Star Micronics NB24-10/15 manual

USER’S MANUAL NOT INTENDED FOR SALE 1 PN 80821223 1[...]

Federal Communications Commission Radio Fre 8 uency Interference tatement This equipment generates and uses radio frequency energy and if not installed and used properly, that is, in strict accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions, may cause in- terference to radio and television reception. It has been type tested and found to comply with [...]

A Special Message to the New Owner Congratulations for choosing this printer, one of the finest available at any price. Your new printer will reward you with many years of high-quality document printing, and is backed by Star Micronics’ more than 30 years in manufacturing precision parts. You already know that it represents the state of the art i[...]

Table of Contents Chapter 1 Setting Up Your Printer Locating the printer Check the carton contents Removing the printer cover Removing the packing tube Removing shipping screws Fitting the platen knob Installing the ribbon cartridge Installing the mute cover Installing the interface board .- Installing the font cartridge Chapter 2 Getting to Know Y[...]

Chapter 3 Using the Printer with Commercial 25 Software Using commercial software Word processing with the printer General concepts The escape code The master reset code Using Letter Quality (LQ) Getting the most from your print choices Using the printer with EasyWriter II Redefining pitch settings and print control codes A sample printout with Eas[...]

Chapter 4 Printing with BASIC 43 Some basics of BASIC First steps ASCII codes and the CHR$ function Control codes The escape codes A note on command syntax Selecting the right software mode Some special kinds of text Draft and Letter Quality characters Italic printing Characters in the Font Cartridge Underlining and overlining Superscripts and subs[...]

Chapter 6 Special Features of the Printer 87 Now hear this Resetting the printer Taking the printer off line Printing the bottom of the sheet Backspace, delete, and cancel text Printing zeroes Immediate-print Adjusting the width of space between characters Printing at half-speed Uni-directional printing The seven bit dilemma Block graphics characte[...]

Chapter 8 Caring for Your Printer Cleaning the printer Replacing the ribbon Replacing the print head Appendix A DIP Switch Settings Switch functions 125 131 Appendix B ASCII Code Conversion Chart 137 Appendix C Character Code Table 139 Standard mode characters IBM mode characters Character set #l Character set #2 1 All Character set Appendix D Func[...]

Appendix H Serial Interfack Specifications Configuring the serial interface The serial protocols Serial busy protocols XON/XOFF protocol ACK protocol 233 Index 239[...]

CHAPTER 1 SETTING UP YOUR PRINTER Subjects covered in Chapter 1 include- . Choosing a suitable place for your printer l Unpacking l Setting up LOCATING THE PRINTER Give some thought to the best place to put the printer. Both the printer and computer should be used in normal office sur- roundings. For best performance, we recommend: l Use the printe[...]

1 Figure l- 1. Check to make sure you have all six items: 1) Printer, 2) Mute cover, 3) Paper guide, 4) Ribbon cartridge, 5) Platen knob, and 6) User’s manual. You should also have a parallel interface board to connect your computer to the printer. Also available are a parallel inter- face board with extra buffer memory and a serial interface boa[...]

3 disengage the two or three tabs at the front, then lift it off the rest of the way. To replace the cover, slide the tabs in at the front and lower it into place. Figure l-2 shows the proper posi- tion and movement for both removing and replacing the cover. Figure 1-2. Remove the printer cover by lifting carefully. n Removing the packing tube The [...]

4 must be removed before use. First, take off the printer cover. The protective tube is split along its bottom side to allow easy removal. Grasp one end of the spiral tube and firmly pull it up- ward and away from the carriage rail. n Removing shipping screws (15-inch type only) There are two shipping screws inside the 15-inch type printer, used to[...]

.- 5 foam packing material which held your printer inside the pack- ing box. Be careful to remove the knob before disposing of the packing pieces. n Installing the ribbon cartridge This printer uses a neat, easy-to-change ribbon cartridge with automatic threading. To fit or change the ribbon cartridge: Figure l-5. __~. I Press the cartridge into pl[...]

to your right or left until the ribbon automatically slips down into its proper place between the print head and the silver ribbon guide. ‘igure 1-6. To thread the ribbon, slide the print head carriage ._ i manually to the right OP left, and the ribbon will slip down by itself into its proper position. 7. Replace the printer cover. (A switch on t[...]

7 The mute cover reduces the printer’s operating sounds. Note the position of the guide pins on the mute cover as shown in Figure l-7. Holding the mute cover at each end, insert the guide pins into the cutout hooks on the printer cover. Hold the mute cover down onto the printer. To remove it, reverse the procedure. n Installing the interface boar[...]

8 n Installing the font cartridge This printer is mounted the Prestige characters as standard. You can add one or two different character styles by installing the optional font cartridges to the printer. To install or change a font cartridge, start by turing off the power switch. Fit the font cartridge into the slot and slide it all the way. Ggure [...]

CHAPTER 2 GETTING TO KNOW YOUR PRINTER i - / / . : i. /’ . Subjects covered in Chapter 2 include- . Parts of the printer - what they’re for and how to use them l Paper selection and loading l Adjustment l Testing printer operation CONTROLS AND PARTS OF THE PRINTER n Parts of the printer PRINTER COVER - This protects the ribbon and the print hea[...]

10 Mute cover Printer cover P h Control panel Font cartridge slot Platen knob Interface cover .- L--~~--. ~~~ Figure 2- 1. Front and rear views.of the printer. printer. PLATEN - This is the rubber cylinder that carries paper to the print head. INTERFACE COVER - On the back of the printer, this cover conceals and protects the interface board. The co[...]

11 your computer cable. SLOTS FOR FONT CARTRIDGES - These are the two openings at the bottom right of the front of the printer. Insert- ing an optional font cartridge pushes the small door up out of the way and exposes a connector which accepts the cartridge. n Controls and indicators Now let’s go over the controls and indicators of the printer, [...]

TYPE STYLE KEY - Changes the type style among four or six styles when the On Line indicator is off. QUALITY INDICATORS - Either DRAFT or LETTER glows green to indicate the character quality (set by the Quality key). QUALITY KEY - Changes the print quality every time it is pressed when the On Line indicator is off. PITCH INDICATORS - Shows the chara[...]

13 w Extra functions There are twelve more functions that are not directly specified on the control panel. You can access six of them by pressing one particular key when you turn on the power; six others are activated by pressing two control keys at once. Hex dump Self-test 1 Self-test 2 Type Style Print Pitch Panel mode Panel mode Quality Panel mo[...]

14 n Other controls There are other controls, not connected to the control panel. Some of the more important ones are: POWER SWITCH - The switch that turns the printer on and off is at the back, on the left side. PLATEN KNOB - This knob is at the middle of the right side and lets you turn the platen by hand, like a typewriter. Caution: Turn the pla[...]

15 The paper bail holds the paper against the platen according to the setting of the release lever. The bail is opened when the release lever is in the top position, closed when the lever is in the second or third positions, and opened by the printer when the lever is in the bottom position. I Release lever I Figure 2-5. Use friction feed for singl[...]

I-- ~-- ~_~__- Figure 2-6. Raise the paper guide for loading single sheets. / Figure 2-7. Prop up the paper guide by inserting the guide stand in the notches provided for it.[...]

L . -. 1. ..- ‘. b_ L. L_ _- 17 5. Set the release lever for single sheets - the second posi- tion from the top. 6. Align a sheet of paper on the guide along the adjuster. 7. Turn on the power switch. (The Paper Empty indicator will glow because there is no paper.) 8. Now set the release lever to the auto-feed setting - the top position. The prin[...]

n Loading sprocket-feed paper This is standard computer paper, with the holes along the sides and perforations between the sheets, It is also called sprocket, punched, fan-fold, or just plain “computer paper”. It can be as narrow as 4 inches, and up to 10 inches wide (4 inches to 15.5 inches on 15-inch type). 1. Turn on the printer and set the [...]

L 19 8. Check that the paper is still positioned correctly, and close the sprocket covers (Figure 2-10). ~-- ~-~ Figure 2-10. Close the sprocket covGG<w?pGa tioned correctly. I I - Figure 2-11. Ready to load the sprocket-feed paper. Note the reversed position of the paper guide.[...]

20 9. Set the release lever to the auto-feed setting. The printer will advance the paper automatically. 10. When the paper stops, set the release lever for sprocket- feed paper again. 11. Install the paper guide on the printer. See Figures 2-10 and 2-11 for details. When used with sprocket-feed paper, the guide is turned around and laid flat (Figur[...]

21 TESTING THE PRINTER Your printer has two built-in programs that printout sample lines of letters, numbers, and other characters - to show you that everything’s in good working order. Self-test 1 is the long version, and self-test 2 is the short one. You can use either one to show the characters available in the printer, to check the in- stalla[...]

22 Self-test 2 Standard mode IBM mode I- -___~ Figure 2-13. The self-tests show you what the printer can print. 1 I - I I I Figure 2-14. Connect the cable like this.[...]

fghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz(~}- !";~$g&'()*+,-./0123456789:;(=>?@~CDEFGH ghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz(:)- !";c.$x&'(] .+,-./0123456789:;C=>?@ABCDEFGHI hijklmnopqrstuvwxyz( :}- !-::S%&'()*+.-./0123456789:;<=>~@ABCDEFGHIJ .ijklmnopqrstuvwxyz(:)- !‘*;:SX&'()'+.-./0123456789:;<=>?@ABCDEFGHIJK jkl[...]

24 MEMO - -[...]

L i ‘h i L i I CHAPTER 3 USING THE PRINTER WITH COMMERCIAL SOFTWARE Subjects covered in Chapter 3 include- * Using commercial software l Controlling the printer with the Panel mode USING COMMERCIAL SOFTWARE Many of you purchased this printer to use with commercial software. You made a good choice because this printer is com- patible with most com[...]

I 26 but instead ask some questions about what your printer can do. The answers to the “most asked” questions are: Yes - this printer can do a “backspace”, and this printer can do a “hard- ware form feed”. With these questions answered, you are ready to start print- ing. Read the manual that came with your commercial software and the ne[...]

27 help of your program manual and the supporting chapters in this manual, you should be able to figure out how yours works. GENERAL CONCEPTS Each word processing program has a way to get out of the standard text entry mode in order to accept the special printer function codes. WordStar uses the CONTROL key in different ways to define the print fun[...]

28 reset code and resets the printer to its DIP switch settings. These print characteristics are the same as the ones used by the printer when it is first turned on. The code sequence for master reset is (ESC) “@“. By check- ing the ASCII equivalents in Appendix D, you can see that the decimal expression is 27 64. You’ll see these numbers sev[...]

Second, read Chapter 4 which describes them in greater detail and shows examples of how they are used in BASIC programm- ing. The functions will, for the most part, act the same in your word processing program. Understanding what’s available and how they perform will help you use them correctly in your documents. And third, follow the procedures [...]

ruler line to print pica, elite and condensed width pitches. In ad- dition, you can use a similar method to print in letter quality. The print control codes can be redefined to enhance the final product of your document. The boldface, underline, superscript and subscript functions require only a slight “recoding” of infor- mation in the printer[...]

Press RETURN and the Edit Global Sequences screen will be displayed. These codes control the print functions for form feed, line feed, margin settings and automatic justification. We do not recommend that you edit any of these codes. Press RETURN and the Edit Pitch Table screen will be displayed. On this screen, you will enter the ASCII decimal val[...]

32 transferred to the Edit Line Spacing screen. Do not change these codes. They define how many lines per inch the printer uses. Press RETURN to transfer to the Edit Font Support screen. Change all of the entry fields to Option 2 (Control Code Sup- port) on the Edit Font Support screen. Also, make changes in the other fields to look like the figure[...]

51. Normal to Bold 52. Bold to Normal 53. Normal to Shadow 54. Shadow to Normal 55. Normal to Underline 56. Underline to Normal 57. Normal to Double 58. Double to Normal 59. Normal to Overstrike 60. Overstrike to Normal 61. Normal to Special 62. Special to Normal 63. Normal to Subscript 64. Subscript to Normal 65. Normal to Superscript 66. Superscr[...]

34 Now, change the pitch setting in the next line to pica by set- ting a new ruler line: Ruler Name - pica; Character Pitch - 10. Use the print control key S (for italic) to highlight the second sentence in the paragraph. Move the cursor to the “E” in “Enclosed” and (in the sentence mode) use the ALT and S keys to highlight the sentence. (Y[...]

ASCII decimal values to turn on and off different prints. You want to affect that aspect but not the print pitch itself. Leave that for your document ruler line. Remember, all the codes can be found in Appendix D of this manual. Also, keep in mind that print control keys can be combined in your document such as boldface and underline. EasyWriter II[...]

36 It is also possible to define the - PA (alternate pitch) com- mand to change the print pitch of your document. The Word- Star User’s Manual fully describes the use of these * P func- tions. You should refer to your manual if you need help with them. There are four alternate ^ P codes that can be defined during the installation of your WordStar[...]

37 You can specify the range to print in all the normal ways: by pointing, by typing the cell addresses of the endpoints, by enter- ing a range name, or by using the F3 key to point to a range name. After you have specified a range to print, and changing any of the other options that you wish, start printing the spreadsheet by selecting the Go opti[...]

38 @ : Spreadsheet Title : Page 1) And, on August 12, 1986, the results might look like this: 12-Aug-86 Spreadsheet Title Page 1 Another of the selections under Options is Setup. This selec- tion allows you to create a setup string that will be sent to the printer before each section of the spreadsheet is printed. You can include non-printing codes[...]

39 this case, use the “Panel” modes. Selection of any of the Panel Modes at power-on ensures that your choices remain in effect until you turn the power off. This means that the printer will ignore any codes sent by the soft- ware that you are using. The Panel Modes allow selection of the following printing attributes: Key Type of Panel mode Ty[...]

key, press the QUALITY key once again to make your choice, and press the ON LINE key again. To select the Type Style Panel mode, press the TYPE STYLE key while turning on the power. To change the character set to another, press the ON LINE key, select the desired type, and press the ON LINE key again. The Type Style Panel mode is now set to the cha[...]

41 **: Hold down *: Press Forward micro-feed II * ** * * ** I I Clear the print buffer l--l Right margin set 1 Left margin set 1 Figure 3-2. You can set many functions by the combinations of the control panel keys in the Off Line mode. 3. When you can set the print start position, release the Paper Feed key or the Top Of Form key first, then releas[...]

42 Paper Feed key - Right margin set 3. While holding the two keys, the print head moves across the page step-by-step. 4. When the print head goes to the position where you want to set margin, release the two keys. So the printer acknowledges the margin with the sound of beep. H Clearing the print buffer You can clear the contents of the print buff[...]

CHAPTER 4 PRINTING WITH BASIC Subjects covered in Chapter 4 include- . Listing BASIC programs on the printer l How a program prints things l Control codes, escape codes, and command syn- tax l Selecting the right software mode l Letter quality (LQ) characters l Fixed and proportional character spacing l Special printing- Printing in italics Underli[...]

44 SOME BASICS OF BASIC 4 First steps The first things that a beginner learns to do are to list a pro- gram and to print a character string. Certainly these are the easiest operations one can do, but even they may depend on what computer you have. In Microsoft BASIC, we can list all the steps in a program by entering LIST. This lists them on the CR[...]

45 w ASCII codes and the CHR$ function You can talk to your computer in BASIC, but your computer and your printer talk to each other in what are known as ASCII codes. In the ASCII code, each number from 0 to 255 has a par- ticular meaning - 36, for example, makes the printer print a dollar sign. Some numbers cause the printer to do other things, to[...]

4fi - the “control” key and one other. The other key determines what code is sent - pressing the control (CTRL) key and A sends ASCII code 1, CTRL B sends ASCII code 2, and so on. Your printer has a lot of control codes to let you do some useful things. Let’s try one that we’ve mentioned several times already: 10 ' Demo of ASCII code 2[...]

47 B The escape codes Back when the ASCII system was set up, computer equip- ment was relatively simple and thirty-three control codes were considered sufficient at the time. The American Standards peo- ple realized that eventually more control codes would be need- ed, so they included the escape (ESC) code to allow almost any number of additional [...]

So for our example above, any of these BASIC statements will have the same result: LPRINT CHR$(27);CHR$(87);CHR$(l) LPRINT CHR$(27);CHR$(87);CHR$(49) LPRINT CHR$(27);"W";CHR$(l) LPRINT CHR$(27);"W";CHR$(49) LPRINT CHR$(27);"Wl" Even though there are many commands that require the use of ASCII code 0 (the (NUL) characte[...]

49 n Draft and Letter Quality characters This printer’s Letter Quality (sometimes abbreviated as LQ) character set is ideal for correspondence and other important printing, as it produces very high quality characters. In addi- tion, your printer prints draft quality characters. This is ade- quate for most work and has the fastest printing speed. [...]

50 Table 4-1 Letter quality commands Function Letter quality ON Letter quality OFF Control code (ESC) “x” 1 (ESC) “I” 2 (IBM-P mode only) (ESC) “x” 0 (ESC) “I” 0 (IBM-P mode only) n Italic printing Italic letters are letters that are slanted to the right. Your printer can print all of its letters in italic as well as the roman (stan[...]

Chapter 3, and set the Italic type, then run the program again. You should get like this: This line is in ITALIC characters. This line is in ROMAN characters. As you can see, this time the printer ignored the control codes to set or cancel italic characters. n Characters in the Font Cartridge This printer offers you the Prestige LQ characters as st[...]

52 characters before line 70 switches printer back to internal LQ characters with an (ESC) “k” CHR$(O) command. You can control the font styles with the extra functions with the control panel. Table 4-3 Font selection commands Function Control code Selects font slot 1 (ESC) “k” CHR$(l) Selects font slot 2 (15~inch type only) (ESC) “k” C[...]

53 In this program underline is turned on in line 30 with (ESC) “ - ” 1, and then off in line 50 with (ESC) “ -” 0. The overline is turned on in line 70 with (ESC) “-” 1, and then off in line 90 with (ESC) “-” 0. There’s a new aspect to this program, though. The semicolons at the end of the lines told BASIC that those lines were t[...]

54 Here line 30 turns on superscripts with (ESC) “S” 0. It’s turned off in line 50 with (ESC) “T”. Then between printing text, subscripts are turned on in line 70 with (ESC) “S” 1, and finally off in line 90. Again, everything prints on one line because of the semicolons. CHANGING THE PRINT PITCH In “printer talk,” the number of c[...]

55 When you run this program you should get this: This line is SEKI-CONDENSED pitch, This line is ELITE pitch. This line is PICA pitch (normal). Line 20 turns on semi-condensed pitch with (ESC) “g”. Line 30 prints the line at 15 characters per inch. Line 40 turns on elite pitch with (ESC) “M”, and line 50 prints the line at 12 characters pe[...]

return with CHR$(20), as done in line 50. Sometimes you may wish to stay in expanded print for more than one line. Change your program to this: 10 ’ Demo of permanent expanded mode 20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"Wl"; 30 LPRINT "Permanent expanded" 40 LPRINT "mode stays on until" 50 LPRINT "it is "; 60 LPRINT CHR$(27);[...]

Demonstration of CONDENSED printing. 57 Condensed print set with CHR$(15) stays on until you turn it off with CHR$(18). Note that you don’t need to put an (ESC) in front of the CHR$(15), although (ESC) CHR$(lS) works just the same. Table 4-8 Condensed print commands Function Control code Condensed ON CHR$(15) or (ESC) CHRW5) Condensed OFF CHR$(18[...]

220 LPRINT "This is EXPANDED SEMI-CONDENSED." 230 LPRINT CHR$(27);"M"; 240 LPRINT "This is EXPANDED ELITE." 250 LPRINT CHR$(27);"P"; 260 LPRINT "This is EXPANDED PICA." 270 LPRINT CHR$(27);"WO" 280 END Here’s what you should get from this program: This line is CON3ENSED ELITE pitch. This[...]

c h i. k% c ib Try this program to see how the proportional spacing works. 10 ' Demo of proportional printing 20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"M"; 30 LPRINT "This line is NORMAL ELITE printing." 40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"pl"; 50 LPRINT "This line is PROPORTIONAL ELITE." 60 LPRINT CHRS(27);"P"; 70 LPRINT "Thi[...]

60 this: boldface and emphasized print. Both of these go over the characters twice, but they use slightly different methods to darken the characters. Let’s try them and see what the dif- ference is. The following table shows the control codes for getting into and out of boldface and emphasized modes. Table 4-10 Print emphasis commands Try them no[...]

your printer is set for normal printing. Look closely at the different lines of printing. In the line of boldface printing each character has been printed twice, and the paper was moved up slightly the second time they were printed. In emphasized printing, the characters are moved slightly to the right the second time the printer prints. The second[...]

For example, if you want to select elite expanded boldface print, you would calculate the value of n like this: Elite 1 Boldface 16 Expanded 32 n= 49 The command would look like this: CHR$(27);“!“;CHR$(49) To better understand the way the print modes work, consider that each mode except pica (pica is the default) has a separate switch that can [...]

. CHAPTER 5 FORMATTING TEXT Subjects covered in Chapter 5 include- * The carriage return and line feed l The amount of space between lines l Moving to the next page l The number of lines on a printed page l Horizontal and vertical tabs l Setting margins - left, right, top and bottom l Centering and aligning Chapter 4 showed us the basic techniques [...]

64 return. Each time the printer receives a CHR$(13) it returns the print head to the left margin. It does not advance the paper (if DIP switch 2-6 is on; see below). Line feed is more complicated. Each time the printer receives a CHR$(lO) it both advances the paper one line and returns the print head to the left margin, ready to start a new line. [...]

65 Table 5-l Line feed commands Function Control code Return print head to left margin CHR$(lS) Advance paper one line CHR$( 10) Reverse paper one line (ESC) CHR!$(lO) Adds (LF) to every (CR) (ESC) “5” 1 (IBM-P mode only) Restore normal function of (CR) (ESC) “5” 0 (IBM-P mode only) n Changing the line spacing When you turn your printer on,[...]

66 This is what you will get with the Standard mode: THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 9 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 10 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 11 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 12 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 14 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 15 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 16 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 17 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 18 THIS LINE SPACING I[...]

L L i i 6'7 The (ESC) “3” CHR$(n) command sets the line spacing in in- crements of l/180 inch. Change line 40 in your program to this: 40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"3";CHR$(I); and run the program again. Now the results will look like this: THIS THIs TfI‘[S THIS THIS LINE THIS LINE LINE SPAC I SPACING IS SET TO 24 SPACING IS SET TO 25 NG[...]

68 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 9 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 10 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 11 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 12 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 14 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 15 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 16 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 17 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 18 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 19 THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO 20 THIS LI[...]

Table 5-2 Line spacing commands - l/8 inch 7160 inch 7172 inch pi , ” ~ljJb, IFS, “k (IBM modes) (‘ESC, “A” CHR$(n) (Standard mode only) Set line spacing to l/6 inch Set line spacing to n/60 inch Set line spacing to n/72 inch (FS> “A” CHR$(n) (IBM modes only) Set line spacing to n/180 inch (ESC> “3” CHR$(n) (Standard modes [...]

70 NEW 10 ' Demo of one-time line feeds 20 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 1." 30 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 2."; 40 ' One-time line feed 50 LPRINT CHR$(27);"J";CHR$(lOO); 60 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 3." 70 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 4." 80 END Here is what your printer will produce with Standard mode: LINE NUMBER 1. LI[...]

PAGE CONTROL Now that we have seen how to control line spacing, we can go on to page control - positioning the printing on the page and ad- justing the paper length. n Form feed The simplest forms control code is the form feed. Form feed (or (FF)) is CHR$(12) and causes the printer to move the paper to the top of the next sheet. Try it by changing [...]

72 n Reverse form feed Just as your printer can perform a reverse line feed, it can do a reverse form feed. This code moves the paper so that the print head is positioned at the top of the current page. This can be used, for example, to print text in a multi-column magazine for- mat; print the first column, then reverse form feed back to the top of[...]

73 Let’s set up a 7 inch high form length, which is typical of many computer checks. The following program will do it. NEW 10 ' Demo of variable form lengths 20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"C";CHR$(O);CHR$(7); 30 LPRINT "PAY TO THE ORDER OF:" 40 LPRINT CHR$(lZ); 50 LPRINT "PAY TO THE ORDER OF:" 60 END This program should pr[...]

Table 5-5 Top and bottom margin commands Function Control code Set top margin to n lines (ESC > “r” CHR$(n) Set bottom margin to n lines (ESC) “N” CHR$(n) Cancel top and bottom margins (ESC) “0” In both cases the value of n tells your printer how many lines to skip, although there is a slight difference in the usage. When you set the[...]

75 Now when you run the program, your printer skip the first six lines and the last six lines on each page. Always send a form feed after setting the top margin, or it will not work on the first page printed. That’s because the top margin only takes effect after a form feed. Line 50 sets the top margin, line 30 sets the bottom margin, and line 10[...]

76 SETTING LEFT AND RIGHT MARGINS The left and right margins of this printer work just like a typewriter - once they are set all printing is done between them. You can set margins either by using the keys on the con- trol panel, as described in Chapter 3, or by escape commands. The commands to set the margins are given in the following table: Table[...]

77 Run the program. The results will look like this: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx When you want to reset the margins to the default values, you have two choices. You can either turn the printer off and back on, or yo[...]

78 ONE TWO THREE FOUR Even though the words are different length, they are spaced out evenly by the horizontal tabs. Now add the following line to your program to set different horizontal tabs: 15 LPRINT CHR$(27);"D";CHR$(7);CHR$(l4);CHR$(21); CHR$(O); .- (ESC) “D” is the command to begin setting horizontal tabs. It must be followed b[...]

79 Table 5-7 Horizontal tab commands Function Control code Advance to next tab position CHR$@) Set tabs at nl, n2, etc. (ESC) “D” CHR$(nl) CHR$(n2) . . . . . CHWO) Set tabs every n columns (ESC) “e” 0 CHR$(n) Restore the default tab positions (ESC) “R” (IBM-P mode only) n One-time horizontal tabs Suppose you need to move to a position a[...]

40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"$";CHR$(I);CHR$(O); 50 LPRINT "Horizontal tab." 60 NEXT I 70 END In this program, the print head is positioned before the “H” in “Horizontal” is printed. 60 +++++ Horizontal tab. 62 +++++ Horizontal tab. 64 +++++ Horizontal tab. 66 +++++ Horizontal tab. 68 +++++ Horizontal tab. 70 +++++ Horizontal tab[...]

L c. i L I. i i L i. L I 40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"";CHR$(I*2O);CHR$(O); 50 LPRINT "Horizontal"; 60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"";CHR$(I*lO);CKR$(O); 70 LPRINT "Tab . ' 80 NEXT I 90 END Relative Horizontal Tab. Relative Horizontal Tab. Relative Horizontal Tab. n Vertical tabs Vertical tabs have the same kinds of uses that h[...]

82 in ascending order. Our example sets vertical tabs at lines 10, 15,25 and 30. Then the CHR$(ll) in each of the following lines advances the paper to the next vertical tab. The printout is shown below. FIRST TAB. SECOND TAB. THIRD TAB. FOURTH TAB. Add one more line to the program to demonstrate one more feature of vertical tabs. 80 LPRINT CHFt$(l[...]

83 the one-time horizontal tab command. Try this program to see how these commands work. 10 ’ Demo of print positions 20 LPRINT ‘I* 1st Line, 1st Column” 30 LPRINT CHR$(27);“fl”;CHR$(3); 40 LPRINT ‘I* 5th Line, 1st Column” 50 LPRINT CHR$(27);“fO”;CHR$(7); 60 LPRINT I’* 6th Line, 7th Column” 70 LPRINT CHR$(27);“fl”;CHR$(2);[...]

H Vertical tab channels Vertical tab channels are especially hefpful in two situations. The first occurs when you are writing a program to accompany a preprinted form that can accommodate verious types of responses. The second occurs when you create a multipage form or report with different vertical tabs on each page. Table 5- 11 Vertical tab chann[...]

Ti TOP OF FORM LST TAB OF CHANNEL 1 2ND TAB OF CHANNEL 1 L. L. ‘R)P OF FORM tST TAB OF CHANNEL 2 2ND TAB OF CHANNEL 2 POP OF FORM LST TAB OF CIIANNEL 3 2ND TAB OF CHANNEL 3 In this program we set tabs at 10 and 20 in channel 1 in line 20. In line 30 we set tabs 15 and 25 in channel 2, and in line 40 we set tabs 17 and 28 in channel 3. Because the[...]

Table 5-12 Alignment commands Function Control code Left-justified printing (ESC) “a” 0 Centered printing (ESC) “a” 1 Right-justified printing (ESC) “a” 2 Fully-justified printing (ESC) “a” 3 Try this program to see how easy it is. 10 ’ Demo of aligning and centering 20 LPRINT CHR$(27);“1”;CHR$(20); 30 LPRINT CHR$(27);“Q”;[...]

CHAPTER 6 SPECIAL FEATURES OF THE PRINTER Subjects covered in Chapter 6 include- . Printer’s bell l Master reset l Uni-directional printing l International character sets l Printing BIG characters l The optional sheet feeder l Reading a hex dump In the previous chapters we have learned about several groups of control codes. In this chapter we wil[...]

88 - The code to sound the “bell” is CHR$(7), which is ASCII code 7 or (BEL). Any time your printer receives this code it will sound the bell for a quarter of a second. This can be used to re- mind the operator to change the paper or to make other ad- justments to the printer. You can try this by typing: LPRINT CHRS(7) w Resetting the printer U[...]

89 sheet. You can disable the paper-out detector so that it doesn’t stop the printer. This will allow you to print to the end of the sheet, and even beyond if you are not careful. The codes to con- trol the paper-out detector, along with the other codes that we have just looked at are in the following table. Table 6-1 Some miscellaneous commands [...]

90 The following program shows how these codes works. 127); lo LPRINT "BACKSPACE DOES NOT"; 20 LPRINT CHR$(8);CHR$(8);CHR$(8); 30 LPRINT u=== WORK" 40 LPRINT "DELETE DOES NOT"; 50 LPRINT CJJR$(127);CHR$(127);CHRs( 60 LPRINT "WORK" 70 LPRINT "CANCEL LINE"; 80 LPRINT CHRS(24); 90 LPRINT "DOES NOT WORK[...]

. ‘ . L. at the speed of your typing. In the immediate-print mode, the print head prints one character at a time, as you send it. The printer also moves the paper up so that you can see the current line and then down to continue printing. You can turn the immediate-print mode on with (ESC) “i” 1. Before looking at it, let’s review the norma[...]

92 Table 6-2 Units of motion for the adjustment of the character width Unit of motion Print pitch Pica pitch Elite pitch Semi-condensed & Condensed pitch Draft characters Letter Quality characters l/120 inch l/180 inch 11120 inch l/180 inch 11240 inch l/360 inch Try this program to see how this works. 10 ' Demo of adjusting spaces 20 LPRIN[...]

93 CPS with the LQ characters. The main advantage to half-speed printing is a quieter run. n Uni-directional printing Uni-directional printing means printing in one direction only. Your printer normally prints when the print head is moving in both directions. But once in a while you may have an application such as making table where you are more co[...]

94 Let’s analyze the program. Line 20 defines the line spacing to 6/60 of an inch so that the characters that we print will touch top to bottom. Lines 30 - 50 print 10 vertical line characters. Then line 70 sets uni-directional printing and the vertical lines are printed again. Finally line 110 sends a form feed to advance the paper to the top of[...]

95 Table 6-4 Eighth bit controls Function Control code Turn the eighth bit ON (ESC) “)” (except IBM-P mode) Turn the eighth bit OFF (ESC) “=“(except IBM-P mode) Accept the eighth bit “as is” from (ESCj ,,#,, (except IBMsP modeJ the computer n Block graphics characters and special symbols Besides the upper and lower case letters and symb[...]

96 3v 128 C 133 a 138 & 143 A 148 6 153 u 158 Q 163 ti 168 i 173 j 178 1 183 a 188 4 193 A- 198 F 203 17 208 11 213 r 218 ,- 223 228 C 233 9 238 E 243 i 248 0 253 2 4+ 129 ii 134 8 139 Y 144 J? 149 (3 154 u 159 f 164 ii 169 r 174 << 179 j 184 ;t 189 il 194 T lgg It 204 IF 209 =j= 214 F 219 224 a 229 u 234 S-2 239 n 244 [ 249 . 254 n 5I 13[...]

97 Figure 6-l shows what this program will print. If your chart doesn’t look like this because it has regular letters and numbers instead of the special symbols, then your computer is only using seven bits (unless you have set Standard mode by mistake). You can get the correct printout by changing line 110 to this: 110 LPRINT I;CHR$(27);">[...]

98 In this program, line 10 selects character set #2 so that all the graphics characters can be used (including the “club” symbol). Then lines 20 - 80 print the 5 of clubs figure. Line 90 cancels character set #2 (which is the same as selecting character set #l). Here is what this program prints: n International character sets Your printer chan[...]

99 The characters that change are shown beneath their ASCII code in Table 6-6. Table 6-6 International character sets H Printing characters in the control code area When you refer the Appendix C, you’ll find many characters are printed in the control code area. (Remember that the low- order control codes are the ASCII codes 0 through 31 plus 127,[...]

100 In this program line 20 determines that the following 32 characters should be printed as printable characters. So, the characters in the control code area are printed as shown below. v+i4 irtj + 0 If you want to print more characters using the (ESC) “” command you must tell the printer how many characters should be printed. The total numbe[...]

101 110 OUT &H378,1 : OUT &H37A,5 : OUT &H37A,4 120 RETURN 40 GOSUB 100 100 O=INP(&H3BD) : IF 0<128 THEN 100 110 OUT &H3BC,I : OUT &H3BE,5 : OUT &H3BE,4 120 RETURN n Printing BIG characters You can even enlarge your character sets for attention-grab- bing headings or special effects. There are two commands you can use[...]

102 THIS IS DOUBLE SIZED PRINTING. THIS IS QUAD SIZED PRINTING. As you can see, when the big character command is used, the baseline for each character does not align. If you want to align the baseline, try this program: 10 ’ Demo of aligning big characters 20 LPRINT “THIS IS ” ; 30 LPRINT CHR$(27);“j”;CHR$(l8); 40 LPRINT CHR$(27);“h”[...]

! 1: 103 cut sheets automatically. Work done on cut sheets looks better that done on computer paper, and you don’t have to tear the “perforations” off each sheet as you must with fan-fold paper. The automatic sheet feeder feeds a new sheet automatically every time the printer receives or generates a form feed. Any time you wish, you can turn [...]

104 10 FOR I=0 TO 255 20 LPRINT U-IRS(I); 30 NEXT I 40 LPRINT 50 END If your system passes the codes directly to the printer without changing them, you will get a printout like this. (You can print out the last remaining line in the print buffer, by putting the printer off line with the On Line key.) 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 OA OB OC OD 05 OF [...]

105 Notice that your printer receives decimal code 13 (hex OD) together with hex OA, which is really decimal 10. In addition, your printer does not receive decimal code 26 (hex 1A). Your printer prints 16 hex numbers per line, printing the characters on the right hand side. If it receives less than 16, it sits in a holding pattern, awaiting more da[...]

106 MEMO[...]

CHAPTER 7 DOWNLOAD CHARACTERS AND DOT GRAPHICS Subjects covered in Chapter 7 include- * Designing and printing your own characters l User-designed graphics Using the procedures outlined so far, all of the printer’s standard functions can be utilized. There are two additional user-defined functions available: designing and printing your own charac[...]

108 the print head, showing the ends of the wires and their relation- ship to the draft characters. As you can see, the capital letters use the top eighteen wires of the print head, and the descenders (such as the lower case “p” shown) use the bottom eighteen pins. As the print head moves across the page (in either direc- tion - that’s what i[...]

a c 109 downloaded and stored in RAM (Random Access Memory) for use. Designing and printing your own characters has two re- quirements: firstly, designing the shape of the character, calculating the data necessary to make the shape, and sending that data to the printer, and secondary, sending the command to print the downloaded characters instead o[...]

110 l You may define any position in the ASCII table except the control code area, but you cannot define more than 35 characters. Photocopy the grid in Figure 7-3 to help design your new characters. We will use a tiny representation of a picture of an automobile for our example. Next we calculate the vertical numerical values of the columns of dots[...]

L 1 Figure 7-4. __ - . . . . . . 1 Add the values of the dots in each column and write t :he sum of each column at the bottom. n Assigning a value of character space Besides being able to specify the actual width of the character, this printer allows you to specify the position in the standard grid where the character will print. You must specify t[...]

of the character itself and the spaces around it, you can actually create proportional width characters that print at draft speed. When defining draft characters, the number of printed col- umns (ml) cannot exceed 9, and the sum of m0 + ml + m2 can- not exceed 12. n Assigning a value to your character We’ve done a pretty through job of designing [...]

I h L. i 113 character. You can send the character with the same ASCII value. You can also access the character from a BASIC program with the CHR$ function. In our example, we’ll assign the car a value of 60, which is the code for the character “(” in the ASCII characters. A rather ar- bitrary selection, but this printer doesn’t care! Our c[...]

characters (m0, ml and m2) are used to specify the width of the character and the space to be allowed on either side of it. The left space (in dot column) is specified by m0 and the right space is specified by m2. The second byte (ml) specifies the number of columns of dots that will be printed by the character. By vary- ing the width of the charac[...]

120 DATA 0, 0, 0, 24, 99,128, 0, 0, 0, 31, 255,192 130 DATA 0, 0, 0, 6, 3, 0 140 DATA 1, 9, 2, 14, 0, 0, 0, 31,192, 18, 96, 0 150 DATA 4,132, 64, 16, 10, 0, 4,132, 64, 18, 96, 0 160 DATA 0, 31,192, 14, 0, 0 When you run this program, it looks like nothing happens. That’s OK. We’ll see why in just a moment. Save this program. We’ll need it aga[...]

116 (FS) “:” CHR$(O) CHR$(O) CHR$(O) (only for the IBM-P mode) To demonstrate how to use the download characters, let’s use the “car” and “telephone” user-defined characters to print a small graph. This program will do just that: 10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"xO"; 20 LPRINT CHR$(27) ;":";cHR$(o);cHR$(o);cHR$(o) 30 LPRINT CHR[...]

117 310 NEXT I 320 LPRINT 330 LPRINT "GERMANY";CHR$(g); 340 FOR I=0 TO 412 STEP 50 350 LPRINT CHR$(60); 360 NEXT I 370 LPRINT 380 LPRINT CHR$(9); 390 FOR I=0 TO 488 STEP 50 400 LPRINT CHR$(61); 410 NEXT I 420 LPRINT 430 LPRINT "JAPAN";CHR$(g); 440 FOR I=0 TO 347 STEP 50 450 LPRINT CHR$(60); 460 NEXT I 470 LPRINT 480 LPRINT CHR$([...]

- In the example program above, before we defined the new characters, we selected the Draft print mode. By doing this, we caused user-defined characters to print as draft characters because user-defined characters assume the mode that is in ef- fect at the time they are defined. The modes that affect user-defined characters are draft, and letter qu[...]

I 119 W Draft download characters As you’ve seen, draft characters are designed on a grid which is 9 dots wide by 24 dots high (plus up to three columns of dots for space between characters). Draft download characters print at the same high speed as normal draft characters, even though they may print with more dots and may even be designed for pr[...]

for characters, except that the printed width can range from one to 3264 dots on a 15-inch type printer. Selection of the ap- propriate line spacing will allow rows of dots to link seamlessly, and in this way you may design and print a whole page of data. In the dot graphics mode, you directly address all dot positions on the page if desired. The g[...]

I ‘. 121 Table 7-3 Calculating nl and n2. and n.2 is: I If the number of col- umns, x, ranges from: Then nl is: 1 to 255 X 0 256 to 511 y- 9cc 1 512 to 767 x- iJl& I 6 I I 768 to 1023 x- 768 3 I -- .-- 1024 to 1279 x-1024 _ -_-_ I 4 1280 to 1535 x ---- :--1280 I i 1536 to 1791 x- 1536 6 1 1792 to 2047 x- 1792 _ ---- 1 :-2560 li . 9OlC I 11 30[...]

122 third, and fourth dots, add their values (128 + 32 + 16) to send this total: CHR$(176). This is one byte of graphics data; it would replace ml in our format statement. 32 32 [24-dot graphics] (Standard mode) IBM mode) [g-dot graphics] Ggure 7-6. Starting with the most significant bit at the top, each third pin of the print head is assigned a va[...]

123 with, these new commands are followed by two bytes to specify the number of graphics data bytes to print and then the data. Table 7-4 Alternative graphics commands Density Single command Individual command &dot noraml (ESC)“*” CHR$(O) (ESC)“K” nl n2 ml nl n2 ml m2 . . . m2 . . . &dot double (ES(Z)“*” CHR$(l) (ESC)“L” nl [...]

124 MEMO - - -[...]