Best way to implement printing forms (invoices, etc)?

Niels S. Eliasen nse at delfi-konsult.com
Tue Aug 7 13:52:53 PDT 2012


On 2011-11-12, Helge Blischke <h.blischke at acm.org> wrote:
> Joe Greco wrote:
>
>>> Joe Greco wrote:
>>> You could use the "alternate pstops filter" (see the links on the CUPS
>>> web site). The filter published there is based on the 1.1.19 original; if
>>> you drop me an e-mail, I could send you a more recent source based on
>>> 1.3.5. This filter (use any 1.3.x sources to compile) can easily be used
>>> on 1.4.x (1.5.0 not tested).
>>> When using that filter, you can apply the preprinted forms as a watermark
>>> to the pages with a little bit of PostScript programming.
>> 
>> Wow, that looks kind of promising.  I had talked to some other PostScript
>> hackers about this but it was kind of discouraging.  I haven't written any
>> serious PS in near 20 years and only putter with it very infrequently, so
>> I think the next intelligent question is ... "what's a little bit of
>> PostScript programming?"
>> 
>> I'm not sure I have the time to undertake authoring our forms in PS,
>> though I feel like pstops would be likely to work with this if I did.
>> 
>> It'd be preferable to be able to take an existing PS file (or author new
>> ones using something like Mayura Draw) and use that, but I don't know how
>> possible that really is.  Is that a likely possibility for someone of only
>> modest PostScript skills?
>> 
>> Thanks for the lead, in any case!  I'm going to have to put together a
>> CUPS VM now to go play with this a bit more.
>
> Apart from my last ptoposal, there may be a cheaper (without the need of 
> recompiling a cups filter) way to achieve what you need: I recently browsed 
> my archives and found a backend (written in Perl) which did just do what you 
> want but generating PDFs instead of direct printing. It even offers 
> different "preprints" for different pages of tha output (like a full 
> letterhead for the first page and follow-up forms for the second ff. 
> page(s)). I could easily modify that script to operate as a CUPS filter.

That would be absolutely fantastic!!!!
I have a printing problem, where the output is some 35000 pages/day !!! 
That would _really_ _really_ be appreciated!

and then if there is any way to call macros stored in the printer memory... 
then I would be a happy nerd! :-)

>
> Lwr me know if *this* would be a suitable solution for you.
>
> Helge
>




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