Re: printing on the Simpl. Chinese and other non-latin1 locales

[Cyrille Chepelov <cyrille chepelov org>]

Le Tue, May 28, 2002, à 03:49:50PM +0800, Zhang Lin-bo a écrit:

> > Uh. Now I'm puzzled. I guess it'll take being more defensive on the loop you
> > have highlighted in your previous message. Please still forward the .po
> > changes to the zh_CN.po maintainer, unless the Postscript font names are the
> > what the contents of the translated strings were.
> 
> I have sent the suggested modifications to lark@linux.net.cn

Thanks.
 
> > When you mean "Western", do you mean latin1, latin0 or do you mean ASCII ?
> 
> Sorry I meant ASCII.

OK. I'll try your patch, hopefully today, to check whether it breaks or not
on a latin0 workload.

> Attached is a sample diagram (zh_CN.dia, zh_CN.png,
> zh_CN-working.eps created by my modified Dia,
> and zh_CN-nonworking.eps created by the original Dia).

Thanks ! 
 
> The Chinese fonts needed are in the ttfonts-zh_CN-2.11-21 package,
> and ghostscript resource files in ghostscript-6.52-8, both
> packages are from rh7.3. After installing the packages, you
> need to create the UTF-8 encoded fonts (*-UniGB-UTF8-H) by:
> 
> 	cd /usr/share/ghostscript/Resource
> 	./ag1.sh install BousungEG-Light-GB
> 	./ag1.sh install GBZenKai-Medium

I'm afraid I'll need the ag1.sh script as well (I'm not running Red Hat).

> You may be right. I don't know much about issues concerning portability
> of PS files. I have looked at the PS files created by other programs,
> for example, AbiWord uses GB-EUC encoding (I can modify Dia to work this
> way), while mozilla seems to directly use the CID fonts.

It would be interesting if you could send me a couple sample files
(privately). I'm not a Postscript wizard, and while I can read some
non-latin alphabets, I'm totally at loss with the CJK writing systems (big
surprise)

> > Specifically, I don't understand why the \uni1234 notation doesn't work in
> > your case -- it definitely should.
> 
> I think that the problem is due to lack of corresponding font files
> which support unicode encoding (none of the font files created by ag1.sh
> are usable, and I don't know how to create the required one by myself).
>
> The problem may be simple for someone who's familiar with PS fonts
> and encodings. But I just don't know how to do it.

Then, what is shipped by RH ? 
I mean, how are encoded the Chinese fonts in the RH 7.3 Ghostscript package ?

Would extending the table of known symbol names in lib/ps-utf8.c (to avoid
\uni1234 notations on Chinese glyphs) help ?

> > A couple test cases would be worth trying:
> >         * a diagram with a few symbols (less than 256)
> >         * a diagram with a lot of symbols (more than 256)
> >
> > You may want however to test whether enabling only the first half of your
> > patch (the lib/font.c section) and leaving the lib/ps-utf8.c code is enough
> > to solve the problem ?

 
> No. The "*-UniGB-UTF8-*" fonts only accepts UTF-8 encoding. I have tried
> every font in the directory /usr/share/ghostscript/Resource/Font created
> by ag1.sh, none of them works with the /uniXXXX (or /A) notation.

I will try your patch with latin0 input; if people working on latin(!1 && !0)
systems had the time to test your patch as well, to see whether UTF-8 latin2
or KOI8-R is acceptable to Ghostscript, it would be a good knowledge data 
point.

Then, what would be even more wonderful, would be to assemble the following 
test PS files:
	latin0-custom-encoding # I can make this yesterday
	latin0-UTF8	       # I'll do it this evening.
	latin2-custom-encoding # I've got nell's EPS, which works on my l0 system
	latin2-UTF8
	KOI8-custom-encoding
	KOI8-UTF8
	zh_CN-custom-encoding  # what you call nonworking
	zh_CN-UTF8	       # what you call working
	ja_JP-custom-encoding  # working, according to Akira TAGOH
	ja_JP-UTF8	

build a second set of files (the same but after going through ps2ps), and
then pass the whole batch of files to non-Ghostscript Postscript devices
(printers, high-end photocopiers, etc.), and see what works and what
doesn't.

For the moment, I assume the -UTF8 files are out of the PS spec; maybe they
aren't after all? 

I'm able to generate only the latin0 files; I'll need volunteers for the
rest (the files you attached to your mail will be fine). And of course,
volunteers to print 20 pages of paper on high-end devices I have no access
to ;-) and on various-locale Ghostscripts.

> I did not subscribe because I was receiving too many messages
> each day, and I thought I just need to post a few questions.
> Sorry for the mess.

No problem; you may want to use some kind of mailbox-filtering software
(procmail)

	-- Cyrille

-- 
Grumpf.