[cups.general] Scaling documents to different page sizes?

[Helge Blischke]

Alex Dyas wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> Env - Ubuntu 12.04, CUPS 1.5.3-0ubuntu4
> 
> Our aim is to give our users an easy way of scaling documents to different
> page sizes.  For instance, printing an OpenOffice text document created as
> A4, scaled up to A3 paper.  Or printing a PDF originally created as A5
> onto A4 paper, scaled accordingly.
> 
> We have been looking for some time now on a consistent way to do this, and
> so far we have not found a good solution.  Does anyone have any advice? 
> Seems to be quite a simple requirement.  The solution needs to be driver
> and application independent.  We have a substantial number of different
> printers in our environment, and we'd like a solution that works from any
> application that can print.
> 
> The closest we have come is creating CUPS printer instances with specific
> options, but it seems that printer instances are not fully supported by
> all applications, so we have abandoned this avenue.
> 
> Thanks in advance,
> 
> Alex
> 

If your printers are native PostScript printers (language level 2 at least), 
I could provide you with a JobPatchFile to be included in the printer's PPD 
which should do the scaling.
The current implementation requires the /Policies <</PageSize 3>> as a page 
device parameter, as it has been developed to emulate this vehaviour on 
printers the PS interpreter of which is faulty in this respect, but that 
could easily be modified.
But note, as many PS interpreters around on real printers sufer from one or 
the other deficency, you may need to test and modify is when needed.

Let me know if this is an option for you.

Helge