1 HP2XX A HPGL converter into some vector- and raster formats HP2XX reads HPGL ASCII source files, interprets them, and converts them into either another vector-oriented format or one of several rasterfile formats. Currently, its HPGL parser recognizes only a subset of HPGL/2. Some high-level functions like polygon mode and fill patterns are missing. Also, only some of the fixed space vector fonts and none of the variable space arc fonts are supported. Beside these limitations, hp2xx has proven to work with many HP-GL sources without any trouble. USAGE: hp2xx [-options] [hpgl-file(s)] 2 GENERAL_OPTIONS -f Name of outputfile -l Name of optional log file -m Mode -p Pen size(s) -c Pen color(s) -"P" Selected page -q Quiet mode -r Rotation angle -s Name of swap file 3 Description hp2xx reads from stdin or from a file if any given on the command line. If no output file name is given (default), the output automatically goes into a file whose name is derived from the input file name and the current mode. For example, hp2xx -m pcl foo.hpgl writes the output to a file "foo.pcl". Use option -f outfile to specify your output file name explicitly. The program scans the current HPGL source, converts all drawing commands into elementary vectors, saves these in a temporary file, and concurrently determines the maximum coordinate range used. It then processes the vectors by mapping them into a user-defined coordinate system, preserving the aspect ratio of the original data. This coordinate system by default fits into a window of size 200 mm by 200 mm. To change the size of this bounding window, use -h height and -w width to set the (max.) desired height and width of your output picture; optionally use -a aspectfactor to alter the aspect ratio by the given factor (aspectfactor < 1 narrows your picture). The generated picture will always fit into the window defined by -h height and -w width, padded with background color at the lower or right margin if needed. A second way of defining sizes is relying on the size the picture would actually show if plotted on an (A4) sheet of paper by a HP-compatible plotter. By activating flag -t (true size), options -a, -h, and -w are ignored, and the sizes are derived from the HP-GL file assuming that 1 HP unit = 1/40 mm. 3 -f Option Format Default Description -f char * "" Name of output file. "" = autom., "-" = stdout 3 -l Option Format Default Description -l char * "" Name of optional log file By naming a file with option -l log_file you can redirect the diagnostic outputs into the given file, even without a redirection mechanism for stderr like in UNIX shells (e. g., DOS). 3 -m Option Format Default Description -m char * pre Mode. Valid: mf,cad,em,epic,eps,pcl,pcx,pic,img,pbm,pre,uis Use option -m mode to select the program mode, i.e. the output format. Currently supported: mode = "mf" (Metafont), "em" (emTeX \special{} commands), "epic" (line drawing using TeX macros within epic.sty), "eps" (PostScript), "fig" (XFig version 3.1 format), "gpt" (Gnuplot ASCII format), "hpgl" (simplified HP-GL, e.g. for import tasks), "pcl" (HP-PCL Level 3 format (suitable for printing on a HP Laserjet II, DeskJet, or compatible printer), "img" (GEMs IMG format), "pbm" (Portable Bit Map / Portable Pix Map), "pcx" (PC-Paintbrush format, also accepted by MS-Paintbrush and many other PC based pixel renderers), "png" (Portable Network Graphics format), or "rgip" (Uniplex RGIP). If the plot contains colors, hp2xx will automatically create a PPM file instead of a PBM file when pbm mode is selected. There is also a preview option "pre" which supports VGA cards (DOS), ATARI, AMIGA, X11 servers, Sunview and VWS. Default mode is "pre". 4 RASTER_FORMATS The following formats are supported: HP-PCL, PCX, PIC, IMG, PBM/PPM, PNG, and previews. However, generation of other formats is made easy for programmers because of hp2xx's modular structure. The program allocates a bitmap on a line-by-line basis, swapping lines to disk if needed, and plots into this bitmap. Depending on the selected format, a conversion module is then activated, which can easily be replaced by other converters. Add more formats if you like! 5 PRE Preview on all machines. Use options -h -w -o -O -C to define the screen size and position of your output (-o -O -C may not always apply). For VGA cards (DOS), option -V VGAmode gives you a simple way to utilize SVGA modes. Please take care not to define larger windows than your graphics device can handle, as the results are unpredictable. As hp2xx uses standard BIOS calls to set pixels on VGA cards (slow but portable), you can select any hi-res mode supported by your system by simply specifying the mode byte with this option. 5 PCL HP-PCL Level 3 format, most useful for direct printer output. Due to this action, there have been added some extra flags and options: Use flag -i to send a printer initialization sequence before the actual image. Flag -F adds a Form Feed (FF, hex 0C) after the image is completed, which is what you may want most of the time. However, overlay printing of several files is feasible by omitting -F. For additional control of the picture's final position on paper, you may add x or y offsets using -o X_offset or -O Y_offset. E.g., -o 20 -O 30 will give you 30 mm additional top margin and 20 mm additional left margin. Option -C modifies these offsets to center the picture within the frame defined by -w -h. For DeskJet / DeskJet Plus / DeskJet 500 / Deskjet 550 printers, there are some special printer commands. Activate them with option -S n. n=0 switches them off, n=1 activates black/white mode, n=3 (DJ500C and DJ550 only) supports CMY color data, n=4 (DJ550C only) supports CMYK color data. Any n except 0 invokes TIFF data compression. 5 PCX PC-Paintbrush format The size of a PCX picture is controlled via its specified height and the current DPI value. To create a high-resolution PCX image, just increase the DPI value as desired. PCX format does not accept offsets. 5 IMG GEM image format; see PCX. 5 PBM Portable bit map (or PPM, portable pixmap for color plots); see PCX. 5 PIC_and_PAC (Unsupported options) ATARI ST screens (640x400 pixels) can easily be dumped to files. Programs such as STAD accept graphics by including such screen dump files. Graphics filling more than one screenful may be split into screen-size blocks and loaded/mounted blockwise. hp2xx converts to ATARI bitmap format by trying to fit the resulting picture into a single screen equivalent (max. 400 rows, max. 80 Bytes (640 pixel) per row). If it succeeds, hp2xx produces a single output file. Specify ONLY its base name (option -f), since hp2xx adds the file extension ".pic" or ".pac" automatically. Do NOT try to work on more than one HPGL file simultaneously! Do NOT use more than 6 characters for the file name, and avoid digits. If more screen blocks are required horizontally and/or vertically, hp2xx will automatically split the picture into separate files, counting them columnwise (top-to-bottom and left-to-right), adding a two-digit number to the given file name. A maximum of 10 columns is supported. The picture is padded with background color at its right and lower margins, if needed. PAC features file compression, PIC does not. 4 VECTOR_FORMATS Supported vector formats are: TeX/Metafont, emTex-specials, TeX/epic-Macros, Simplified HP-GL, XFig 3.2, Gnuplot ASCII, as well as Uniplex RGIP, and PostScript. Use -m mf to convert a HPGL drawing into a Metafont character to be included into a TeX document as the character "Z" of a special font that you may create. Edit the metafont source, e.g., to change the letter "Z" for another, or to change the line thickness, which is set to 0.4pt by default. The other TeX-related modes ("cad" for TeXcad compatible code, "em" for employing \special{em:line} macros, and "epic" for drawing lines with macros from "epic.sty") address different compromises to cope with TeX's poor line drawing capability and are generally not recommended nor fully supported. Feel free to experiment with them -- they generate ASCII output that should be "input" into TeX/LaTeX documents. Use option -p pensize(s) for control over pensize: The actual Metafont or PostScript pensize will be "pensize * 0.1 mm", with pensize = 0 - 9 (0 = no drawing). The same applies to PostScript mode (-m eps), you also need to use options -o -O -C (see below) for proper margins on paper since hp2xx puts your picture "flush" to the left and upper paper limit by default. Option -p pensize(s) controls the size (in pixels) of the virtual plotting pen. The only implemented shape of the pen tip is a square of the given length. pen sizes of 5 to 9 units will be acccepted but replaced by 4 units. Specifying -p4 when in 75 DPI mode will make pretty clumsy pictures, while you may prefer -p2 over -p1 when in 300 DPI. 3 -p_or_c Option Format Default Description -c char * 11111111 Pen color(s). Valid: 1 to 8 digits of 0-7 each. 0=off, 1=black, 2=red, 3=green, 4=blue, 5=cyan, 6=magenta, 7=yellow. -p char * 11111111 Pensize(s) [dots] (default), [1/10 mm] (mf, ps). Valid: 1 to 8 digits of 0-9 each. A carusel of 8 pens is simulated. You can specify pen sizes and colors for each of these pens via options -p string and -c string. "string" must consist of 1 to 8 digits (0-9 for size, 0-7 for color). Digit number n (counting from left) corresponds to pen number n. The digit value is this pen's color or size in internal units. For raster formats, a unit is a pixel, and for vector format, it corresponds to 1/10 mm (see below). The default size is 1 for all pens. Colors are assigned according to: 0=off, 1=black, 2=red, 3=green, 4=blue, 5=cyan, 6=magenta, 7=yellow. Examples of use: -p22222222 -c33333333 changes all pensizes to 2 units, all colors to green -p302 -c407 makes pen #1 a blue pen of size 3 , pen #3 a yellow pen of size 2, suppresses all drawing with pen #2, and keeps all other pen sizes and colors. 3 -(Capital)P Option Format Default Description -P int 0:0 Selected page range (0 = 0:0 = all pages) Sometimes, HP-GL files contain several pages of plotter output. hp2xx recognizes the HP-GL commands for "feed-forward" or "new page", but by default it draws everything on a single page. You can select any particular page range by using option -P firstpage:lastpage which causes hp2xx to skip all drawing commands except those on the given pages. Please note that even if only a single page is actually drawn, hp2xx will nonetheless process the whole HP-GL file. This makes sure that effects of early pages on internal modes indeed influence later pages, as on a real plotter. 3 -q Option Format Default Description -q off Quiet mode. No diagnostic output. 3 -r rotation_angle (in degrees): Option Format Default Description -r double 0.0 Rotation angle [deg]. -r90 gives landscape allows you to rotate the object prior to all scaling operations. Its main use is to facilitate landscape format: -r90 rotates your whole picture, e.g. from portait to landscape format. However, any reasonable rotation angle is valid. 3 -s Option Format Default Description -s char * hp2xx.swp Name of swap file While processing large pictures at high resolution on low-memory machines, typically under DOS, the program may start swapping. Optionally change the swap file by using -s swapfile, e.g. to speed up processing by swapping to a RAM disk. 2 SIZE_OPTIONS Option Format Default Description -a double 1.0 Aspect factor. Valid: > 0.0 -h double 200 Height [mm] of picture -w double 200 Width [mm] of picture -x double - Preset xmin value of HPGL coordinate range -"X" double - Preset xmax value of HPGL coordinate range -y double - Preset ymin value of HPGL coordinate range -"Y" double - Preset ymax value of HPGL coordinate range -t off True size mode. Inhibits effects of -a -h -w 3 Scaling If you need to process a series of similar objects which should be translated into exactly the same coordinate system, there is a way to override the auto-scaling: First, run all files separately and note the infos on the used coordinate ranges. Then, pick a range that will cover ALL your pictures. You can now assign defaults to the internally generated range limits by specifying -x xmin, -X xmax, -y ymin, and -Y ymax. NOTE: Clipping is NOT supported! If any picture coordinate exceeds your limits, they will be overwritten. 2 RASTER_OPTIONS Option Format Default Description -d int 75 DPI value (x or both x&y) -"D" int 75 DPI value (y only) -e int 0 Extra clipping space If you use a raster format, the picture is rasterized by default into a 75 DPI resolution image. Use option -d DPI_value to change the resolution, e.g. -d300 will cause a HP LJ-II compatible 300 dpi rasterization. There is a way of specifying a different resolution for y direction: -D DPI_y_value Some programs were found, which generate HPGL output with too tight clipping bounds, which lead, for example, to some parts of text characters clipped off. Use option -e extraclip to add some extra amount of space to clip areas to workaround such mistakes. For example, -e 40 will add 40 extra plotter units to every side of clipping box which is 1 mm in true size. 2 PCL_only Option Format Default Description -"F" off Send a FormFeed after graphics data -i off Pre-initialize printer -"S" int 0 (Deskjet) Special commands: 0=off,1=b/w,3=CMY,4=CMYK -d (see Raster) Valid ONLY 300, 150, 100, 75 -"D" (see Raster) INVALID for PCL! 2 EPS_PCL_and_some_previews Option Format Default Description -o double 0.0 x offset [mm] of picture (left margin) -"O" double 0.0 y offset [mm] of picture (upper margin) 2 Examples % hp2xx -m pcx -f my_output.pcx -d300 -p2222 -h50 -a 1.2 my_input.hp creates a PCX file at 300 DPI of height 50 mm, using an aspect factor of 1.2 and a pen size of 2 pixels for pens 1-4. % my_hpgl_generator | hp2xx -f- -o20 -O30 -F -q | lpr -P my_PCL_printer HPGL output is piped through hp2xx; the resulting PCL code is piped to the printer queue, giving an image of height 100 mm at 75 DPI. An additional left margin of 20mm and upper margin of 30mm is created. A formfeed will be added (handy if your printer queue does not). % hp2xx my_input.hp Preview on screen or into window. 2 Original Author (maintainer until 3.2.0) Heinz W. Werntges, Physikal. Biologie, Geb. 26.12, Heinrich-Heine-Universitaet, D-40225 Duesseldorf, Germany. Internet: werntges@convex.rz.uni-duesseldorf.de Maintainer/author since version 3.3.0 Martin Kroeker, Daveg GmbH, Schottener Weg 2, D-64289 Darmstadt, Germany. mk@daveg.com OR martin@ruby.chemie.uni-freiburg.de ATARI features & PIC, PAC, IMG modes are due to Norbert Meyer, Duesseldorf. AMIGA version & PBM mode are due to Claus Langhans, Kelkheim (Ts.) X11 previewer is due to Michael Schoene, Duesseldorf. Thanks for VAX support and a lot of testing to Michael Schmitz & Gerhard Steger, Duesseldorf (See the acknowledgement in the TEXINFO doc file for later contributors.) Many OS/2 helps were due to Host Szillat, Berlin. 2 Diagnostics The number of ignored and/or unknown HPGL commands is given. You will be informed if swapping starts. Progress is indicated by a logarithmic count of internal vectors during scanning and plotting, or by dots during (raster mode) output, where each dot corresponds to 10 scan lines. 2 Bugs There still are many non-implemented HPGL commands. The color assignment of some X11 servers leaves something to be desired. Color is only partially supported (not all possible formats). VGA preview: Color "magenta" shows as brown on some VGA cards. To match the specified sizes on your display during preview, you may have to calibrate it using -d -D, e.g. by overwriting the 75 DPI default. Only little testing has been done on TeX-related and ATARI formats, so be prepared for bugs there, and PLEASE report them -- thank you! 2 See_also F. Sowa's raster-to-TeXfont converter.