Manual Reference Pages - asa2pdf (1)
NAME
asa2pdf(1f) - [FILE FILTER] Convert text files with/without ASA carriage control to an Adobe PDF file. (LICENSE:PD)
CONTENTS
Synopsis
Description
Usage
Options
Environment Variables
Examples
See Also
Author
License
SYNOPSIS
asa2pdf -o output_filename -i input_filename -g gray_scale_shade -b lines_alternately_shaded -d dashcode -s top_middle_page_label -t top_left_page_label -P # add page numbers -l lines_per_page -f font_name -S columns_to_shift_data -N # add line numbers -H page_height -W page_width -u points_per_unit -L left_margin -R right_margin -B bottom_margin -T top_margin -help -version -show
DESCRIPTION
Basically, asa2pdf(1) emulates a line printer that recognizes ASA carriage control. That is, it lets you convert ASCII text files using ASA carriage control into Adobe "clear text" PDF files instead of a printed page.
The PDF is clear-text ASCII so that it is easy to still use other Unix/Linux utilities such as spell(1), diff(1), grep(1), .... on the output files.
To properly view the output requires a PDF processor (such as xpdf(1),acroread(1)/AcroRd32, gv(1) or ghostview(1), ...). Most modern systems can view, mail and print PDF files.
The default layout generates a landscape 132-column 60-line format with every other two lines shaded. A variety of switches are available to let you easily print files with no vertical carriage control, and in portrait mode too. There are options to use dashed lines instead of shading, to set different margins, and so on.
WHAT IS ASA CARRIAGE CONTROL?
The ASA carriage control standard was the first important formatting standard for printing and viewing text files. The standard was almost universally adapted by printer manufacturers of the time (and printers were a much more common output device than interactive displays).
Most commercial high-level programs at the time the standard was created were either FORTRAN or COBOL; so nearly all early FORTRAN output used ASA carriage control (ASA was the American Standards Association -- now ANSI). This FORTRAN/ASA association became so strong that the standard is sometimes referred to as the "Fortran carriage control standard" (FCC). Indeed, even though ASA is no longer commonly directly supported on desktop printers, it was part of the Fortran 90 standard (this was dropped in Fortran 2003 -- how a printer processes files is really not directly part of any programming language).
Times have changed, and the once nearly ubiquitous ASA standard is poorly supported on Unix and MSWindows machines in particular (Direct operating-system support of ASA files was once common, but is now rare).
But no alternative as simple has emerged for output files that truly replaces the ASA standard (although machine control characters (ctrl-H, ctrl-L, ...) have come close they have their own issues).
So many programs using ASA-based formatting have not been changed, and use commands like asa(1)/nasa(1), and fpr(1) to allow the files to be printed as desired but NOT to generally be viewed properly on-line, and printing itself is becoming less common.
So the problem isn’t so much with ASA files, but that today’s infrastructure does not support the format well. The asa2pdf(1) program bridges the gap by allowing you to still make and manipulate ASA files until you want to print or email them, at which time you can quickly convert them to an Adobe PDF file.
USAGE
asa2pdf(1) reads input from standard input. By default the first character of each line is interpreted as a control character. Lines beginning with any character other than those listed in the ASA carriage-control characters table or in the list of extensions below are interpreted as if they began with a blank, and an appropriate diagnostic appears on standard error. The first character of each line is not printed.
ASA Carriage Control Characters
+------------+-----------------------------------------------+ | Character | | +------------+-----------------------------------------------+ | + | Do not advance; overstrike previous line. | | blank | Advance one line. | | null lines | Treated as if they started with a blank | | 0 | Advance two lines. | | - | Advance three lines (IBM extension). | | 1 | Advance to top of next page. | | all others | Discarded (except for extensions listed below)| +------------+-----------------------------------------------+Extensions
H Advance one-half line. R Do not advance; overstrike previous line. Use red text color G Do not advance; overstrike previous line. Use green text color B Do not advance; overstrike previous line. Use blue text color r Advance one line. Use red text color g Advance one line. Use green text color b Advance one line. Use blue text color ^ Overprint but add 127 to the ADE value of the character (ie., use ASCII extended character set)
OPTIONS
-o outputfile Name of Adobe PDF output file to create -i inputfile Name of text file to read. Defaults to stdin.
PRINTABLE PAGE AREA
The page size may be specified using -H for height, -W for width, and -u to indicate the points per unit (72 makes H and W in inches, 1 is used when units are in font points). For example:
-u 72 -H 8.5 -W 11 # page Height and Width in inches -T 0.5 -B 0.5 -L 0.5 -R 0.5 # margins (Top, Bottom, Left, Right)common media sizes with -u 1:
+-------------------+------+------------+ | name | W | H | +-------------------+------+------------+ | Letterdj (11x8.5) | 792 | 612 | (LandScape) | A4dj | 842 | 595 | | Letter (8.5x11) | 612 | 792 | (Portrait) | Legal | 612 | 1008 | | A5 | 420 | 595 | | A4 | 595 | 842 | | A3 | 842 | 1190 | +-------------------+------+------------+
SHADING
-g 0.800781 gray-scale value for shaded bars ( 0 < g 1 ) 0 is black, 1 is white. -b 2 repeat shade pattern every N lines -d ’ ’ dashcode pattern The pattern is a series of integers defining an on-off sequence in user units used to create a dash pattern. A single digit "N" implies a pattern of "N N". (seems buggy)
MARGIN LABELS
-s ’’ top middle page label. -t ’’ top left page label. -P add page numbers to right corners
TEXT OPTIONS
-l 60 lines per page -f Courier font names: Courier, Courier-Bold,Courier-Oblique Helvetica, Symbol, Times-Bold, Helvetica-Bold, ZapfDingbats, Times-Italic, Helvetica-Oblique, Times-BoldItalic, Helvetica-BoldOblique, Times-Roman, Courier-BoldOblique -S 0 right shift 1 for non-ASA files -N add line numbers
INFORMATION
-version display version number -help display this help
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
o $IMPACT_TOP Will be printed in large red letters across the page top. o $IMPACT_GRAY sets the default gray-scale value, same as the -g switch.
EXAMPLES
Sample input:
> The numbers are plain underlined double-struck over-struck >+ __________ double-struck /////////// >R /////////// > abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789-=_+()*&^%$#@!\|[]{};’:",.<>/?‘~ > >r red >g green >b blue > PRIMARY: >R red >G green >B blue > 1/2 line advance >H 1 >H 2 a-1 >H 3 Z >H 4 b > back to a normal lineSample commands:
# use non-ASA file to generate portrait mode with a dashed line under every line asa2pdf -S 1 -W 8.5 -H 11 -b 1 -d ’2 4 1’ -T 1 -B .75 -o paper.pdf < INFILE# banner on top env IMPACT_GRAY=1 IMPACT_TOP=CONFIDENTIAL asa2pdf -o paper.pdf < test.txt
# 132-column landscape asa2pdf -s LANDSCAPE -o paper.pdf <asa2pdf.c
# 132-column landscape with line numbers with dashed lines asa2pdf -s ’LANDSCAPE LINE NUMBERS’ -d ’3 1 2’ \ -N -T .9 -o paper.pdf <asa2pdf.c
# portrait 80-column non-ASA file with dashed lines asa2pdf -s PORTRAIT -S 1 -W 8.5 -H 11 -b 1 -d ’2 4 1’ \ -T 1 -B .75 -o paper.pdf < asa2pdf.c
# portrait 80-column with line numbers , non-ASA asa2pdf -s ’PORTRAIT LINE NUMBERS’ -l 66 -S 1 -W 8.5 -H 11 \ -b 1 -T 1 -B .75 -N -o paper.pdf < asa2pdf.c
# titling asa2pdf -d ’1 0 1’ -t "$USER" -b 1 -P -N -T 1 \ -s "asa2pdf.c" -o paper.pdf <asa2pdf.c
SEE ALSO
ALTERNATIVES TO ASA2PDF
About the only standard ASA support on Unix variants is that some contain the asa(1)/fpr(1) and nasa(1) commands for converting ASA text files into and from text files with machine control (MC) characters such as form-feed, backspace, carriage-return, .... Most personal printers will no longer properly print ASA files directly, but they will often correctly print files with simple MC characters (Note that the asa(1) command is referenced in the POSIX.2 standard).
Furthermore, if a printer does not directly support MC characters, text conversion utilities such as enscript(1) and a2ps(1) can often be used to print the files (usually by converting the files to PostScript or PCL). Such utilities support features such as titling, page numbering, and other useful options.
Programs like "Adobe Distiller" can convert text to a PDF; as well as editors such as OpenOffice. In fact, most modern document-formatting editors can read in an ASCII text file and save it as an Adobe PDF file.
HTML and PostScript/PDF and PCL files are the alternatives often incorporated to satisfy simple formatting criteria -- yet HTML is not printer-oriented; and PDF files are complex to write from a simple program, and PCL is vendor-specific and has few on-line viewers available for it.
Assuming converting the Fortran program to just write a plain ASCII file instead of an ASA file is not acceptable, More extensive flat-text formatting is available usingasa(1)/nasa(1), fpr(1), enscript(1), a2ps(1), and ps2pdf(1).Other Unix commands that can be useful in working with plain text and MC character files are
o HTML, *roff and LaTex-related file formats o libraries for writing more sophisticated PostScript, PDF, and HTML/CSS files o XML files formatted using Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) files o RTF (Rich Text Format) files
pr(1) can be used to add page numbers and titles. expand(1) can remove tab characters fold(1),fmt(1) can be used to wrap the text cut(1) can let you trim or select columns cat -n can be used to add number lines paste(1) can be used to put files side-by-side.
AUTHOR
John S. Urban
LICENSE
Public Domain
| asa2pdf (1) | March 11, 2021 |
