2022.2

Using an ASCII file on a printer
If an ASCII file gets sent to a printer (which is possible in a PlanetPress Suite solution), you need to
know if your printer supports binary mode as this is the recommended mode for ASCII emulation. On
printers that support binary mode, you can switch the printer to binary mode using the printer keypad or
by sending the appropriate PostScript code to the printer.
In binary mode, the printer reads the end of line characters (carriage return [CR], line feed [LF], and car-
riage return followed by a line feed [CRLF]) as they appear in the data stream and does not perform any
substitution. A printer that does not support binary mode or is not running in binary mode replaces any
CR, LF, or CRLF that appears at the end of a line of data with a LF.
A form feed signals the end of a data page in ASCII emulation. If no form feed occurs in the data
stream, the emulation adds data to the data page buffer until the buffer is full.
ASCII emulation options
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Tab on carriage return: Select this option to fix formatting problems caused by isolated CR char-
acters found within the data. When this option is selected, isolated CR characters are spaces, as
defined in the Number of spaces in the tab box below. Note that this option is available only when
the Read in binary mode option is selected.
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Number of spaces in the tab: Enter the number of spaces you want the application to use
when an isolated carriage return character is found within the data. This number typically
corresponds to the maximum column number. If your data is formatted so as to occupy a
maximum of 120 characters on each line, enter a value of 120 in this box, so when an isol-
ated CR character is found, the data following the CR character will appear starting from
column 121. Note that this option is available only when the Tab on carriage return option
is selected
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Number of spaces per tab: Enter the number of spaces you want to use when actual TAB char-
acters are found within the data.
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Remove HP PCL escapes: Select if you want all Hewlett Packard Printer Control Language
escape sequences to be removed from the data.
Channel skip emulation
Channel skip emulation is a variant of line printer emulation. It tells the process to read the data stream
one line at a time, and to treat the first character of each line as a code that indicates how to position
the line of data in the data page buffer.
By default, in channel skip emulation, the integer 1 signals the end of a data page. You can change this
default when you set up the emulation.
Note that if a given value is used for multiple channels, the result may be different at design time, or
when a PlanetPress Design document is previewed or printed.
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