Bad PostScript data generated -- any way to diagnose?

[Alex Taylor]

On Fri, 15 Oct 2010 11:12:17 UTC, Helge Blischke <h.blischke at acm.org> wrote:

> > The problem is that running the file through CUPS results in an
> > unprintable file.  Here is the output of the same file, immediately
> > after being processed by pstops and foomatic-rip:
> >   http://users.socis.ca/~ataylo00/output_ps_bad.zip  (114 KB)
> 
> isn't this just the case we fiddled around about a month ago (the OS/2 
> issue)?

Yes, although with somewhat farther-evolved diagnosis on my part.  As
posted on .development, I thought it best to move the thread to the 
..general list.


> If you - as a test - edit the foomatic-rip.ps and comment out the end 
> statement immediately preceding the showpage (i. e. prepend a % the the 
> end), it will be rendered by ghostscript (yes, even 9.00) and print OK 
> on a real printer (a OKI C3600 in my case).

Indeed, the generated output file looks much cleaner now.  (I can't
actually test printing it until Monday, when I'm back at work...)


> The reason for the failure is that the setup section (the first one) 
> contains a  a "200 dict begin" near the beginning (to be precise, in 
> line 99), and this (anonymous) dictionary is popped off from the 
> dictionary stack just preceding the showpage statement.

OK.  Given my near-zero level knowledge of PostScript, I'll have to 
take your word for that. <g>

> I think as you may not be able to modify the presentation manager of 
> OS/2, the only way to settle this issue is to implement a prefilter in 
> CUPS for the file type "application/postscript" that checks for 
> %%Creator: Presentation Manager and, if true, edits the PS file 
> appropriately.

Actually, we do have the source code for the PostScript presentation 
driver; we've already made some minor modifications to it, so this 
may well be within our powers as well. :)


> In order to know what to do in detail I'd need to know how jobs look 
> like that contain more than only one page.

I'll try and produce one shortly.

Thanks!

-- 
Alex Taylor
Fukushima, Japan
http://www.socis.ca/~ataylo00

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