foo2hbpl1(1)

📦
this version · 2 versions
, in nixos 26.05

💅 foo2hbpl1 — like, the whole manual, but make it make sense

okay so bestie, you're looking at foo2hbpl1(1), straight out of the General Commands Manual ✨ this is the page that tells you how to turn Ghostscript vibes into printer-language vibes. buckle up 🎀

🌸 NAME 🌸

foo2hbpl1 — converts Ghostscript output into an HBPLv1 printer stream. that's it. that's the job. iconic. 👑

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

foo2hbpl1 [options] <pnm-or-pam-file >hbpl1-file

read it like a sentence: you feed it a pnm-or-pam file on stdin, it hands you an hbpl1-file on stdout. in through the front door, out through the back 🚪✨

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

so here's the tea 🍵 — foo2hbpl1 takes Ghostscript's pbmraw, pgmraw, ppmraw, or pamcmyk32 output formats and converts them into monochrome or color HBPL version 1 streams. and why do we care?? because those streams are literally what drives these printers:

  • the Dell 1250c
  • the Dell C1660w
  • the Dell C1760w
  • the Epson AcuLaser C1700
  • and the Fuji-Xerox CP105b

your fave weird little printer squad fr fr 🖨️🫶

🦋 COMMAND LINE OPTIONS 🦋

only two, and honestly? they ate. 💅

  • -J filename — the filename string to send to the printer. yes, you're handing the printer a name. give it something cute.
  • -U username — the username string to send to the printer. tell it who did this. main character energy only.

🔥 EXAMPLES 🔥

🌈 create a black and white ZJS stream

gs -q -dBATCH -dSAFER -dQUIET -dNOPAUSE
    -sPAPERSIZE=letter -r600x600 -sDEVICE=pgmraw
    -sOutputFile=- - < testpage.ps
| foo2hbpl1 >testpage.zm

look at that pipeline go 😭 gs does its thing, foo2hbpl1 catches it, and out pops testpage.zm. monochrome masterpiece.

🎀 create a color ZJS stream

gs -q -dBATCH -dSAFER -dQUIET -dNOPAUSE
    -sPAPERSIZE=letter -g5100x6600 -r600x600 -sDEVICE=pamcmyk32
    -sOutputFile=- - < testpage.ps
| foo2hbpl1 >testpage.zc

same energy, but this time it's pamcmyk32 and -g5100x6600 and the output is testpage.zc — color slay 🌈💅 note the device swap and the geometry flag, they're not optional vibes, they're literally in the command.

🍓 FILES 🍓

  • /usr/bin/foo2hbpl1 — that's where the binary lives, bestie 📍

🧚 SEE ALSO 🧚

go read these next, they're the friend group 👯

👑 AUTHOR 👑

  • Rick Richardson <rick.richardson@comcast.net>
  • Peter Korf <peter@niendo.de>
  • Dave Coffin <dcoffin@cybercom.net>
  • http://foo2hbpl.rkkda.com/
ngl if you're out here piping raw Ghostscript into a Dell and it's not working, double-check your -sDEVICE first 🫶 that's the vibe check that matters most.

okay that's the whole page!! 💜 cute sign-off time: this was foo2hbpl1(1) from the General Commands Manual, brought to you by the foo2hbpl crew — go say hi at http://foo2hbpl.rkkda.com/ and stan responsibly 🌸✨🎀

📦 where this page comes from