Path: menudo.uh.edu!usenet From: teler@cs.huji.ac.il (Eyal Teler) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews Subject: REVIEW: DocDump, version 3.6 Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.applications Date: 2 Mar 1994 16:37:34 GMT Organization: The Amiga Online Review Column - ed. Daniel Barrett Lines: 191 Sender: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu (comp.sys.amiga.reviews moderator) Distribution: world Message-ID: <2l2fce$pv6@menudo.uh.edu> Reply-To: teler@cs.huji.ac.il (Eyal Teler) NNTP-Posting-Host: karazm.math.uh.edu Keywords: printing, text, multi-page, shareware PRODUCT NAME DocDump, version 3.6 BRIEF DESCRIPTION Print several pages of text on one sheet of paper using small print, either single sided or as a double-sided booklet. This program was provided on the coverdisk of Amiga Computing Magazine, issue 71, March 1994. See my review of this magazine elsewhere in the comp.sys.amiga.reviews archives. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Robert Grob Address: Orange Nassaulaan 6 4101 JT Culemborg (Gld) The Netherlands LIST PRICE Shareware. Registration is $7 (US). SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE A printer. SOFTWARE None. COPY PROTECTION None. MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Amiga 500, 1MB Chip RAM, 2MB Fast RAM Kickstart 1.2, Workbench 1.3, ARP Fujitsu 100MB SCSI drive in A590 Canon BJ-200 printer INSTALLATION The DD_Install file on the disk DOES NOT work. It needs the file DocDump.settings, which is not in that directory. To install, you need to copy S/DocDump.settings to your S: directory, and DocDump/req.library to your LIBS: directory, if you don't already have it. Note that the req.library supplied with the program is an old version, 1.2. (Newer versions are available on the Aminet ftp site and elsewhere.) You should then copy the program to wherever you want it. File names do not completely match those in the documentation, and the Workbench 1.3 icon files which should be included are not there. Still, no important files are missing. REVIEW DocDump allows the printing of ASCII documents in small print, fitting several printed pages on one physical sheet of paper. Output formats are Dump (four pages per sheet), Column (two columns per sheet), and Booklet, which prints four pages on each side of the sheet, in a form suitable for making an A5 booklet. Each page is printed with a suitable title, and the Booklet form also prints cover pages (front and back). The program lets you load a file, specify the needed titles, and print it. Printing can (and should) be configured to match the printer. Page size, tab size, and handling of special characters (such as line feeds) can be specified from the control window. You can also call your favourite editor from the control panel, to view and edit the loaded file. The program prints to the PAR: device, rather than the PRT: device. This is because PRT: has limitations on font sizes. This means that a special, program-specific device driver should be made for each specific printer. The program comes with four device drivers, and defaults to Epson compatibility. Once I found out how to install the program, I tried to print the instructions manual using the instructions contained in it. My BJ-200 is set to Epson mode, with 66 lines on an A4 page. I entered the settings described in the documentation, and started printing. Unfortunately it seemed that there were fewer lines on the page than the program expected, resulting in several lines spilling onto the next page each time. I waited for the printing to end, just to see how it looks. DocDump defaulted to single sheets, even though my preferences said 'fanfold'. I tried to reduce the number of lines per page, from 60 to 58. One line still spilled to the next page. Unfortunately I couldn't stop the printing (see BUGS), so I rebooted. I then changed the number of lines to 57, and it printed OK. Five pages were printed (I changed to 'fanfold', of course), and when prompted, I turned the heap over and reinserted them. No hassle. Even with the small letters and draft printing I used, the result was very readable, which is a tribute to the BJ-200, I suppose. My only problem was creating a booklet from the printed papers. My stapler was too short, even after I tried the tip in the documentation. DOCUMENTATION A short description in the magazine contains some important notes. DocDump.doc is a high quality documentation file. When printed as a booklet, the result is clear and well organised. It even has an index! LIKES AND DISLIKES The idea is very nice. The final results are also quite good. If you're into saving paper, that's the program for you. There are two main problems in practice. First of all, it's not trivial to find the right setting for your printer. There are different page size settings needed for each mode, so it will take some experimenting to find out the right settings. This process could be quite slow. Also see BUGS. The second problem is speed. I estimate that it takes 4 times longer than printing the text normally. This seems to me a problem of the printer, and not of the program itself, but the magazine mentioned that it printed slowly, so I suppose that it's common to most printers (scaling the font?). COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS I don't know any other program which can do this. BUGS Want to stop the printing? Press the Abort button. But printing continues anyway. Put the printer offline. Will you get a 'printer trouble' requester after some time? No way! To stop the printing I had to reboot my Amiga. VENDOR SUPPORT The shareware fee does not entitle you to any special support. You pay only for the right to use the program, including any future versions. To get support, you'll need to send money to the author to cover postage fees for his answer (he requests this in the manual). WARRANTY Coverdisk replacement by the magazine. CONCLUSIONS This could be a very useful program in some cases. If you have a good printer and don't mind the wait, you could get some good results. It might be useful for programmers, who want to cram more of their program onto one sheet (I used to want more lines when I programmed the Amiga). It is also useful for those occasions when you want to carry around some printed documentation without taking too much space. It could have been a nice program for draft printing of some texts, if not for the slow printing speed. Also, the Abort bug is annoying. I'll give DocDump 8 out of 10. COPYRIGHT NOTICE Copyright 1994 Eyal Teler. All rights reserved. --- Daniel Barrett, Moderator, comp.sys.amiga.reviews Send reviews to: amiga-reviews-submissions@math.uh.edu Request information: amiga-reviews-requests@math.uh.edu Moderator mail: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu Anonymous ftp site: math.uh.edu, in /pub/Amiga/comp.sys.amiga.reviews