Re: Misc. Questions: vDosXy | NB

["John Paines" dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxx (Redacted sender "vf200@xxxxxxxx" for DMARC)]

With the proviso that I'm not a user of xy-4,  the answer would seem to be "no".  The automatic detection of HPLJ/PCL6 drivers, and the printing to PDF, is a feature specific to vDos.  However, you can always run vdosxy under Win7 32; which (on a reasonably fast computer) is just as good in my view as running native, and with the added bonus of control over screen fonts, display size of screen fonts, colors, lines per page, etc., and easy exchange to and from the Windows clipboard.  Any Windows printer will be available to you, regardless of brand or interface.


The other alternative is to continue to run under Win7 native, but add a third party printer utility, like DOSPRINTER or (my preference) winprint.exe, available as freeware on the vDos page at sourceforge.  However, you'll need to use a generic or Epson driver -- these emulators typically use Epson escape codes -- and therefore you won't get much control over printer features, beyond underscores, italics and bold, and even that may require some experimentation.  These utilities will, however, print to a HPLJ, typically offering a choice of installed monospaced Windows fonts.


I use both methods on my vDosxy setup, depending on type of document, with macros loading drivers as needed.

 
 
 
 
  From: J R FOX 
 To: "xywrite@xxxxxxxx" 
 Sent: Thursday, June 25, 2015 10:52 PM
 Subject: Re: Misc. Questions: vDosXy | NB
  
 

John,

O.K., different scenario, and just out of curiosity.  I have Xy-4 on another computer, under 32-bit Win-7, where VDosXy is not needed for running Xy.  Does the rest of what you wrote still apply ?  (No PT deltas, as this is Xy-4.)


   Jordan

 
 
 
 
 


  From: John Paines 
 To: "xywrite@xxxxxxxx" 
 Sent: Thursday, June 11, 2015 8:19 PM
 Subject: Re: Misc. Questions: vDosXy | NB
  
 

. . .

Though it *can* print, with limited functionality, to Laser Jet printers, DOSPRINTER can't make use HP LJ drivers and has a number of other limitations.  If you want to use HP LJ drivers and PCL6, try the following:

1) download pcl6.exe from Edward Mendelson's WP reference pages, put it in the vDos directory, load a xywrite HPLJ driver and print.  A pdf of your printer output will print to the screen, which can in turn be sent to any Windows printer, whether or not it's a HP LJ, and/or saved to disk; or

2) same as 1) above, but follow Edward Mendelson's additional instructions, available on the vDos discussion site, for printing directly to the printer, bypassing the need to generate a PDF on screen.

In both cases, the default font with will be HP's "Dark Courier".  You can also use any of the internal scalable PCL6 fonts, with "PT" codes or embedded "PI" codes.