Ray DiBugnara, 18 Meadow Road, Bolton, MA 01740-1120
August 18, 1993
(America Online ╥RayDiBug╙)
(Internet RayDiBug@AOL.COM)
INTRODUCTION
For any Apple Macintosh computer and HP Color (500C or 550C) or BW Deskwriter printer. This Greyscale Version 2.3 supports most drawing and graphics programs, gives several grayscale translation choices and has specific support for perfect horizontal/vertical gray hairlines (0.25 point) in 12.5%, 25% and 50% gray values).
REVISION HISTORY
Version 1.0 is the original release.
Version 2.0.X increased support for more applications and generated four different Greyscale options. Support for color and the 550C printer was also distributed as a separate file.
Version 2.2 supports the latest HP drivers including color version 3.0 and black and white version 3.9. Also both color and BW files are now bundled together.
Version 2.2a adds support for BW version 4.0 and also corrects a file labeling error. The DW 550C folder had a version 2.0 AND a version 3.0 identified. In fact, the version 3.0 belonged in the DW 500C folder instead. No other changes were made. People who either did not need that file or figured out for themselves the error need not update their files.
Version 2.3 corrects a defective DITL/DLOG with the DW 550C resources that caused the user to be unable to access Page Setup or Print without a bomb (or equivalent). This version also adds, by popular demand, a new soft line greyscale resource which combines the features of both the soft greyscale (SGS) and the line greyscale (LGS).
REQUIREMENTS
1) Requires HP Deskwriter drivers BW versions 2.2, 3.1, 3.9 or 4.0 (4.0 Europe only!) or Color versions 2.0 or 3.0 Serial/Appletalk drivers. Please update any older driver versions before applying this patch.
2) Requires a copy of Apple's ResEdit (2.1 and 2.1.1 are the latest). If you don't have a copy, ask a friend to help you.
3) Requires that you care if you have high quality grayscales in your printer output.
INCLUDED FILES
Greyscales Made Easy (The file you are reading)
Greyscales PICT (Sample Greyscale Demo File)
Read Me First (A quickie introduction)
SuperLaserSpool Users (Conflict resolutions)
QuickBASIC Users (Deskwriter printing problems)
Driver 3.9 Bugs (Minor glitches with BW 3.9)
Plus the following folders (─) and their contents╔
Blank and White Folder
Deskwriter 2.2
DW 2.2-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
DW 2.2-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
DW 2.2-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
DW 2.2-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
DW 2.2-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Deskwriter 3.1
DW 3.1-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
DW 3.1-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
DW 3.1-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
DW 3.1-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
DW 3.1-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Deskwriter 3.9
DW 3.9-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
DW 3.9-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
DW 3.9-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
DW 3.9-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
DW 3.9-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Deskwriter 4.0 (Europe Only!)
DW 4.0-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
DW 4.0-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
DW 4.0-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
DW 4.0-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
DW 4.0-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Color 500C Folder
Deskwriter 500C 2.0
CDW 2.0-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
CDW 2.0-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
CDW 2.0-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
CDW 2.0-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
CDW 2.0-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Deskwriter 500C 3.0
CDW 3.0-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
CDW 3.0-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
CDW 3.0-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
CDW 3.0-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
CDW 3.0-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Color 550C Folder
Deskwriter 550C 2.0
CDWC 2.0-GS 2.3 rsc (Normal Greyscale)
CDWC 2.0-SGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Greyscale)
CDWC 2.0-DGS 2.3 rsc (Direct Greyscale)
CDWC 2.0-LGS 2.3 rsc (Line Greyscale)
CDWC 2.0-SLGS 2.3 rsc (Soft Line Greyscale)
Of course, the most you will need is four resource files for the particular printer driver you are using, one for each of four custom driver copies you can make.
BEGIN
Fixes the Deskwriter's grayscale performance for Canvas¬ 3.0.X, MacDraw II, Superpaint (including 3.0), MacDraft II, WingZ, Resolve, Word (including 5.1) Excel (including 4.0), Inspiration (including 4.0), and probably most other applications that use QuickDraw object grayscales. The Line Greyscale, one of the four Greyscale options and a unique variation, is optimized for Canvas¬ but may work with many others.
Q) What do you mean, QuickDraw object grayscales?
A) Drawing programs and most other applications (Excel, etc.) use Apple's QuickDraw for drawing objects. This includes its own system for making grayscales. Paint programs, however, address the printer directly on a dot-by-dot basis bypassing the QuickDraw gray patterns. These will not be affected by this patch.
Q) I have the latest version of HP's driver and it shows a check box that says ╥Print in Grayscale╙. Isn't that the same thing as your resource?
A) No it isn't. That has to do with printing special color or BW files that actually specify grayscale depth per pixel. Your driver will attempt to interpret this information and produce a reasonable gray effect. You have probably already noticed that clicking the check box usually doesn't make any difference. If you don't have one of these file types (and the application to support it), that option won't work. On the other hand, these QuickDraw Greyscale resources I'm giving you will work all the time.
Q) I have a color printer. What do I want with a grayscale?
A) Grayscale is just a term to signify various shades between black and white. For color printers, it would be various shades between red and white, green and white, etc. This Greyscale resource package fixes all Deskwriter grayscale.
Q) What's broken?
A) Nothing is really broken. Grayscales are merely black (or color) and white dot patterns arranged to approximate a shade. On your computer screen, these dots are arrayed in a ╥clunky╙ 72 dots per inch (DPI) pattern. Your Deskwriter, however, is capable of an elegant 300 DPI pattern. The 72 DPI grayscale needs to be translated to a 300 DPI grayscale.
Q) I thought I already had 300 DPI?
A) You do! Your fonts and all your drawing objects are sent at 300 DPI. But patterns (grayscales included) are transmitted to the printer by the application at 72 DPI to the Deskwriter because it is a QuickDraw device and that is how things are done for patterns.
Q) Then there is nothing I can really do about it, is there?
A) But yes! Hewlett Packard (HP), in their infinite wisdom, put into each of their Deskwriter drivers (Versions 2.X and the latest 3.X) two conversion tables in a resource called ╥PAT#╙. One table contains a list of 72 DPI grayscales and the other a list of 300 DPI grayscales. There are 21 conversions in the version 2.X table and 15 in the version 3.X table.
Q) So?
A) So if a 72 DPI grayscale matches one of the 15 patterns in the first table, the Deskwriter immediately substitutes the 300 DPI grayscale pattern from the second table. Clever, no?
Q) Then I already have 300 DPI grayscales covered, right?
A) Well, yes and no. Not every drawing program uses the same pattern to approximate the same gray shade. HP designed their Deskwriter 3.X tables to make every drawing program deliver the same gray shade pattern. To make this work, however, the results come out at only 75 DPI (or 150 DPI for 4 grays, 12%, 25%, 50% and 75% gray) which isn't much of an improvement. The older Deskwriter 2.X had a couple of 300 DPI patterns but the rest were 75 DPI.
Q) Is that why I sometimes got a really smooth gray in one shade but a spotty gray in another shade with Version 2.X?
A) That is correct!
Q) So how did you fix this?
A) I changed the PAT# table. For the 72 DPI side, I installed a much more extensive pattern list matching every drawing program and application I could get my hands on. There are a maximum of 64 gray patterns, not counting white.
Q) How can you substitute 64 patterns when there were only 15 to begin with? Won't the rest be ignored?
A) The HP programmers wrote their code to never assume a fixed number in their table. They always accommodate any size table. This is real programming professionalism.
Q) Was this as easy as it sounds?
A) Not really. It required examining how each drawing program established their gray patterns. Unfortunately, not everyone uses the same definitions. If I have missed anyone's drawing program, I apologize but there is a finite number of patterns that will fit in the conversion table (about 130).
Q) How do I know what driver version I currently have?
A) From two places. In the Finder, select your current driver and use GetInfo to find the version number. From Page Setup or Print, one of the dialog boxes should have the version number. If you have version 1.X (less than 2), please update to a newer driver as almost nobody is using these anymore╔so I didn't make a grayscale conversion for them.. The new drivers are free from your HP dealer. Use 2.X if you are cramped for space otherwise use 3.X.
Q) Why have you supplied five grayscale resource files for each driver? I only have one printer, after all.
A) Greyscale Version 2.3 allows several choices. When the Deskwriter squirts a black dot, the ink spreads out a bit so that a black dot is always larger than a white dot. This means that a 50% dot pattern would look more like a 75% pattern--a bit dark. Each file gives a different choice of gray pattern conversion to suit individual requirements. And so, the four choices╔
THE DIFFERENT GREYSCALES
1) The Normal Greyscale corrects for ink dot bleed out with a 3:2 grayscale reduction conversion.
2) The Soft Greyscale reduces the gray intensity by 2:1 to give softer grays and less wetting of the paper. This is best for Xerox duplication, overhead projection slides, etc. It also uses less ink.
3) The Direct Greyscale gives a 1:1 gray conversion. Of course this makes a much darker copy but it replicates the original dot-for-dot pattern and is included for the purist. Also, special HP clay bearing papers produce finer dots than standard Xerox paper and some users may find it preferable.
4) The Line Greyscale is a limited Direct Greyscale plus certain horizontal, vertical and diagonal 300 DPI patterns for printing fine vertical and horizontal hairlines (or fine line fills) such as would be used to make forms, etc. These special patterns approximate 12.5% gray, 25% gray and 50% gray. (They appear as miniature diagonals or perpendicular lines which is why they make such uniform gray hairlines.) However, if your drawing program can generate fine dashed lines on its own, you may not need this feature. The Greyscale Demo PICT file contains some gray hairlines that, as you will see, only print correctly with the Line Greyscale driver.
5) The Soft Line Greyscale is exactly like the Line Greyscale as far as line support goes but uses the softer greys of the Soft Greyscale driver. This was added by ╥popular╙ demand. As with the Line Greyscale, it too is limited.
Q) Why do you say that the Line Greyscales are ╥limited╙.
A) Well, the Deskwriter driver only handles about 130 patterns which are all taken up now to service as many drawing programs as possible. To add the fine line support, I had to remove many gray interpreter patterns. I did, however, keep all of the Canvas¬ patterns.
Q) Your PICT file lists grays in 1% increments but you said there was only 64 total shades. How is this possible?
A) On an HP Deskwriter, it isn't. You will note that sometimes 2 side-by-side shades are identical. The 1% increments are used by Canvas¬ for selection purposes but can only be displayed in increments of 1/64, or less.
Q) What do you mean by, ╥Or less.╙?
A) The Direct Greyscale uses all 64 grays but appears, as previously mentioned, on the dark side because of the large ink dots. The Soft Greyscale, which uses a 2:1 reduction, only has 32 grays in increments of 1/32 because of the compression. The Normal Greyscale is half way between Direct and Soft and has about 48 grays.
Q) Which do I use?
A) You can try them all. Up to 5 Deskwriter print drivers, the original plus 4 modified drivers, are possible. You can select which one you want at the time you print by using the Chooser.
Q) You've mentioned Canvas¬ a number of times now. I don't have Canvas¬ so will Greyscale do me any good?
A) Absolutely. I did try to accommodate as many drawing programs as I could. Give it a try and see if you like it. Use your own drawings to try it out. Many grays patterns should work well and, if you're lucky, all of them will.
Q) OK, let's cut to the bottom line! How do I fix my Deskwriter?
A) You don't touch your printer, just the software driver in the System Folder. Follow the instructions.
INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
1) Locate the Deskwriter driver (either version) in your System Folder (Extensions Folder inside System Folder for System 7). Make a copy(s) of it (Command-D) and name it differently from the original. For example, I use ╥DW 3.1 GS╙. Just add the ╥GS╙ or ╥SGS╙, etc. after the name so it is easy to identify. To simplify things, use the same name for the driver as the resource file except don't use the ╥ rsc╙ at the end of the name. The name, however, is not critical.
2) The required resources are in the corresponding 4 files (per driver type) I gave you. Launch ResEdit and open this file. A small window will reveal 4 resources: ╥PAT#╙, ╥DITL╙, ╥DLOG╙ and ╥vers╙. Select all four (Command-A) and copy (Command-C). Close the window. Keep ResEdit open.
3) Open the Deskwriter driver copy you made (don't work on the original, please!). When the window opens, (lots of resources will show) just paste (Command-V). Answer ╥Yes╙ (and only Yes--you want to keep the same ID numbers) to the dialog that asks if you wish the replace the old resources. Close the window. Answer ╥Yes╙ to the dialog asking if you want to save the changes.
4) Repeat for each additional driver and then quit ResEdit. Keep the files straight if you are modifying more than one. That's all there is to it!
5) You may use the driver immediately without restarting. After you restart your computer, however, the Get Info box of that driver will now include something like ╥Greyscale by Ray DiBugnara╙ so you can always tell a converted driver. Also, ╥Page Setup╙ and ╥Print╙ will have a ╥Greyscale 2.3╙ (or whatever is appropriate) appended to the ╥Deskwriter╙ name.
6) If you select Chooser from the Apple Menu, you will now see all Deskwriter drivers--the original and the various grayscale versions. For version 3.X, print spooling works for all drivers (after you turn it on for each new driver). You can compare documents printed with each drivers╔the stock version and the four 300 DPI grayscale versions.
7) I have included a demo file for you to open and print. It is in the PICT format so any drawing program you have can open it and print it. I think you will be pleasantly surprised. This PICT file contains grayscale assignments from 1% to 100%. As mentioned earlier, since the Mac has grayscales from 0 to 64 in steps of 1/64, sometimes two adjacent percent gray samples will appear identical. This Greyscale modification is merely interpreting the best it can.
MORE QUESTIONS
Q) I'm afraid to use ResEdit because I don't know how. What should I do?
A) That's what friends (or customer support) are for. You can either ask them for help, or, you can be daring and follow the step by step instructions and try it yourself. You will be using copies of the drivers and ResEdit 2.1.1 is pretty good at warning you about mistakes. Your dealer can supply you a copy of ResEdit 2.1.1 if you don't have one. An extensive instructions file comes with the application. ResEdit is what makes the Macintosh unique.
Q) Why didn't HP do this grayscale fix in the first place?
A) I don't know. I'm sure the courser 75 and 150 DPI patterns copy better on cheaper Xerox copiers, but with the newer copiers, I prefer the finer gray patterns. Maybe someday HP will allow you the choose the grayscale resolution right from the Print dialog.
Q) How much is this gonna cost me?
A) Let me see╔I've had to double my previous price (which was zip) so, 2 x zip = zip! I guess it's still zip. Greyscale is free to use and to give away. Such a deal! Just keep ALL the files together if you give away a copy. This package, if kept together with all files, may also be freely distributed (and installed) by any organization as part of any profit or non-profit program with just a simple postcard letting me know who you are. (Postcards or EMail of encouragement from regular users are also appreciated.)
Q) Can anything go wrong?
A) The modifications are harmless and you can always switch back to the original driver. However, if you use SuperLaserSpool, you will find that SLS gets confused by the nearly identical drivers and sometimes won't change them even when you have used the Chooser. Update the drivers to version 3.X and use HP's own spooler which not only is faster but doesn't get confused with the different drivers. (See the separate file: SuperLaserSpool Users.)
SOME ADVICE
Keep your Deskwriter clean. Dirty contacts or plugged jets on the inkjet head can cause missing dots. Also, the shiny chrome rod that the print head slides on can get dirty causing the head to shudder ever so slightly. This can cause slight irregularities or stripes in an otherwise smooth gray pattern. Consult with an HP service center on what to do if this problem should occur.
The HP large capacity ink cartridges have a tendency to skip or misfire when first used after sitting a while leaving fine vertical white lines at the top of the first page. Either use a ╥primer╙ page or switch back to the older standard capacity cartridge.
AND MORE QUESTIONS
Q) Hey, I installed your previous version of Greyscales 2.0. What should I do?
A) Update to version 2.3 as enough things have changed since 2.0 that it's just easier to update. You just paste 2.3 resources directly over any previous version. You do not have to make new driver copies (unless you have a new driver).
Q) Your sample file prints perfectly on my drawing program but when I select my own gray patterns, a few of them are 75 DPI. Why is that?
A) The sample file uses gray patterns which are all compatible with Greyscale 2.3 which your program uses to print. However, to make new patterns, your program uses its own gray patterns and, apparently, a few may not covered by Greyscale 2.3. Sorry!
Q) Will this work on both the serial and Appletalk driver?
A) Yes!
Q) What if I get an even newer version of the Deskwriter driver?
A) Chances are Greyscale 2.3 will still work if you copy only the PAT# and vers resource. Don't copy the DITL and DLOG resource since they are version specific. If that doesn't work, send me a copy of the driver resources DITL, DLOG, PAT# and vers (via America Online) and I'll work on it.
Q) I installed Greyscale 2.3 and now all my grayscales have become very clunky and worse than they were before.
A) Either you accidentally damaged the driver or you are running another print spooler besides HP Print Monitor (Like SuperLaserSpool, for instance!).
Q) So, what do I do?
A) Trash the defective driver, re-read the instructions and re-create the driver. (And don't feel bad because I did this once myself and I wrote this thing!) That should fix it.
Q) Well I did and it didn't. Now what?
A) Turn off your spooler. If it prints OK now, then you have a spooler problem. If the spooler is HP Print Monitor, then search in the System Folder (or Extensions Folder) for ╥Printer ZSM 1╙ and trash it. That is the temporary spooler driver copy and, maybe, it became corrupted. (SuperLaserSpool also makes driver copies and in covered in a separate notice in this package.)
Q) You're a real peach for doing this for us!
A) Aw, shucks.
FINALLY
Well, there you have it. Humor aside, I do hope you all enjoy this latest Greyscale 2.3 effort for the Deskwriter.
