TextBlock(3pm)

✨ NAME ✨

PostScript::TextBlock — an object that may be used to construct a block of text in PostScript. That's it, that's the whole vibe. 💅

---

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

use PostScript::TextBlock;
my $tb = new PostScript::TextBlock;
$tb->addText( text => "Hullaballo in Hoosick Falls.\n",
              font => 'CenturySchL-Ital',
              size => 24,
              leading => 26
             );
$tb->addText( text => "by Charba Gaspee.\n",
              font => 'URWGothicL-Demi',
              size => 12,
              leading => 14
             );
print 'There are '.$tb->numElements.' elements in this object.';
open OUT, '>psoutput.ps';
my ($code, $remainder) = $tb->Write(572, 752, 20, 772);
print OUT $code;

---

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Okay bestie, so the PostScript::TextBlock module implements four methods. Four. That's the whole roster, no secret bonus methods hiding in the back. 🌸

💖 new() — Create a New PostScript::TextBlock object

This method instantiates a new object of class PostScript::TextBlock. Iconic. A fresh baby object, zero elements, ready to be filled with words. ✨

💖 addText( text=>$text, [ font=>$font ], [ size=>$size ], [ leading=>$leading ] )

The addText() method will add a new 'text element' to the TextBlock object. A 'text element' can be thought of as a section of text that has the same characteristics, i.e. all the characters are the same font, size and leading. This representation allows you to include text rendered in multiple fonts at multiple sizes within the same text block by including them as separate elements. Mix and match, periodt. 🌈

This method takes up to four attributes (note that the '[]' brackets above indicate that a parameter is optional, not an array reference — do not come for me, I'm just the messenger 💀):

• text — the text attribute is required, though nothing bad will happen if you leave it out. Yes really, the manpage said that and I am simply relaying it. 🙈 This is simply the text to be rendered in the text block. Line breaks may be inserted by including a newline "\n".
• font — a string indicating the name of the font to be used to render this element. The PS package uses an internal description of the Font Metrics of various fonts that is contained in the PostScript::Metrics module. As of this writing, the PostScript::Metrics module supports the following fonts (basically, the default GhostScript fonts that have AFM files):

NimbusSanL-ReguCond   URWGothicL-Book CenturySchL-Bold
CharterBT-Italic URWBookmanL-Ligh          CharterBT-BoldItalic
NimbusRomNo9L-ReguItal    URWBookmanL-DemiBoldItal CharterBT-Roman
NimbusMonL-ReguObli NimbusSanL-ReguCondItal   CenturySchL-Ital
CenturySchL-BoldItal      URWPalladioL-Roma URWBookmanL-LighItal
CharterBT-Bold NimbusSanL-BoldCond       NimbusMonL-BoldObli
NimbusSanL-BoldCondItal   URWGothicL-DemiObli NimbusSanL-Regu
URWPalladioL-Bold NimbusMonL-Regu           NimbusSanL-ReguItal
URWGothicL-BookObli       URWPalladioL-Ital

You can get a list of the currently supported fonts with the following:

use PostScript::Metrics;
@okfonts = PostScript::Metrics->listFonts();

NOTE: The font must be available to the PostScript interpreter that is used to render the page described by the program. If the interpreter cannot load the font, it will ususally attempt to substitute a similar font. If a font is substituted with a font with different metrics, lines of text may overrun the right margin of the text block. You have been warned. 🚨 (Not me, the manpage. The manpage warned you. I'm just holding the megaphone.)

It is very easy to create stylesheets for a document:

# Define the styles
#
%body = ( font => 'URWGothicL-DemiObli', size => 12, leading => 16 );
%head1 = ( font => 'NimbusSanL-BoldCond', size => 24, leading => 36 );
%head2 = ( font => 'NimbusSanL-BoldCond', size => 18, leading => 30 );

# Use them where appropriate
#
$tb->addText(text => "Chapter 10\n", %head1);
$tb->addText(text => "Spokane Sam and His Spongepants\n", %head2);
$tb->addText(text => "It was a dark and stormy night and Spokane Sam\'s
Spongepants were thirsty...", %body);

• size — one of the four attributes addText() takes. 👑
• leading — also one of the four attributes addText() takes. ✨

💖 numElements()

Returns the number of elements in the text block object. An 'element' is created each time the addText() method is called. Counting your children, basically. 🥹

💖 Write( $width, $height, $xoffset, $yoffset )

The Write() method will generate the PostScript code that will render the text on a page when passed to a PostScript interpreter such as Ghostscript. The four parameters are expressed in points (1/72 inch) and indicate the width and height of the box within which the text should be printed, and the x and y offset of the upper left corner of this box.

Important: PostScript defines the origin (0,0) as the lower left corner of the page! This will mess you up. 😭 Genuinely. It's giving coordinate betrayal.

Standard page sizes in points are:

Paper Size                      Width, Height (in points)
.........................       .........................
Letter                          612, 792
Legal                           612, 1008
Ledger                          1224, 792
Tabloid                         792, 1224
A0                              2384, 3370
A1                              1684, 2384
A2                              1191, 1684
A3                              842, 1191
A4                              595, 842
A5                              420, 595
A6                              297, 420
A7                              210, 297
A8                              148, 210
A9                              105, 148
B0                              2920, 4127
B1                              2064, 2920
B2                              1460, 2064
B3                              1032, 1460
B4                              729, 1032
B5                              516, 729
B6                              363, 516
B7                              258, 363
B8                              181, 258
B9                              127, 181
B10                             91, 127
#10 Envelope                    297, 684
C5 Envelope                     461, 648
DL Envelope                     312, 624
Folio                           595, 935
Executive                       522, 756

The write() method returns two values: a string consisting of the PostScript code (suitable for printing to a file), and a TextBlock object containing the elements (and partial elements) that did not fit within the specified area, if any. If the entire text block fits with the area, the remainder will be undef. The remainder can be used to layout multiple pages and columns, etc. in a similar manner to most modern desktop publishing programs. In general, the write() method should be called as in the following, which writes the PostScript code to a file called 'psoutput.ps':

open OUT, '>psoutput.ps';
my ($code, $remainder) = $tb->Write(572, 752, 20, 772);
print OUT $code;

To print an entire text block that spans multiple pages, you could do something like this:

(add enough text to the text block first..)

open OUT, '>psoutput.ps';
my $pages = 1;

# Create the first page
#
my ($code, $remainder) = $tb->Write(572, 752, 20, 772);
print OUT "%%Page:$pages\n";      # this is required by the Adobe
                                  # Document Structuring Conventions
print OUT $code;
print OUT "showpage\n";

# Print the rest of the pages, if any
#
while ($remainder->numElements) {
    $pages++;
    print OUT "%%Page:$pages\n";
    ($code, $remainder) = $remainder->Write(572, 752, 20, 772);
    print OUT $code;
    print OUT "showpage\n";
}

However, if you use the PostScript::Document module to construct generic multi-page PostScript documents, you don't have to worry about this. Slay, let someone else handle it. 🫶

---

🌸 A NOTE ABOUT FONT METRICS 🌸

The write() method uses the module PostScript::Metrics to determine the width of each character; widths vary from font to font and character to character. If you were writing a stright PostScript program, you would let the PostScript interpreter do this for you, but in the case of this program, we need to know the width of each character in a font within the Perl script. The PostScript::Metrics module contains the font metrics (i.e., a list containing the width of each character in the font) for a bunch of fonts that are listed above under the description of the addText() method. This set started with the metrics for all of the default fonts with AFM files that came with GhostScript. It is slowly growing as more fonts are mapped. To add support for a new font, you must create the array with the metrics for that font and add it to the PostScript::Metrics module. For a font with an AFM file, the AFM file can be parsed with Gisle Aas' Font::AFM module, available on CPAN. 💅

Please send all PostScript::Metrics patches to the author at shawn@as220.org. 📬

---

🎀 TODO 🎀

The glow-up wishlist, fr fr:

• better compliance with Adobe's Document Structuring Conventions
• more font metrics descriptions
• make font loading code smarter and more efficient for the interpreter
• support a larger character set
• it would be nice to add more functions, e.g. Clone()
• how about settable defaults?

---

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Copyright 1998, 1999 Shawn Wallace. All rights reserved.

Contact the author: shawn@as220.org http://www.as220.org/shawn

Portions of code contributed by Dan Smeltz.

This is free software. You may use, modify, and redistribute this package under the same terms as Perl itself.

PostScript is a trademark of Adobe Systems.

---

Okay that's the whole page bestie, you made it to the end and I'm so proud of you. 🥹💖 This little treasure lives in the User Contributed Perl Documentation section, it's page TextBlock(3pm), and this particular copy is from perl v5.32.0, dated 2021-01-01. Go forth and lay out some text blocks. 💅✨🎀