RISC OS 3 Applications Upgrade Disc #1
======================================

Copyright  Acorn Computers Limited, 1994.

This disc contains the following:

  !Printers, version 1.22, containing
    MakePSFont 1.06
    PDriver    3.20
    PDriverDP  4.15
    PDriverPS  4.13
    PDumperSpt 1.09
    RemPrnMsgs 1.00
    RemPrnSpt  0.17
    PDumperDM  0.35
    PDumperIW  0.34
    PDumperLJ  1.04
  !Scrap
  !SysMerge
  !System, containing
    ColourTrans 1.57
  Printers


Distribution
------------

This disc may be freely distributed only for use with RISC OS 3 and only in
its complete form.

Any person or organisation wishing to make this disc available on any public
access on-line system or via public domain, careware or shareware service
should contact Customer Services at Acorn in writing at the address at the
bottom of this file for licensing details. The contents of this disc remain
copyright of Acorn Computers Ltd.


Enhanced RISC OS 3 printer manager
----------------------------------

The enhanced printer manager is designed to run on RISC OS 3.10 or later, and
requires at least 2Mbytes of RAM.

This new version comes out of many discussions with Acorn Education Dealers
and Acorn Education Centres. We have taken into account many of the comments
and we hope that the facilities provided by this new version will answer most
of the points made.


Installation
------------

To support the modifications and extra functionality in !Printers it is
necessary to provide some updated modules on the new disc.  !System contains
an updated version of the ColourTrans module.  Use the !SysMerge application
to update your current version of !System.  A new version of PDumperSupport
and the associated printer driver modules are loaded automatically by
!Printers when needed.


What's new?
-----------

The following changes have been made to !Printers:

1. 'background' printing.
   This very useful feature has been added to the printer manager. In effect,
   this causes printing to be directed to a spool file for files in the
   queue, after which the spool file is then sent to the printer as a
   background activity. Since not all applications support queueing of
   printing, this feature will not work with all applications. Background
   printing is an option selectable in the 'Connection' dialogue box.

2. Improved colour printing support.
   Acorn has been working in conjunction with third parties to design and
   develop new ColourTrans and PDumperSupport modules. In addition to better
   colour rendition at the 256 colour level, the drivers now provide support
   for 24bpp colour rendition through the use of a three pass system. This is
   done transparently to the application and the user. Applications which can
   make use of this include Draw and Artworks. !Paint, and other similar
   sprite-based packages, will not print correctly in colour using 16 million
   colours option. Sprites can be printed from !Draw if you want to print
   using this option.

3. New and improved printer definition files.
   We have a number of new printer definition files for colour and black &
   white printers. Drivers for the Hewlett Packard Deskjet 500C, 550C and
   1200C have been included; the 550C driver will also work correctly for the
   Deskjet 310 colour. The BJC600 has been included as an additional PDF. New
   black and white dot matrix PDF's have been included for various printers.
   The Epson Stylus 800 has been included with its own PDF which will also
   support the other printers in the Stylus range. The original PDF's
   supplied have been improved to provide higher resolution colour printing
   options. The lists of supported printers supplied within each manufacturer
   directory have been significantly updated with information supplied or
   verified in most cases by the manufacturers to include nearly 300 printers
   in total.

4. Reduced disc swapping.
   Single floppy drive users have suffered in the past from the overlaying
   system employed in previous versions of the printer manager. For users of
   dot matrix or Laserjet class printers, the necessity to re-insert the
   printer driver disc has been removed. This should alleviate a lot of
   problems for the floppy disc system users within schools. When printing to
   PostScript printers it will, however, still be necessary to insert the
   original printer driver disc.

5. Sensible default options.
   The PDFs will now load with more popular default options selected.
   Printers that print in colour will now select colour and sensible
   resolution options when they are loaded thus reducing the amount of
   configuration required when the printer manager is first set up.

6. PostScript printing.
   Various changes have been made to PostScript printing, including
   standardising the PostScript output.

7. Printing with Acorn Access.
   !Printers has been updated for use with the new Acorn Access package. A
   new option from the Printer Control menu allows the 'Shared' option to be
   selected if Acorn Access is installed. Please refer to the Acorn Access
   notes for further information.

8. New templates.
   Both 2D and 3D templates are provided. Selection is dependant on the
   setting of bit 1 of byte &8C in CMOS RAM. There is therefore no
   requirement for the application to be updated with the sprites and
   template provided by !NewLook.

9. File Output.
   It is now possible, when printing to file, for subsequent output to be
   appended to previous output sent to the same file.

10. Printing 'Output' files.
    When printing 'Output' files created by printing with a dp class
    printer, the problem whereby an address exception could occur at the end
    of the print cycle has now been fixed.

11. Paper size editing.
    The 'Edit Paper Size' option now selects the paper type that is
    configured for that particular printer driver.

12. Cancelling a print job.
    When the Escape key is used to stop a print job the printer manager will
    now send a reset to the printer. It is therefore necessary to ensure that
    the printer is online when escape is pressed.

13. Loading PDFs.
    New PDFs loaded into the printer manager will now be automatically
    installed onto the icon bar so the user does not have to specifically
    make them active.

14. Look and feel.
    Various changes have been made to the printer manager to make it more
    Style Guide compliant, eg the removal of dbox close buttons and the
    addition of 'Cancel' buttons.


Feedback
--------

If you experience any problems contact us, preferably in writing, at the
address below with the following details:

  Printer being used.  
  Version of firmware fitted to the printer. 
  If the printer is Laserjet or PostScript,  how much memory is installed in
   the printer.  
  Which Acorn computer system is being used.
  Full description of the problem including, preferably, a copy of the
   !Printer application, on disc, that is causing the problems.

The address is:

  'Printers'
  Customer Services
  Acorn Computers Ltd
  Acorn House
  Vision Park
  Histon
  Cambridge, CB4 4AE
