldface on ISO
aSGR22 ESC[22m boldface off ISO
aSHORP0 ESC[0w normal pitch DEC
aSHORP2 ESC[2w elite on DEC
aSHORP1 ESC[1w elite off DEC
aSHORP4 ESC[4w condensed fine on DEC
aSHORP3 ESC[3w condensed off DEC
aSHORP6 ESC[6w enlarged on DEC
aSHORP5 ESC[5w enlarged off DEC
aDEN6 ESC[6"z shadow print on DEC
aDEN5 ESC[5"z shadow print off DEC
aDEN4 ESC[4"z doublestrike on DEC
aDEN3 ESC[3"z doublestrike off DEC
aDEN2 ESC[2"z NLQ on DEC
aDEN1 ESC[1"z NLQ off DEC
aSUS2 ESC[2v superscript on Amiga
aSUS1 ESC[1v superscript off Amiga
aSUS4 ESC[4v subscript on Amiga
aSUS3 ESC[3v subscript off Amiga
aSUS0 ESC[0v normalize the line Amiga
aPLU ESCL partial line up ISO
aPLD ESCK partial line down ISO
aFNT0 ESC(B Typeface 0 (default): Courier DEC
aFNT1 ESC(R Typeface 1: Line Printer DEC
aPROP2 ESC[2p proportional on Amiga
aPROP1 ESC[1p proportional off Amiga
aVERP0 ESC[0z 1/8" line spacing Amiga
aVERP1 ESC[1z 1/6" line spacing Amiga
aSLPP ESC[nt set form length n DEC
aPERF ESC[nq perf skip n (n>0) Amiga
aPERF0 ESC[0q perf skip off Amiga
aSLRM ESC[Pn1;Pn2s L&R margin DEC
aCAM ESC#3 Clear margins Amiga
aTBC3 ESC[3g Clear all h tabs ISO
aTBC4 ESC[4g Clr all v tabs ISO
aTBCALL ESC#4 Clr all h & v tabs Amiga
aTBSALL ESC#5 Set default tabs Amiga
aRAW ESC[Pn"r Next 'Pn' chars are raw Amiga
The CanonPref Program
---------------------
Beside all the functions mentioned in the chapter "The Driver in
detail", there are some more options unique to the CanonBJ10
driver. These options are controlled using commodore's standard
environment variables. Those variables can be set by using the
CLI setenv command, or by using the CanonPref preferences program.
CanonPref provides a nice and intuitive user interface and needs
at least Workbench 2 to run. In case you don't use Workbench 2
(V37 and above), see the chapter "Environment options" on how to
control the special option with a Kickstart 1.3 system. If you
don't use these options, default values will be used. The driver
will read the arguments set by CanonPref on opening.
Note: changes to the options may not take place immeadiatly!!!!
The options take place with the next send aRIN or aRIS command.
You can send an aRIN command by using Initprinter or flushing the
driver out of memory (WShell users may use "Flush"; Commodore
users may use the "Stack 40000000" command in order to do this).
CanonPref automatically flushes the driver out of memory for you.
So this note is specialy importent for CLI users not using
CanonPref.
CanonPref can be controlled by the mouse and/or keyboard. Each
gadget of the main program corresponds to the underscored letter.
Pressing that letter is equivalent to clicking on the gadget. In
the case of a cycle gadget, you can use the upper or lower case
letter to cycle back and forth between them. See your system
manual on how to control the file- and fontrequester by keyboard
or mouse.
All windows are opened directly under your mouse pointer, so you
don't have to move or scroll the screen to control the program.
Also, all windows are opened on the default public screen. You
may specify a special public screen by setting the Tool Type
"PUBSCREEN=<screenname>" (name is case sensitive!) and the
CanonPref program will open it's windows on your application
programs screen. You can specify a screen from CLI with the
PUBSCREEN option:
CanonPref PUBSCREEN <screenname>
For instance, if you use the ASDG text editor "CygnusEd" you may
specify "CanonPref PUBSCREEN CygnusEdScreen1" and CanonPref will
open up its windows on the CEDPro screen. Make sure the CEDPro
screen is public before running the example.
After starting, the main window will contain several gadgets,
described in detail. All those gadgets represent an environment
variable which can also be controlled using the CLI setenv
command. I strongly recommend using CanonPref because it is user
friendly and more secure.
Job End: No Signal (default)
Beep
Flash
Beep&Flash
If the printer device gets closed after a dump, you can tell the
CanonBJ10 driver to signal you the end of the print job. This is
especialy usefull on huge graphic dumps wich might require some
time. There are two kinds of signals. You can cause a beep
(CTRL-G) on the printer, a Flash (DisplayBeep) on the Amiga or
both.
Note: some applications print graphics in stripes. If the
application program closes the printer.device after every stripe,
you will get a signal after each stripe. So far, I havn't found
an application program with such a bad behaviour.
Port: Disabled (default)
Port 1
Port 2
Port 3
The CanonBJ10 driver supports the arXon parallel switch box. The
arXon switch box is an external 1 to 3 centronics switch
controlable by software. You can ask the CanonBJ10 driver to
automatically switch to a wanted port for printing and switch back
to the previously used port after printing. This enables you to
use a scanner, digitizer and printer from your Amiga's centronics
port without switching between the devices "by hand". Specify the
wanted printer port in "sbox_printer" and the default port (which
should be set up after printing) in "sbox_active". If you specify
0 (default) as the port, no switching will take place.
Note: "sbox_active" MUST be specified before using the driver in
order to enable the "sbox_printer" command. This is because
"sbox_active" is used to determine whether a switch box is
installed or not. Information about the switch box can be
obtained from:
arXon GmbH
Assenheimer Str. 17
D-W-6000 Frankfurt
Germany
Tel: (++49)-69-7896891
Fax: (++49)-69-7896878
Custom Res-X: 0-65535 dots (default 0)
If the selected papersize in preferences (Workbench 2.0:
"Printer") is CUSTOM, this option allows you to specify the
horizontal resolution of the printed paper. For instance, if you
use Workbench 1.3, you can specify a X-resolution of 2804 dots,
which is equal to the DIN A4 size. If you specify 0 (default) as
X-resolution, the US-LETTER resolution of 2880 dots will be used.
The allowed range is 0 to 65535 dots.
Top Margin: 1 - <page length-1> (default 1)
If "Enable Form" is set to ON (checkmark on), "Top Margin"
specifies the top margin in lines. The top margin defines the
vertical distance between the top of the page and the base line of
the first line on the page. When the cut sheet paper loading mode
(MAN, SF1, or SF2) is selected, this command is ignored. Using
this option together with the preference settings for left, right
margin and page length, you are totaly free in defining the
margins of a page.
Enable Form: not checked (default)
checked
If "Enable Form" is set to ON (checkmark on), page length (as set
in preferences), top margin (defined by CanonTop), and perforation
skip (defined by CanonPerf) will be defined by the driver. Some
applications require a well defined paper size and margins for
printing forms. The CanonBJ10 driver provides you such
possibilities!
Perforation Skip: 0 - (form length-1) (Default: 0 lines)
If "Enable Form" is set to ON (checkmark on), "Perforation Skip"
specifies the number of lines that the printer skips at the end of
each page. This causes the printer to skip the perforation
between pages of continuous forms. If 0 lines are specified,
perforation skip will be disabled. If the specified CanonPerf
value is greater than or equal to the form length (as defined in
the WB preferences program), the skip perforation is cancelled and
the top and bottom margins become inactive.
Font Download: checked (default)
not checked
If you set this option (checkmark on), the printer driver will
automatically download fonts created by you or the FontShop
program. In case you don't need the download feature, you can
disable this feature without deleting or moving the font files.
Paper Length:
This is a read only gadget showing the paper length as defined in
Workbench preferences. You can use the value to set your
perforation skip and top margin value. Changes made to the paper
length preferences are automatically detected by the CanonPref
program and the gadget is updated immeadiately without exiting
CanonPref.
Timeout: 1 - 999 (default 30)
In case huge amounts of data are transfered to the printer,
rendering a picture by the device is much faster than the transfer
of the picture to the printer. If this happens, a requester may
appear on the screen, saying "Printer trouble...". The requester
appears because the printer device thinks no data got transfered
because of a hard- or software failure. In reality your printer
was busy with feeding a new paper. With CanonTime you can specify
a timeout before the printer device brings up the error requester.
The CanonTime var is especially usefull when printing multiple
pages or downloading huge fonts using the drivers automatic font
download abilty. A value of 1 to 999 seconds is allowed. Setting
a high timeout value also has it's drawbacks: in case a real
error appears, you also have to wait the given time before you
really can cancel the print job.
Instead of defining a huge timeout, there is another solution
available: use the CMD program (see you Workbench disk) to
redirect the parallel/serial output to a file on disk. After
this, use the copy command or a printer spooler to copy the file
to "par:". Using this technique, you can safely specify a small
amount of seconds before a timeout.
Customize Tabs...:
The ellipsis (three dots) in this gadget means, that an extra
window will be opened when you select this gadget. The gadgets of
the upcoming window let you customize the horizontal tab stops
settings of your printer. This is usefull for printing program
listings and tables. For instance: you can change the default
tab stops settings:
1 2 3 4 5
12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890...
----+---T+----+-T--+----T----+--T-+----+T---+---T+
to:
1 2 3 4 5
12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890...
---T+-T--T--T-+T--T+-T--T--T-+T--T+-T--T--T-+T--T+
Up to 28 tab stops may be defined. All tab stops above the limit
of 28 are ignored and a requester will tell you so. Horizontal
tabs are selected and stored by the printer in character spaces,
not inches. Thus, any change in the character spacing can change
the physical locations of horizontal tabs on the line, but the
logical positions remain unchanged. With PS fonts, a column is
defined as the width of the current space character at ASCII 32
($20).
You can set/unset a tab stop by simply clicking into the gadget at
the wanted position. A "T" is used for a tab stop. The "-" and
"+" chars are used for helping you in finding the correct
position. Using the slider below the gadget you can scroll the
"tab stops" gadgets to a wanted position. With "Clear Tabs" you
can clear all tab stops. With the "n:" and "Set every n chars"
gadgets, you can easily set tab stops with the same distance.
Simply enter the distance into the "n:" gadget and select "Set
every n chars". Note: the printer driver uses a default distance
of 8. If you want to reset you customized tabs stop settings to
the printer default values, simply call "Customize Tabs..." and
the window will come up with a default "n:" value of "8". Press
"Set every n chars" to get the default values.
You can leave the window with the "Use" or "Cancel" gadget.
Changes made to the tab stops settings are accepted with "Use".
"Cancel" leaves the tab stops unchanged and any changes made will
be lost. Note: "Use" does not save the changes made to your
environment. This is done by using the "Use" or "Save" gadget in
the main window.
Greyscale Conv...:
The ellipsis (three dots) in this gadget means, that an extra
window will be opened when you select this gadget. The gadgets of
the upcoming window let you customize the greyscale conversion
function of the printer driver.
You can define various greyscale conversions for the graphic dump
of the driver. This allows you to make a picture brighter (which
is specially usefull in high density modes), darker, increase or
decrease contrast level. Now using this feature is easy,
understanding it might not. So let's try to describe some things
and after reading it twice, simply try it! You'll be extremely
satisfied with the results....
For more information see the "greyscale conversion" chapter first!
The "Greyscale Conversion" window contains 16 sliders. Each
slider represents a value between 0 and 15, were 0 means black and
15 white. The order of the 16 sliders goes from black (left
bottom) to white (right upper side). For example, following
function (which is the default linear conversion of the driver) is
shown by the sliders:
bright| 15
| 14
13| <- <- <- <- <- <- <- <- 13
O | 12 ^
| 11 |
U | 10
| 9 ^
T | 8 |
| 7
P | 6 ^
| 5 |
U | 4
| 3 ^
T | 2 |
| 1
dark|0 ^
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark 13 bright
I N P U T
As you can easily see, a greyscale value of 13 is printed by the
driver as greyscale value of 13. So no change. To define this
linear greyscale conversion, you can also click on the "default"
gadget in the lower right side of the window. "Invert" inverts
every slider setting resulting in a printed "negativ" of your
picture. "gamma +" sets the 16 slider to a value defining a gamma
corretion function. The "gamma" conversion function provides a
way to significantly brighten an image without losing much detail.
"Gamma -" is the opposite of "gamma +" and results in a darker
printout. By repeatidly clicking on the "Bright" gadgets, you can
make your printout darker ("Bright -") or brighter ("bright +").
You can leave the window with the "Use" or "Cancel" gadget.
Changes made to the conversion function are accepted with "Use".
"Cancel" leaves the conversion function unchanged and any changes
made will be lost. Note: "Use" does not save the changes made to
your environment. This is done by using the "Use" or "Save"
gadget in the main window.
Cancel:
You may leave the CanonPref program by clicking on the "Cancel"
gadget. Changes made to the settings will not be saved.
Use:
You may leave the CanonPref program by clicking on the "Use"
gadget. Changes made to the settings will be saved to the ENV:
directory. Note: on normal Workbench 2.0/2.1 environments, all
vars in the ENV: directory are temporary and will be erased the
next time you boot the machine. In case you want to make the
settings permanent, use the "Save" gadget.
Save:
You may leave the CanonPref program by clicking on the "Save"
gadget. Changes made to the settings will be saved to the
ENVARC: and ENV: directory for permanent and temporary use.
Environment Options
-------------------
You can set options for the CanonBJ10 driver by using the "setenv"
CLI command instead of the CanonPref program. This command saves
your option in the "ENV:" directory using a file. See your system
manual for a complete description of the setenv and "getenv"
command. The driver will read in the arguments on opening the
printer device. In case you don't have enough memory, the driver
refuses to open.
Note: reading the options does not always mean they take place
immeadiately. So if you make changes by using "setenv", flush the
driver out of memory or run "Initprinter" in order to let the
driver know about your changes. CanonPref will do this for you
automatically.
Remember that environment vars (they are stored in the "ENV:"
directory) are normaly erased by booting. If you don't want to
set the environment vars every time you boot, you can place them
in "ENVARC:" (Workbench 2.0/2.1) or assign "ENV:" to a non
volatile disk (KS 1.3). Make sure you use the commodore "setenv"
command to set the environment vars! Under KS 2 (or higher), the
driver supports local and global environment vars! Here is a list
of the possible options and their meaning. As usual, everything
is case insensitve:
SetEnv sbox_printer <0|1|2|3> (Default: 0)
The CanonBJ driver supports the arXon parallel switch box. The
arXon switch box is an external 1 to 3 centronics switch
controlable by software. You can ask the CanonBJ driver to
automaticly switch to a wanted port for printing and switch back
to the previously used port after printing. This enables you to
use a scanner, digitizer and printer from your Amigas centronics
port without switching between the devices "by hand". Specify the
wanted printer port in "sbox_printer" and the default port (which
should be set up after printing) in "sbox_active". If you specify
0 (default) as the port, no switching will take place.
Note: "sbox_active" MUST be specified before using the driver in
order to enable the "sbox_printer" command. This is because
"sbox_active" is used to determine weather a switch box is
installed or not.
SetEnv CanonBeep 0|1|2|3 (Default: 0)
If the printer device gets closed after a dump, you can tell the
CanonBJ10 driver to signal you the end of the print job. This is
especially usefull on huge graphic dumps wich might require some
time. There are two kinds of signals. You can cause a beep
(CTRL-G) on the printer, a DisplayBeep on the Amiga or both.
0 = No Action (default)
1 = Printer beep (CTRL-G)
2 = DisplayBeep
3 = Printer beep + DisplayBeep
Note: some application print graphics striped. If the
application program closes the printer.device after every stripe,
you will get a signal for each stripe. So far, I havn't found an
application program with such bad behaviour.
SetEnv CanonResX <num> (Default: 0 dots)
If the papersize is CUSTOM, this option allows you to specify the
horizontal resolution for graphic dumps. For instance, if you use
Workbench 1.3, you can specify a resolution of 2804 dots, which is
equal to the DIN A4 size. If you specify 0 (default) as
resolution, the US-LETTER resolution of 2880 dots will be used.
The allowed range for <num> is 0 to 65535 dots.
SetEnv CanonTime <num> (Default: 0 seconds)
In case huge amounts of data are transfered to the printer,
rendering a picture by the device is much faster than the transfer
of the picture to the printer. A requester may appear on the
screen, saying "Printer trouble...". The requester appears
because the printer device thinks no data got transfered because
of a hard- or software failure. With "CanonTime" you can specify
a timeout until the printer device brings up the error requester.
The "CanonTime" var is especially usefull when printing multiple
pages or downloading huge fonts, using the drivers automatic font
download abilty. If you specify 0 (default) as timeout, a timeout
of 30 seconds will be used. A value from 1 to 999 seconds is
allowed. Instead of defining a huge timeout, there is another
solution available: use the "CMD" program (see you Workbench
disk) to redirect the parallel/serial output to a file on disk.
After this, use the copy command or a printer spooler to copy the
file to "par:". Using this technique, you can safely specify a
small number of seconds before a timeout.
SetEnv CanonConv <num0-15> (Default: 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,
11,12,13,14,15)
You can define various greyscale conversions for the graphic dump
of the driver. This allows you to make a picture brighter (which
is specialy usefull in high density modes), darker, increase or
decrease contrast level, and do gamma correction. Now using this
feature is easy, understanding might not. Simply try it after
reading the documentation! You'll be extremly satisfied with the
results....
For general information see the "greyscale conversion" chapter!!!
You must define exactly 16 greyscale values for CanonConv. Each
value must be in range from 0 to 15, were 0 means black and 15
white. The order of the 16 values goes from black to white. For
example, you want to define following function (which is the
default linear conversion of the driver):
bright| 15
| 14
13| <- <- <- <- <- <- <- <- 13
O | 12 ^
| 11 |
U | 10
| 9 ^
T | 8 |
| 7
P | 6 ^
| 5 |
U | 4
| 3 ^
T | 2 |
| 1
dark|0 ^
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark 13 bright
I N P U T
As you can easily see, a greyscale value of 13 is printed by the
driver as 13. So no change. To define this linear greyscale
conversion, you must enter in CLI:
SetEnv CanonConv "0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15"
Next time you print graphics, the new conversion function is used.
Defining and editing a greyscale conversion function using the
setenv command is uncomfortable. You can use the CanonPref for
editing and defining a function. When finished with defining, you
can get the values set in CanonPref by using the "getenv
CanonPref" CLI command.
SetEnv CanonTab <num1-28> (Default: 9, 17, 25,...)
This environment let you customize the horizontal tab stops
settings of your printer. This is usefull for printing program
listings and tables. For instance: you can change the default
tab stops settings:
1 2 3 4 5
12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
T T T T T T
with 'Setenv CanonTab "3 6 9 12 15 18" ' to:
1 2 3 4 5
12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890
T T T T T T
Up to 28 tab stops may be defined. All tab stops above the limit
of 28 are ignored. All previous tabulators are cleared.
Horizontal tabs are selected and stored internally in character
spaces, not inches. Thus, any change in the character spacing can
change the physical locations of horizontal tabs on the line, but
the logical positions remain unchanged. With PS fonts, a column
is defined as the width of the current space character at ASCII 32
($20).
SetEnv CanonPerf <0-form length-1> (Default: 0 lines)
If CanonForm is set to ON, CanonPerf specifies the number of lines
that the printer skips at the end of each page. This causes the
printer to skip the perforation between pages of continuous forms.
If 0 lines are specified, perforation skip will be disabled. If
the specified CanonPerf value is greater than or equal to the form
length (as defined in the WB preferences program), the skip
perforation is cancelled and the top and bottom margins become
inactive.
SetEnv CanonTop <0-form length-1> (Default: 0 lines)
If CanonForm is set to ON, CanonTop specifies the top margin. The
top margin defines the vertical distance between the top of the
page and the base line of the first line on the page. When the
cut sheet paper loading mode (MAN, SF1, or SF2) is selected, this
command is ignored.
SetEnv CanonForm ON|OFF (Default: OFF)
If CanonForm is set to ON, page length (as set in preferences),
top margin (defined by CanonTop), and perforation skip (defined by
CanonPerf) will be defined by the driver.
SetEnv CanonFont ON|OFF (Default: ON)
Using this switch, you can enable or disable font download without
actually deleting the download fonts in your ENV: and/or ENVARC:
directory. Set this var to "OFF" if you don't want any fonts to
be downloaded.
SetEnv CanonFontDat <fontfilename> (Default: not used)
If you generate fonts with the FontShop program for automatic font
download, the fonts will be saved in the ENV: and, if "Prefs
(save)" was selected, ENVARC: directory.
BJ10-FontShop
-------------
The FontShop program allows you to generate and download fonts
from your Amiga to the BJ printer. As a font source it uses
standard Amiga fonts. In case you use a font with a high
resolution (ie. size) you can get the best print quality out of
your printer using an unlimited pool of fonts.
FontShop provides a nice and intuitive user interface and needs at
least Workbench 2 to run. In case you don't use Workbench 2 (V37
and above), you may generate download font files on a Workbench
2.0/2.1 machine and copy them.
FontShop can be controled by mouse and/or keyboard. Each gadget
of the main program corresponds to the underscored letter.
Pressing that letter is equal to clicking on the gadget. In the
case of a cycle gadget you can use the upper and lower case letter
to cycle back and forth. See your system manual on how to control
the file- and fontrequester by keyboard or mouse.
Each window is opened directly under your mouse pointer. So you
don't have to move or scroll the screen to control the program.
Also, all windows are opened on the default public screen. You
may specify a special public screen by setting the Tool Type
"PUBSCREEN=<screenname>" (name is case sensitive!) and the
FontShop program will open it's windows on your application
programs screen. You can specify a screen from CLI with the
"PUBSCREEN" option:
FontShop PUBSCREEN <screenname>
For instance, if you use the ASDG texteditor "CygnusEd" you may
specify "FontShop PUBSCREEN CygnusEdScreen1" and FontShop will
open up its windows on the CEDPro screen. Make sure the CEDPro
screen is public before running the example.
After starting the main window will show up containing several
gadgets described later in detail. With "Select a font..." you
can invoke the system font requester and choose a font for
download. The printer can fully understand all fonts with up to
48 dots. If you don't have such a huge font available, simply
enter the 48 point size into the gadget and the system will scale
a font, so that it fits 48 points. A font size of 48 points is
recommended for the best output quality. If you choose a font
greater than 48 point, several or all character will be cut of at
the bottom (only the 48 upper rows will be printed). If you
select a font size with a baseline of 48, you may fully print all
upper case characters in huge size (for instance 8 CPI). After
selecting the font you get back to the main window with "OK". Now
you can download the font to the printer by clicking on the
"Download" gadget.
NOTE: MAKE SURE YOUR PRINTER DIP SWITCHES ARE SETUP RIGHT FOR
DOWNLOAD FONTS (see the "Installation" chapter for more
information).
There are several things you can alter in the main window. These
are in most cases only for experienced users and will be discussed
in the following list of possibilities:
Fonts:
This is a readonly field and shows you the currently selected
font.
CPI:
This is a readonly field and shows you the characters per inch
(cpi) of the selected font. The cpi number depends on your
selected font, font width, InterSpace and font mode (Proportional
or Mono Spaced characters.
"Select a font...":
This gadget will bring up the systems font requester. Select a
wanted font and style (underlined, italics, bold, invers) for
download. Note: the printers normal font height is 48 dots (and
36 dots wide). You may download a smaller or greater font, but a
font greater 48 dots will most likely be cut of at the bottom. In
case you only want to use the upper case characters of a
downloaded font, you may use a font heigher than 48 dots with a
baseline of up to 48 dots. If all upper case characters are above
the baseline, everything should work fine and you get "super"
characters. The default baseline of a selected font is shown in
the "Baseline" gadget after selecting a font.
There are several commercial and public domain font collections
available, offering you huge 48 dots high fonts in high quality.
Also, you may use Intellifonts (CompuGraphic) from Agfa
Corporation if you have installed the right diskfont library (see
your Kickstart 2 manual for more information). Over 250
Intellifonts are available offering you a high quality output at
variable sizes and styles. For information about Intellifonts
write to:
Intellifont Scaleable Typefaces
Agfa Corporation
90 industrial Way
Wilmington, MA 01887
USA
Tel: (508) 658-5600 ext. 2311
Also, if you want to make your own download chars or alter
existing fonts, there are several nice and easy to use font
editors available on the amiga (public domain and commercial).
Ask your dealer for it!
-->To:
This is a cycle gadget. If "Prefs (Use)" is selected, the font
gets downloaded directly to ENV: directory. The printer driver
will download the saved font the next time you send an aRIN or
aRIS command. If you want to save the font permanently instead of
temporarily, use "Prefs (Save)". This will save the font in the
non volatile ENVARC: directory. You may also download the font
directly to a file for late use by selecting "File". Such font
files can be quickly downloaded from your application program or
batch file in huge quantities. If "File" is selected and the
download gets started, a file requester will ask you for a
filename. Note: the font files must be copied to "par:" not
"prt:"!
Space Mode:
This is a cycle gadget. You may download a font to the printer in
a fixed width (Mono Space) given in the "Char Width" gadget. Or
you may download the font with proportional spaced chars. You may
define a special space (InterSpace) between two proportional chars
given you a lighter font impression.
Note, the given mode reflects the downloaded font mode, not the
Amiga font mode. You may download a mono spaced Amiga font as
proportional printer font (ie. kerning is used). Even if the
downloaded font is mono spaced, the printer regards the font as a
proportional spaced font (even though it isn't). After selecting
a new font with "Select a font..." this gadget is altered to the
mode of the new selected font.
Char Width:
This integer gadget can only be activated, if "Mono Space" mode is
active. With this gadget you may define the width of all
characters in dots. After selecting a new font, the value of the
gadget will be set to the default width of the selected font. In
case you selected a proportional font, the gadget reflects the
width of the widest character of that proportional font.
InterSpace:
This integer gadget can only be activated, if "Proportional" mode
is active. With this gadget you may define a microspace between
downloaded proportional spaced characters.
Baseline:
With this integer gadget you specify the number of dots between
the baseline and the top border. After selecting a new font, the
Baseline will automatically be set to the system baseline of that
font.
"T" char next "T" char
---------------- --------- \
| ---------- | | ---- |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | \
| | | | / font size
| | | | |
| | | | |
Baseline-> |- - - - - - -| | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
---------------- --- /
\_____ _______/ ^
\/ |
width ------ InterSpace
Download:
After clicking on this gadget, the download gets started. Please
be patient, the download may take some time. During download, all
gadgets are ghosted.
Quit:
Clicking on this gadget (or the CloseWindow gadget) quits the
program.
Now some general things about the BJ10-FontShop you should take
care of:
FontShop supports accents. Though, some accents are generated by
combining two chars (for instance ø = o + /). When downloading
such chars in a small size and proportional mode, there might be
some small misalignments (for instance causing a o/ instead of
ø). You can avoid such problems by altering the size of that
special chars or downloading the font in mono space mode.
While the amiga has a huge font table, the BJ10 is not capable of
holding that much download characters in its printer memory.
Because of this, only "usual" characters get downloaded to the
printer and others not. The view not downloaded characters will
be printed in the normal resident font of the printer.
The program assumes you have 32KB Ram of download RAM in your
printer. If you select a huge font, this RAM might not be enough
causing some char definitions to be ignored by the printer
(accents are the first chars wich get lost in this case, so check
for them if you really need them!)
Greyscale Conversion
--------------------
While your Amiga is able to show color and greyscale pictures on a
monitor, there is no way to reproduce those picture on a black
and white printer like the Canon BJ10. In order to print
color/greyscale pictures the printer driver converts colors and
greyscales to an array of simple b/w dots. The greyscales and
colors are hereby simulated by using a 4 by 4 dither array. The
main process of this function is done by a function called
"greyscale conversion". This function takes a greyscale value and
translate it to a value wich is finaly used to print the original
greyscale value. The greyscale conversion makes sure, the printed
greyscale matches the greyscale shown on your Amiga monitor most.
Because every printer and picture is different, you need a special
conversion function for every printer and picture. Most Amiga
drivers simply use a linear conversion function for every
picture. This means the amount of printed dots on your printer is
directly proportional to the greyscale level of your picture.
The brightness of printed picture using a linear greyscale
conversion is often not satisfying. There are two main reasons
this:
- the greyscale levels shown on your monitor are not linear. For
instance, the difference between two neighboring dark greyscale
levels is not as big as between to brighter levels.
- the Canon BJ printers have a precise printerhead movement. This
gives you the possibility to print 360 dots per inch (dpi). But
there is one drawback, which most printers have: a 1/360 inch huge
dot can not be printed. The dot is a bit greater, which causes the
dots to overlap each other. This causes a dark printed picture
and a loss of contrast.
To compensate these affects, the CanonBJ10 driver allows you to
customize and adjust the greyscale conversion function. You can
also do some art work (for instance pseudo colors) by using this
function.
The Amiga printer.device supports up to 16 greyscale levels. These
levels are represented by values from 0 (black) to 15 (white). Now
let's have a look at the default linear conversion function:
bright| 15
| 14
13| <- <- <- <- <- <- <- <- 13
O | 12 ^
| 11 |
U | 10
| 9 ^
T | 8 |
| 7
P | 6 ^
| 5 |
U | 4
| 3 ^
T | 2 |
| 1
dark|0 ^
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark 13 bright
I N P U T
As you can easily see, every greyscale level is unchanged by the
greyscale conversion function. For instance, a value of 13 is
unchanged. Now we could simply increase the brightness of the
output, by simply adding 1 to each value:
bright|
| 1415
14| <- <- <- <- <- <- <- <- 13
O | 12 ^
| 11 |
U | 10
| 9 ^
T | 8 |
| 7
P | 6 ^
| 5 |
U | 4
| 3 ^
T | 2 |
| 1
|0 ^
dark| |
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark 13 bright
I N P U T
Now the greyscale value of 13 would be printed as 14. A drawback
for brighten up a picture this way is the greyscale value 14 and
15. Both levels would be printed with the same value of 15 which
means white. A better method to brighten up a picture is kind of
gamma correction function. The "gamma" conversion function
provides a way to significantly brighten an image without losing
much detail:
bright|
| 15
| 14
| 13
O | 12
| 1011
U | 9
| 8
T | 7
| 5 6
P | 4
| 3
U | 2
|
T | 1
|
dark|0
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark bright
I N P U T
As you can see, there is no detail lost because several levels got
totaly black or white. Though, some levels are printed using the
same value. You can alter this function to brighten up your
picture even more. Just try...
There is a gadget for the above shown function in the CanonPref
program called "gamma +". Simply click on the gadget to get the
function above and if you like, alter the function afterwoods.
You can make a darker picture the same way you brighten up a
picture. Simply lower the levels instead of increasing them.
Now there is even more you can control by using the conversion
function. For instance you can increase or decrease the contrast
of the printed picture. For increasing the contrast, you must
increase the steepness of the conversion function for instance
like this:
bright|
| 15
| 14
| 13
O | 12
| 11
U | 10
| 9
T | 8
| 7
P | 6
| 5
U | 4
| 3
T | 2
| 1
dark| 0
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark bright
I N P U T
To decrease the contrast, simply make the function more flat:
bright|
|
O |
|
U |
| 1415
T | 1213
| 1011
P | 8 9
| 6 7
U | 4 5
| 2 3
T |0 1
|
|
|
dark|
--+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
dark bright
I N P U T
Using the greyscale conversion function, you are also able to
filter out parts of a picture with a special color. Just try and
I'm sure you'll be satisfied.
Hints & Trouble Shooting
------------------------
* In case of stripes and empty lines check your printer margins
(DIP switches, preferences setting, settings within the program
you use,...). Also make sure your computer does have enough
memory. Specialy Art Department (TM) Professional 2 users should
use the "MAXMEM" option to make sure the driver does get enough
memory for printing or ADPro will simply print trash or empty
lines. About 100 kb memory should be available before start
printing!
* Data should be sent to the printer only via parallel.device
(par:) or printer.device (prt:) and not both together as this may
confuse the printer.
* In case you found a problem with the driver, please send a
description which makes it possible to reproduce the problem. For
this purpose, you should provide following information:
- The disk contains a Report program. Allways include the
output of this program.
- Which application program are you using and which version?
- Which Workbench revision are you using?
- Include a dump of the program as file (use the CMD program from
the Workbench disk for this) and in printed form.
- In case of problems with the FontShop program, also include
the font.
- and if possible: provide a copy of your used Workbench
disk/application ready set up for printing
* If you are interested in buying AmigaTeX from Radical Eye
Software, you should buy the dvipref AmigaTeX driver. This driver
also needs the 360*360 fonts which come with the dvip6 driver.
* FontShop supports accents. Though, some accents are generated
by combining two chars (for instance ø = o + /). When downloading
such chars in a small size and proportional mode, there might be
some small misalignements (for instance causing a o/ instead of
ø). You can avoid such problems by altering the size of that
special chars or downloading the font in mono space mode.
* Downloaded fonts are not printed? Check you dip switch setting
(see the "installation" chapter)!
* Unable to start FontShop and CanonPref? Make sure you have at
least Kickstart 2.04 and Workbench 2.04 installed right.
* Unable to print? Check you printer cable! Also make sure the
CanonBJ10 driver is selected in the Workbench preferences program!
* Printer doesn't work under Kickstart 2.04 while Kickstart
1.2/1.3 works fine? Check your printer cables "online" and "out
of paper" lines! Make sure they are connected right. Also if a
device is connected to your serial port: try after removing it!
* Paper sheets are ejected and you don't want them to be
ejected? Check your Workbench "paper type" preferences. Note:
the aRIN and aRIS command eject a "used" sheet of paper! So it
might be totaly normal!
* "Printer trouble..." requester? Have a look at the "CanonTime"
environment description on how to avoid such requesters from
appearing! Anyway, clicking on "Resume" will continue the
printings without losses.
* After sending data to the printer, the last page doesn't get
ejected? Check your Workbench preferences paper type setting.
Select "Single" sheet!
* The driver doesn't print graphics? There are several reasons
why this might happen. First check you Workbench disk. Make sure
it is as least Workbench 1.3 and no prerelease version of
Workbench 1.3. Also make sure your computer has enough memory for
printing graphics (100KB should be enough)
* Your graphic dumps are not really black? Try a different ink
cartridge and paper! Believe me: you can get a really black
dumps!
* After switching from Workbench 1.3 to 2.0/2.1 your dumps doesn't
have the same size and resolution? This most likely will happen
to users using the DIN A4 paper size. For instance under
Workbench 1.3 you used the Letter size and after switching to
Workbench 2.0/2.1 the DIN A4 size. Because the CanonBJ10 supports
the new paper sizes (DIN A4,A5...) you get a different printouts
under Workbench 2.0/2.1. Simply switch back to the Letter size to
get the same result.
_\/_
this is it.... END /~ ~\
\| o o |/
-------- ------- <- the author ;-)
\/