Many things

From: Michael Sokolov <msokolov_at_ivan.Harhan.ORG>
Date: Fri Jan 28 12:30:52 2005

Randy McLaughlin <randy_at_s100-manuals.com> wrote:

> - Run the result through tiff2ps(1)
> - and finaly generate a PDF with ps2pdf(1).

Could you perhaps be a little more friendly to people like me and Tony Duell
who actually _USE_ our classic computers for our day-to-day work, including
viewing classic computer documentation, and make the PostScript available
as well, i.e., with the last step omitted?

PostScript is infinitely more friendly to Classic Computers than PDF. A
PostScript document can be easily handled by someone who has no computing
technology younger than 1985, that's almost 20 y old, not just 10. No
graphical operating system required (how the heck is one supposed to run
Adobe Acrobat on a vintage command-line OS with a VT100 terminal??), just
use your favourite Classic command-line OS, be it ancient UNIX, VMS, RSX,
or whatever, to send the PostScript file (with a command line) to your
|d|i|g|i|t|a|l| PrintServer 40 (one of the original PS printers, same time
as LaserWriter), and you are done. Can't do that with PDF. And the
original PostScript prior to PDF conversion is always infinitely better
than PostScript produced by turning PDF back into PS (which is what I do
with all PDFs that come my way, because converting back to PS with a command
line tool is the only thing I can do with a PDF file).

One of the first laws I will pass after my revolution is that anyone who
publishes or sends to another person a PDF file produced by conversion from
PostScript but withholds the PostScript source shall be dragged into the
public square and flogged till he can't stand. The recipient of the PDF
file would simply need to call NKVD/KGB with the complaint.

MS
Received on Fri Jan 28 2005 - 12:30:52 GMT