[KLUG Members] Re: StarOffice to PDF -- Actually, Windows' Postscript engine is the problem

[Adam Tauno Williams]

>>We still have a long way to go regarding pdf files.

Yes and no, see below.

>>No, I think you are continuing to miss my point.  You are rastering
>>Postscript and then converting to PDF.  If you "skip the middleman,"
>>you get much more efficient conversion.
>Let's even discuss this further.  What is Adobe Distiller?
>It is, essentially, a print driver for Windows.  It takes the
>meta-print data from the Windows print system, before it is rastered in the
>native printer langauge and bloated bitmaps, and converts it into optimal PDF
>objects.

All *very* true.

>If you use a generic Postscript print driver in Windows, most of the
>time, the Windows print system generates inefficient rastered objects,
>let alone tons of bitmaps -- especially for TrueType fonts that it
>cannot associate with Adobe Type 1 fonts.  So you big, bloated
>Postscript files outputted from Windows.

True.  I've never converted a Postscript file from Windows,  I'm only talking
about the ones that come out of Netscape, Star Office, etc...  These vary
greatly in "quality".  Something like a presentation from Star Impress, for
instance, converts to an amazingly small and nice looking PDF.  Star Office 6.0
seems much better than 5.2 (ancedotal).

>If you now pump that big, bloated PS file into Aladin Ghostscript's
>PS->PDF converter, it cannot do much for you once most things have
>been rastered as bitmaps.
>Conclusion:  *WINDOWS* Postscript is the problem, *NOT* Linux.  Adobe

Er, Postscript can be a problem regardless of the platform it is generated on. 
Maybe M$-Postscript usually stinks,  but I've seen *plenty* of crappy postscript
come out of Linux applications

. . . snipped. . .

>Gnomeprint will eventually learn to do a lot of PDF features.  Of
>course, it won't always understand the underlying application and its
>components.  So it will never be quite as good as a program that is
>designed for professional publication.

GNOME-Print currently has API-to-PDF output, without Postscript "middle-man". 
These PDF files are typically smaller and faster than Postscript converted
documents.  The user community needs to press developers to integrate with the
printing subsystem.  This also eliminates typing "lpr -P4019ps" or some such
none sense into a GUI dialog when you go to print.  That is just plain stupid.
The PDF's I've generated from Gnumeric could dance on the head of a pin.

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