PostScript help

August 26, 2005 4:09 PM

My Google-fu is failing.. yada yada... I am trying to create some simple PostScript output and need a simple how-to.

I want to write a software program that outputs a diagram consisting of (1) text blocks and (2) vector lines, and tweak it later in Illustrator. How can I make a Postscript or EPS file (whichever is best) with these? I can't seem to find a good overview of PostScript or EPS that isn't too technical or too ambiguous.

posted by shannymara to computers & internet (5 answers total)

The easiest way to do that is probably going to be to script Illustrator to create the image in the first place.
posted by kindall at 4:23 PM on August 26, 2005

You may find you can easily write a script in GLE that produces a Postscript file that matches what you want.
posted by edd at 4:29 PM on August 26, 2005

The canonical reference for learning PostScript is The Blue Book; there are copies as PDF online, and a search for "postscript blue book" will also turn up the valuable example files. There's also the huge PLRM [PDF]. You'll need no further reference than these. An installation of Ghostscript is pretty essential for debugging.

If you don't enjoy programming in stack based RPN languages (fie on you!), I'd second any of the recommendations above. It used to be that Illustrator could only read a subset of PostScript; I don't know how it stands now.

SVG is a lot easier to hack on, and you can test-render it in some web browsers. Dunno if your graphics package supports it, tho'.

I used to program and debug huge PostScript programs, so if you need help, my e-mail's in my profile.
posted by scruss at 6:27 PM on August 26, 2005

MetaPost produces very nice PostScript figures, and is gets along well with TeX. This tutorial [PDF link] might inspire you to give it a try.
posted by funkbrain at 2:05 AM on August 27, 2005

Crap. I meant this tutorial [PDF link].
posted by funkbrain at 2:07 AM on August 27, 2005