MPAGE

mpage ? print multiple pages per sheet on PostScript printer

mpage [?1248cfovlaAHOERSUXrt] [?p[prprog]] [?B[textboxmargins]] [?da|p] [?m[sheetmargins]] [?M[pagemargins]] [?Llines] [?Wwidth] [?C[encoding] [?hheader] [?P[printer]] [?j first[?last][%interval] [?stabstop] [?Ffontname] [?zprintcommand] [?Zprintcommand_args] [?Ddateformat] [?bpapersize] [files...]

Mpage reads plain text files or PostScript documents and prints them on a PostScript printer with the text reduced in size so that several pages appear on one sheet of paper. This is useful for viewing large printouts on a small amount of paper. Uses ISO 8859.1 to print 8-bit characters.

The following options are recognized (note that arguments to options may be separated from the option by spaces, except for -B, -m, -M, -p and -P):

-8

Print 8 normal pages per sheet.

-4

Print 4 normal pages per sheet (default).

-2

Print 2 normal pages per sheet.

-1

Print 1 normal page per sheet (included for symmetry).

-O

Print 2 normal pages per sheet. But, this option will print every first and forth page of every set of four pages. This option will ignore the -a and -l options.

-E

Print 2 normal pages per sheet. But, this option will print every second and third page of every set of four pages. This option will ignore the -a and -l options.

-p[prprog]

Pipe input through prprog command (including specified options) before printing (assumes the input is a text file). When no command is specified, it defaults to pr(1).

-c

Toggle Concatenation off pages from different files on single sheets (default off).

-C[encodingfile]

Specify then character encoding file. Default is none. The should be in the mpage library directory (/usr/local/lib/mpage). Mpage has an internal default encoding based on Latin-1 or IBM codepage 850. Depending on compile time option this encoding definition is on or not. Not specifying an encodingfile will toggle the usage of the internal encoding.

-Ddateformat

Set the date format as in strftime(3) to be used in date/time representations (e.g. in headers).

-o

Toggle printing of outlines around each reduced page (default on).

-v

Toggle printing a count of the number of sheets produced for printing (default off) .

-f

Toggles folding lines longer than page width (default off) .

-Ffontname

Specify font. Default is Courier.

-l

Toggle printing landscape or portrait mode. Landscape pages are 55 lines long by 132 characters wide by default. Portrait pages are 66 lines long by 80 characters wide by default. (default portrait) .

-R

Switch to left to right mode, starting first page on left bottom corner. This might be useful for landscape postscript files. (Note: using the -l option after -R undoes the -R, and switches to normal landscape mode.

-B[<num>[lrtb]*]

Specify text box margins and line thickness. The default is 0 columns (lines) for both left and right (top and bottom) margins and 0 line thickness. Specifying -B solely toggles printing of the box. l, r, t or b set the left, right, top or bottom margin respectively to <num> columns (lines). Not specifying any of the sides, will set the line thickness when <num> is given. For example -B1 sets the line thickness to 1. Sides with negative margins will not print.

-m[<num>[lrtb]*]

Specify sheet margin. The default margin is 20 points. Specifying -m solely sets left margin to 40 points. l, r, t or b set left, right, top or bottom margin respectively to <num> points. Not specifying any of the sides, will set all sides when <num> is given. <num> defaults to 40 points. For example -m10 sets all margins to 10 points. -ml50tb sets left margin to default 40 and top and bottom margin to 50 points. -m50l25bt30r set bottom and top margin to 25, left margin to 50 and right margin to 30 points. Margins can have negative numbers. Very large values have funny effects. This is left as an exercise to the user.

-M[<num>[lrtb]*]

Specify logical page margins. For syntax, see -m option. Defaults are 4 for -M option solely, and 8 for <num>. Margins can be negative. This way large white borders in your (postscript) documents canbe reduced. Very large values have funny effects. This is left as an exercise to the user.

-a

Toggle layout of the pages on the sheet so that successively numbered pages run down the sheet, as opposed to left to right. (default updown) .

-da|p

Force input to be taken as ascii (a) or postacript (p) text. This way you can print your postscript code as text, or print postscript code that mpage does not recognise. When using -dp , make sure that the the postscript code contains %Page page separators or else things will probably look odd.

-A

deprecated, see /fB-b/fP option. Prepare output for European A4 sized paper. For default see ’mpage -x’.

-U

deprecated, see /fB-b/fP option. Prepare output for US Letter sized paper. For default see ’mpage -x’.

-bpapersize

Prepare output for selected paper size. Papersize can be A4 for European A4, Letter for US Letter or Legal for Legal sized paper. For default see ’mpage -x’.

-S

Accept non-square page reduction. By default, pages are shrunk equally in X and Y, even if this wastes some space on the sheet. With ?S, reduced pages are larger but slightly distorted. (only used when printing postscript files.)

-r

Reverse printing. The last sheet is printed first. The way of arranging reduced pages on the sheets doesn’t change.

-t

Toggle printing on both sides of the paper. This will toggle duplex mode of the printer. Use this option only if your printer is capable of printing in duplex mode. (default off).

-T

Toggle tumble of every second pages when printing in duplex mode. Use this option only if your printer is capable of printing in duplex mode and together with -t .

-jfirst[-last][%interval]

Print just the selected sheets, specified by number, starting at 1. Here last defaults to the end of data, interval to 1. Thus -j1?10 selects the first 10 sheets, while -j 1%2 prints just the odd-numbered sheets and -j 2%2 prints just the even ones.

You can do double-sided printing, in two passes, as follows. If you use 3-hole punched paper, put it in the printer such that the holes will appear at the top of the page -- on the right as you pull out the printer tray, in our Laser writer II NTX. Print the odd-numbered sheets with

mpage ... -j 1%2 ...

Note the number of pages it reports. (Only half this many will really be printed). When printing finishes, if mpage reported an odd number of pages, remove the last one from the stack, since there will be no even-numbered sheet to match it. Then arrange the stack of paper for printing on the other side. (If it’s punched, the holes will now be on the left.) On our II NTX, the paper comes out blank-side up; replace it in the tray still blank-side up but rotated 180 degrees. For other printers, you figure it out. Now print the even-numbered sheets in reverse order with

mpage ... -r -j 2%2 ...

hoping no one else reaches the printer before you do.

-P[printer]

Specify the printer to which the PostScript output will be sent (e.g.lpr -Pprinter). Using -P with no printer specified will send the PostScript to the default printer queue (e.g. lpr). Using -P- will return output to stdout, useful in combination with MPAGE environment variable. Without -P output will be send to standard output.

-Llines

Adjust the page reduction parameters so that lines lines will fit in the space of one page. This overrides the default values normally supplied. (See the -l option.) If used in conjunction with the -p option then this value is passed to the pr program as well.

-Wwidth

Adjust the page reduction parameters so that a line width characters long will fit in the space of one page. This overrides the default values normally supplied. (See the -l option.) If used in conjunction with the -p option then this value is passed to the pr program as well.

-Iindent

Indent text by indent characters.

-stabstop

Set tabstop width (default 8 characters). Should by >= 2.

-hheader

This is used only when the -p or -H switch is used and is passed as the "-h header" option to pr(1) or as the header for -H.

-H

Create header line for each logical page separated from page text by a horizontal line. Unless -h is given, the header consist of last file changetime, filename and page number, all in bold and slightly larger font. This option only applies to non-postscript files.

-X [header]

Print header centered on each physical page (sheet). If no header is given, the default is the current filename (note the -c option) on the left and the page number on the right.

-zprintcommand

Specify command to use to send output to. Default is lpr . for UCB style spooler, lp for ATT style spooler. You can specify command line options, but see -Z option. For example -zlp for system V Unix.

-Zprintprog_queuename_arg

Specify what option to use for the "-z printcommand" to specify a printqueue. For example -zlp -Z-d for system V Unix. Default is -P for UCB style spooler, -d for ATT style spooler.

Mpage examines the PRINTER (or LPDEST for ATT style spooler) environment variable to override its default printer.

The MPAGE_LIB environment variable can be used to control where the character encodings (-C) can be found.

Mpage also examine the MPAGE environment variable for default option settings. Any option or combination of options can be specified in the MPAGE environment variable. For example, if MPAGE is set to the string:

-2oPqms -L60

it would (in the absence of other command line arguments) print 2 pages per sheet, 60 lines per page, with outlines, on the printer named qms (overriding the PRINTER/LPDEST environment variable, if it exists.) In the environment variable, white space is used as an option delimiter, and no quoting is recognized.

Any command line options will override both the PRINTER and MPAGE environment variables.

/bin/pr

/bin/fold

/usr/tmp/mpageXXXXXX

Suffers under the burden of far too many switches. (But I wanted the choices!)

Many others, w’re sure.

Version 2.4, Released September 1996.

Mark P. Hahn (uunet!pyrdc!mark), Pyramid Technology Corporation

Marcel Mol <marcel@mesa.nl>. Lots of other changes. More or less the main author now.

Help from many others, pleas see the CHANGES file.