DOS2ITOH:

   This Program is a filter to remap the DOS-codepages 437 (US),
   850 (Latin1, Multilingual) and ISO-Latin-1 to the char-coding of
   the C.Itoh 8510/1550 and compatibles (C.Itoh prowriter emulation,
   NEC 8023, AT&T 470-Series, ... ).
   More info about compatibility can be found in 'COMPATIB.LE'.
   The printer should be set to US-charset (with 'greek/graphic/..'-
   extended symbols).


   DOS2ITOH's normal usage will be:

       DOS2ITOH file1 [file_n ..] >PRN:
   or:
       some_dos_command | DOS2ITOH >PRN:


   In the cases above the named files or 'stdin' are remapped to the
   printer charset.  'files..' are allowed to include wildcards.



OPTIONS:

1. You can see online help with '-h' :-)

2. You can print DOS-codepage 850 (Latin1) with '-l'
   and ISO-Latin1 with '-L' (popular in Windows, X11, ... )

   NOTE:
     '-L' can be of interest if you:
     - want to print a pure textfile - generated from Windows
       with a font like 'ARIAL' - and with embedded chars in
       the 'extended region';
     - want to print files from other systems which are
       using ISO-Latin-1 coding (X11, NT, ... ).

3. You can append a 'FormFeed' to each printed file with '-f'.
   With '-F' a 'FormFeed' and a 'CarriageReturn' are appended,
   but NO 'LineFeed', so you will stay at the topline (depends
   on printer's switch setting! ).

4. You can force the printer to use 'greek charset' by inserting
   the proper sequence with '-g' (some printer-models uses 'katakana'
   by default).

5. You can write the output to 'FILE' with '-o FILE'.

   NOTE:
     I've seen a DOS-bug in 'redirection to PRN:' :
     If you write a 'LF' via ' .. > PRN:', then someone on the
     byte's path to your printerport inserts a 'CR' in front
     of your 'LF'.  This can be avoided with '-o PRN'
     (important for ''-printing).

6. You can enable printing of graphic-chars for 'BS' ... 'CR'
   with '-e' . These chars ('BS', ..) must be preceded with an
   'ESC G' sequence in order to be printed. You must insert
   this header for each ['BS', .., 'CR'] that you intend to
   print as graphic symbol.
   There is a demo in this file-collection. Try:

     DOS2ITOH -e escgdemo >PRN:

   NOTE:
     'ESC G' is defined for this program only, it's not a valid PCC.
     ['BS', .., 'CR'] are the decimal bytes [8, .., 13].
     '-e' is ignored in ISO-Latin-1 mapping.

7. DOS2ITOH can be used to filter 8510-preformatted files.
   So you can have 'Printer Control Codes' (PCCs) in your file, e.g.
   functions like 'set boldface' and some time later 'clear boldface'.
   Graphic Bitmaps are handled as PCC.
   All none PCCs are remapped in normal manner.

   As an option these PCCs 
7a.  '-s': can be stripped from files,
7b.  '-S': can be stripped from files, including extended ASCIIs,
7c.  '-t': can pass through without changes,
7d.  '-d': can be dumped to 'stderr' .

7a: The first option can be used to view preformatted files in an editor,
    print them on other printers than 8510, pipe to other filters, ... .
7b: The second option enhances '-s', skipping all chars in the
    extended ASCII-region (no remapping to graphic is performed!).
7c: The third option can perform the preformatted functions as usual,
    but use remapping for all non PCCs.
7d: The forth option can help debugging the input.

   On problems about compatibility with these flags see 'COMPATIB.LE'.


NOTE ON OPTIONS:

The program recognizes '/' AND '-' as option-header.
You can concaternate options after the option-header, e.g. '-fes' .
'-o' is followed by the name of the outputfile or device (see examples).
You can break option-scanning with '//' or '--' ,
thereafter all arguments are treated as files, e.g.:
    DOS2ITOH -foPRN // file1 - -file2 file3 
will print to 'PRN:' in this order:
    'file1', 'FF', 'stdin', 'FF', '-file2', 'FF', 'file3', 'FF' .



INSTALLATION:

All files are packed to a single archive: DOS2IT10.ZIP .
Just unzip them to a directory of your mind.

Archive:  DOS2IT10.ZIP
   file_id.diz      Short description of the program
   readme           Introduction to the filter
   dos2itoh.exe     The filter
   asctab           Extended ASCII-table for print-demo
   asctab.all       Another ASCII-table for full print-demo
   escgdemo         Print-demo of BS, .., CR
   compatib.le      Info about compatibility of printers
   c_itoh.bbs       BBS infos about C.Itoh 8510
   descript.ion     NDOS and 4DOS extended filedescription



ON_LINE_HELP:

Output of 'DOS2ITOH -h':

 This program is free of charge. You must not change it in any way.
 You can freely distribute it as long as this program remains unchanged.
 Copyright N.Pieth, Version 1.0, August 1995
 
 Function: Remapping of DOS-codepages 437 and 850 to that of the C.Itoh 8510,
           whose unimplemented chars and symbols are printed as graphic.
           BS, HT, LF, VT, FF and CR are left unchanged.
           Reads 'stdin' or [files], write to 'stdout'
 Usage:    DOS2ITOH.EXE [options] [file [file ...]]
 Options:  -h  this help
           -l|L  use Latin1 coding (DOS-codepage 850 or ISO-Latin1)
           -f|F  append FF or FF/CR to each file
           -g  insert 'select greek command' before each file
           -e  enable 'ESC G'-header for graphic-printing of [BS .. CR]
           -o FILE  writes output to 'FILE'
           -s  skip (totaly ignore) printer control chars
           -t  set transparency for printer control chars
           -d  dump printer control chars to 'stderr'
           --  breaks option scanning, thereafter:
               -      accepts 'stdin' as file
               -name  accepts '-name' as file
           /   same as '-' in options
 
 Note: 'printer control chars' are the defined printer commands (e.g. 'SI'
   'ESC P' etc.) and graphic bitmaps ( 'ESC S ...').
 
 
 
SOME NOTES:

WHY NOW:
This filter comes very late, but i got the printer yust now (for nothing)
and it works very well.


THE WAY:
I was missing a printed manual, so i was asking for some infos on the net.

Lester Stephen Mah pointed me to a file
       'SimTel/msdos/printer/sfnec.zip',
which can be of interest to anyone without a manual. In 'appendix.doc' you
will find most of the infos you are searching on this topic.
There are some programs in the zip-file, but they didn't work well
on my PC (cryptic printout on some files).
You can read 'appendix.doc' from 'sfnec.zip' with:
    UNZIP -p sfnec.zip appendix.doc | DOS2ITOH -S | MORE
or (if permanently extracted):
    DOS2ITOH -S appendix.doc | MORE
There are some unvalid PCCs in these '..doc'-files. Sorry, i can't change
it, but DOS2ITOH will find these bit-togglers ;-).

Some others gave me helpful hints too, thanks to them.
And one more and special thank to Jim Van Nuland for beta-testing.


THE PROBLEM:
I'm from germany, and here we have some frequently used special
chars in our language.  So there is a problem due to printer
limitations.  I can use the printer's US-charset to print '[',
but no '' and with the GERMAN-charset it's vice versa :-(
This situation was the trigger to write the program.


THE SOLUTION:
A weekend handcoded bit-graphic and:
 this filter will handle the desired function (and much more).


SOME LEGACY:
You know it, but here it comes :-)
USING THIS PROGRAM IS AT YOUR OWN RISK.
THIS PROGRAM COMES WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY, WITHOUT ANY SUPPORT,
WITHOUT ..., BUT WITH REAL PROGRAMCODE!
And:
YOU CAN USE THIS PROGRAM FREELY.
YOU CAN DISTRIBUTE THIS PROGRAM FREELY AS LONG AS IT REMAINS UNCHANGED,
COMES ALONG WITH THIS FILE YOU ARE CURRENTLY READING AND ALL
OTHERS MENTIONED TO BE INCLUDED IN THIS PACKAGE.
YOU MAY NOT TAKE ANY CHARGE EXCEPT A SMALL AMOUNT FOR HANDLING FEES.
YOU CAN WRITE IT ON CD - ALONE OR WITH SOME OTHER PROGRAMS.
YOU CAN THROW IT AWAY IF THE PRINTER IS OUT OF ORDER.



A SIMPLE TEST:
I added a small file ASCTAB, which is a nearly full
extended ASCII table (only NUL, BS, .., CR are 'spaced').
You can see the printers output with:
     DOS2ITOH -o PRN asctab
and in addition all chars (except NUL) with:
     DOS2ITOH -e  -o PRN asctab.all        or:
     DOS2ITOH -el -o PRN asctab.all        or:
     DOS2ITOH -L  -o PRN asctab     



Besides 'WITHOUT ANY SUPPORT', on any problem - or if someone
likes this piece of code - feel free to contact me via email
to 'nop@first.gmd.de' .

Regards and 'no problemo'  Norbert Pieth.
