RetroPrinter Support

v3.18 Release

We have now released v3.18 of the Retro-Printer software. If you have v3.17 the main issue is the config files (ensure epson_pins is 24 and page_length is 66).

- Corrected some minor issues with the default configuration options
- Corrected bug with Printronix-S emulator
- Improvements to Seiko STP Printer emulator
- Corrected handling of horizontal tabs
- Ignore NULL codes sent by printer until start receiving some data
- Bug fix to printing if use plain text emulator

v3.19 Release

- Corrected some bugs in the ESC . 1 (RLE Encoded graphics mode).
- GhostPCL updated to latest version and added custom patch to support different colours
- Added /root/config/convert_pc850 (non HP PCL) - this changes the characters in the generated eps files to use ANSI characters, instead of PC850 as used by Epson character set.
- Added /root/config/merge_pages - (non HP PCL) combines the individual PDF files from each print job into one (experimental)
- Added handling for fixed size Atari Fonts, stored in /fonts/Atari/Atari-PC437-US.bin
Change /root/config/epson_font to Atari (experimental)
Change /root/config/charset to Atari-PC437-US (experimental)
- Added HPGL emulation for plotters with with P-24 (24" x 36") and P-36 (36" x 42") page sizes added (experimental)

v3.19a Release

Just a small update to correct an issue with the PCL emulation

v3.19b Release

Another minor release:
- Corrected bug in Epson ESC.2 graphics modes
- Added code to ignore PJL job code

v3.19c Release

Hot on the heels of v3.19b is v3.19c. This corrects an issue in Epson ESC.2 mode where we were still detecting changes in the MSB setting (force bit 7 on or off) in the middle of the graphics dump!

v3.19d Release

This is a minor update to the default configuration to charset (this was not the correct default setting in v3.19) and print_upperchrset

We have decided to enable print_upperchrset by default.

We have also added preliminary emulators for Apple ImageWriter, Seiko QT-2100P and Tandy DMP-105 printers - we welcome feedback and testing of these by people with these printers (as obvioulsy some raw data files would assist with development).

v3.19e Release

This is a minor update to the merging of pdf files and enhancements to the Seiko QT-2100P printer emulation mode.

Added /root/config/output_CSV setting (to output captured data to CSV) - currently only for the QT2100P emulation
Added /root/config/ff_end_of_job - set to YES to force the system to see Form Feed as the end of a print job
Added /root/config/exchange_codes - set to YES to allow incoming printer code sequences to be exchanged

/root/config/exchange_strings then contains sets of two lines of printer codes (as ASCII characters).
If the first line in a set of codes is captured from the centronics port, it is replaced by the second line in the set.

This can be useful for changing colour of the printout for example.

v3.19f Release

This is a minor update to the Seiko QT-2100P emulation.

v3.20 Release

- Improvements to data capture speed
- Improvements to data capture timing and handling of HP PJL control codes as a wrapper
- Added Flush_timeout to deal with long timeouts
- Added beta emulation of the Mannessmann Tally MT600 printer
- Changes to xpos and ypos positioning to use floating point calculations (essential for the MT600 emulation)
- Offline Switch now has different functions possible, including paper size switching, emulations, job control and printer control
- Correction of merge_pages routine if only one page
- Corrected error in line_raster_print() for Epson hi-resolution modes
- Added a USB_Passthrough setting of CUPS - here the raw captured data is sent to the default CUPS printer
- Added an emulation setting of JOB-Passthrough - here the raw captured data is sent to the default CUPS printer
- Added beta MTLP + EPSON emulation (MTLP-EPSON) for Tally Line Printers
- Various minor improvements

v3.20b Release

We have now released v3.20b of the software, this includes:
- Update of Linux to Debian 12
- Fix issues where a right or bottom margin of 0 was specified
- Fix issues with output_PNG as File (PNG was not being generated).
- Minor change to page size support and clarification in manuals