On Thu, 22 Sep 2005 09:08:33 +1000 john pitman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Any have any experience please? The cost of HP Bardimm seems an
> expensive way to go, when it approaches 75% of the printer
> cost...A$650 for chip when we pay A$800 for a 2200dn refurb.

Soft fonts and NPCONFIG or FILE ;ENV= are your friends, but with 
friends like these you may choose to buy the firmware if you only 
have one or two printers that need the capability.

It is possible create a bytestream file on the HP3000 that can 
contain anything, including a softfont and the PCL commands to load 
and index the font on a target printer, and to pass that file to 
networked printers via either NPCONFIG or FILE ;ENV=.  It is an 
intricate process to create such a file, and you need to obtain the 
necessary softfont file and load it onto the HP3000 of course, but 
it can be done.  Once upon a time there was a third-party, PC 
based, utility that allowed you to do this with a WYSIWYG frontend 
and then upload the result to an HP3000 but the name of the product 
now escapes me.

If you do not need dynamic font management then you can use a 
utility like JetAdmin to install a soft font and and assign it to a 
particular index number on the target printers.  You then use PCL 
commands to reference the font index in your HP3000 applications.
 
I did this many, many years ago but our laser forms grew to such 
numbers and complexity that we ended up buying FANTASIA to manage 
laser printer fonts and forms from the HP3000. 

Regards,
Jim

--   
     *** e-mail is not a secure channel ***
mailto:byrnejb.<token>@harte-lyne.ca
James B. Byrne                Harte & Lyne Limited
vox: +1 905 561 1241          9 Brockley Drive
fax: +1 905 561 0757          Hamilton, Ontario
<token> = hal                 Canada L8E 3C3

* To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, *
* etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *