2.11BSD/src/local/mp/TODO
* From David Freudenstein <dfreuden@cfdev1454.shearson.com>
From Peter W. Osel <pwo@ztivax.siemens.com>
mp v2.5.5 will crash the xnews server if used with pageview under
OpenWindows v2.0.
mp v2.5.5 will not print to an Apple LaserWriterII NTX.
These problems are probably caused by something in the new PostScript
introduced in the last couple of patches. This previous TODO entry from
Francois Ougier <ougier@saphir.cl.bull.fr> gives a pointer to where the
problem may lie:
- From Francois Ougier <ougier@saphir.cl.bull.fr>
I'm not a PostScript expert, but the way CharStrings is used seems to
inhibit the font cache machinery; this may cause the abort. However, I
found a solution in the Adobe's red book which works on my LaserWriter.
It uses the Metrics dictionary.
Previewing to pageview under OpenWindows V3 works fine, as does printing to
a SPARCprinter.
* From Peter W. Osel <pwo@ztivax.siemens.com>
If I print multiple mail messages (i.e. a mail folder or several tagged
messages in elm) only the ``message text'' of the first message is printed
in the correct font, Courier. All subsequent messages are printed in Times
(I guess).
Repeat by: cd mp_src/Data ; mp -m MailFolder | lpr -h
* From Peter W. Osel <pwo@ztivax.siemens.com>
I often use the landscape mode and sometimes I use it to print on both sides
of the paper. I would like to have the "Page# Box" alternating on the left
and right side of the pages. It should also be possible to select whether
the "Page# Box" on odd pages is on the left or right side.
+----------------------+ +----------------------+
!# ######## ######## #! !######## # # ########!
! ! ! !
!Page1 Page2 ! !Page1 Page2 !
! ! ! !
! ! ! !
!########## ##########! !########## ##########!
+----------------------+ +----------------------+
If you put this in a A4 If you properly rearrange
Folder, the Page# is on the pages and print duplex,
the outer edge on both you can fold this and have
sides. A5 double sided print with
Page# on the outer edge too
* From Peter W. Osel <pwo@ztivax.siemens.com>
I tried the landscape mode of mp for A4 paper and was surprised that the
headers don't scale vertically, i.e. fewer lines fit on each page. As I
had changed the %%PageLength from 60 to 72, some lines at the bottom are
`lost'.
I would have expected that when switching from normal mode to landscape
mode, I get the same page layout (# of lines), just scaled by a factor of
.7, so that two logical pages fit on on physical page.
I think I stick with multi(1) a shell script I wrote that uses multi.ps
from Ross Cartlidge <rossc@extro.ucc.su.oz>. multi.ps prints multiple
logical pages on one physical page (two, four, ...). It is applicable
for all PostScript files. Perhaps mp should not support a landscape mode,
but rely on multi/multi.ps? This would fit into the unix tool/filter
philosophy. And the user could use multi in combination with other
PostScript files generated by other tools, too.
* From Larry W. Virden <lwv27%cas.BITNET@CUNYVM.CUNY.Edu>
Is there any thought of adding support within mp's newsp program to
print more of the news article header? My dream would be to be able
to tell newsp (via a .newsprc perhaps?) a set of headers to print using
the same syntax as rn - or even having newsp USE my .rnrc file .
* From Michael J. Tuchiarone <tooch@plan9.Sun.COM>
The ability to better handle different page sizes depending perhaps on a
command line options, or an environment variable, or a LOCALE setting or ...
* From Michael Kerstetter <msk@betelgeuse.boeing.com>
Needs the inclusion of command line options to turn off the top and
bottom banners. In the context of 'mp', if banners were being used,
I envision the top and bottom banners just being reversed, if banners
were off, I'd envision just the page number appearing at the bottom
of the page. Finally, a lot of the printing I do is just quick, few
frills printing of ASCII files, and to support that I would find it
convenient to be able to define left, right, top, and bottom margins
in the 'mp' command line.
* From Lupe Christoph <lupe@alanya.Germany.Sun.COM>
There are so many personal organisers all over the world that you need a
more general scheme. What about a flag that takes the name of the personal
organisers and sticks it in the mp.pro.%s.ps string ?
Of course you need at least a short writeup on how to create these.
Better, a short program that takes a general mp.pro.organiser.ps and
substitutes a few variables. Or you can use short PostScript fragments,
one for each personal organisers.
* From Johan Vromans <jv@mh.nl>
A command line option to have page numbers reset to 1 when printing a
new element of a mailfolder or digest.
* From Peter Collinson <pc@hillside.co.uk>
With regards to the -F (Mail from .....) option:
A more general solution might be to allow a specification on the command
line - I envisage something like
-f 'Mail from %from%'
-f 'Subject: %subject%'
of course `f' isn't available but you get the drift.
* From Paul Higgins <phiggins@orion.oac.uci.edu>
If there are two "Cc" lines in the message, only one gets printed.
* From Paul Higgins <phiggins@orion.oac.uci.edu>
A -T option, analogous to -F, which prints the name from the mail's
"To" field in the top header. [This is not straight forward, because
there can be multiple To: lines and they can be quite lengthy].
* From Andy Norman <ange@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
The time-manager style doesn't appear to quite work for A4. The dotted
lines aren't visible on the top and left of the page. It looks like it
needs shifting southeast a little bit.
* From Andy Norman <ange@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
It would be nice if sed automatically set the page length for the
PostScript prologue files from the Makefile.
* From Andy Norman <ange@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
The chunk in the Makefile that makes links has a variant of 'echo' that
doesn't work on SysV-like systems. 'echo -n "foobar"' looks like
'echo "foobar\c" on SysV.
* From Felix Ingrand <felix@ai.sri.com>
By default, it seems more appropriate to use PAGELENGTH 69 on US paper.
It is not enought to change PAGELENGTH in mp.h, but you have to change
it in the ps prolog too...
* The ability to be able to change the number of "words" extracted from
the user's gecos field, and the maximum number of characters extracted,
via a command line option, for those sites which don't have source to mp.
* From Nick Lochrin <nick@stca77.stc.oz.au>
When printing out digests that consist of mail articles (eg comp.risks)
using "digestp -l" (for landscape format), if the mail articles are
longer than the page, then the footer, which contains the Subject of the
message on that page, obscures some lines of the text (by about 1 inch).
BTW, I am using the A4 paper size defaults, with the following
parameters set in mp.pro.l.ps:
PageLength 72
LineLength 80
/fullwidth 8.5 inch def
/fullheight 11.4 inch def
* From Rory Morris <rory@Aus.Sun.COM>
An option to have some form of dividing line down the middle of the page
in landscape mode.
* The ability to specify a set or range of pages to be printed, rather than
printing the whole file.
* From Gerry Bluhm <Gerald.Bluhm@East.Sun.COM>
The ability to specify which alternate mail or news header lines to be
printed, and which standard ones to suppress.
* From DaviD W. Sanderson <dws@cs.wisc.edu>
Add a new option for indenting the left margin by a given amount (columns,
perhaps, or maybe inches or centimeters). As it is, the text comes out too
close to the left margin to allow for punching holes and putting in a binder.
* From Dan Jacobson <Dan_Jacobson@ATT.COM>
Need an additional command line switch to tell mp to print all headers.
* From John Mackin <john@ditsydh.syd.dit.csiro.au>
If you give mp many arguments, each of which is a file containing a mail
item (just RFC822 headers, no UNIX From_ line), and one of the files has
a Cc: header (haven't checked case matching), then not only that page
but also _all subsequent pages printed_, i.e. even after we are in a whole
new mail item, have that Cc: header printed on them.
* From John Mackin <john@ditsydh.syd.dit.csiro.au>
I know saying what headers you want and don't want is already in the TODO
file. Just let me add my vote for that as a very important feature. Also,
I think the way the headers should work even if the user can't specify the
ones they want is that there should be an _exclusion_ list (like say
Received:) and anything not on the exclusion list should be included.
* From John Mackin <john@ditsydh.syd.dit.csiro.au>
If you are going to set the headers in a non-constant-width font, and I do
agree that that looks quite nice, then you _must_ make sure you set the tabs
correctly. It's not uncommon for me to line up continuation lines at the
right spot using tabs, and I hate the way they come out all wrong under mp.
I guess in concept it is the same: measure the width of the stuff up to where
the tab stop would go with constant-width characters, measure the width of
the same characters in the fonts actually in use, set the tab stop(s).
Perhaps painful, but necessary.
* From John Mackin <john@ditsydh.syd.dit.csiro.au>
I read news with rn, and I save it in mbox format. That means I can print a
file of saved news as a mail folder, using -m. Right? Wrong. I _can_, but
it comes out terrible. I need to convert the From_ lines to use the addresses
in the From: lines, and do random other hacks. (And by the way, after I've
done that, even though -m is set, and it is recognising the From_ lines, it
still sees the Newsgroups: headers and prints "News for John Mackin" at the
top left. I consider this a feature.)
* From John Mackin <john@ditsydh.syd.dit.csiro.au>
Why is the bottom margin, between where you cause a page break in the text
of the item and the grey lozenge, so huge? I don't see why it shouldn't be
the same size as the margin between the top lozenge and the beginning of the
headers.
* From Ken Cross <ken@admin1.Aus.Sun.COM>
It would be nice to have an option to print out the page number / total;
ie. 1/10, 2/10...
* From David W. Smith <dws@dbsoft.com>
There seem to be two camps of half-size (5.5" x 8.5") organizers; one with
6 holes, the other with 7. Rather than trying to enumerate the names (or
their abbreviations) as command line options, two options, -hp6 and -hp7
(for half-page 6-hole, and half-page 7-hole), would probably satisfy 95%
of the folks in the States. If you think that to be a workable idea, I'll
supply you with a pair of prologues for the two formats.
* From Fulvio Marino <fulvio@ssuxos.ICO.OLIVETTI.COM>
What about substituting the "-A4" and "-US" options of mp with
"-X[dots] -Y[dots]", to cover any kind of paper size ? and to add a way
to specify the "unprintable margins" size ?
* From Bertrand Decouty <Bertrand.Decouty@irisa.fr>
An option for printing the time of last modification of the files to be
printed, a-la enscript. Time of day is nice but not very useful when
printing a file.
* From Bertrand Decouty <Bertrand.Decouty@irisa.fr>
From Rainer Klute <klute@tommy.informatik.uni-dortmund.de>
Paper size should be taken from the printer, not from the PostScript
prologue or command line options.
initclip clippath pathbbox
/ury exch def
/urx exch def
/lly exch def
/llx exch def
/fullwidth urx llx sub def
/fullheight ury lly sub def
From Bjorn P. Brox <brox@dms.corena.no>
Display PostScript (Version 1006.6) returns values which won't work
correctly this way.
[This also is a problem using pageview with Open Windows V3(FCS) - Rich].
* From Bertrand Decouty <Bertrand.Decouty@irisa.fr>
As for the default, hard-coded in main.c, paper size, either don't put
any default, or make it defined in the Makefile (-DPAPER_SIZE=A4)
* From David Kerr <dwk@Aus.Sun.COM>
An option to alway print out the date for mail messages, in the format:
Thu, 5 Jul 90 23:46:07 EST
as opposed to taking it from the Date: line in the mail message.
* From Bjorn P. Brox <brox@dms.corena.no>
The mailp script needs to understand and handle the -A4 and -US command
line options.