GNU Enscript Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Misc

• Does enscript read PPD files?
  No. PPD file support is on my TODO list, I will implement in the near future.

• What's missing / what's different in the Adobe enscript emulation?
  • Enscript's option `-o' has been changed. In enscript `-o' lists missing characters. In GNU enscript `-o' is an alias for `-p' and missing characters are listed with an option `-O'.
• Make install installs with teh current umask. I use 077 for root, which gives all the installed directories rwx------. No good for general use...
  Makefile is just doing what it was told. Change your umask for the installation time or override INSTALL_DATA and INSTALL_PROGRAM Makefile variables.

Character Sets

Printing, Output Media

• I printed some documents with options `-G2r', everything goes just fine but there are no page numbers in the upper right corner. What goes wrong?
  You are probably using wrong output media; your printer uses different output media than enscript. Check what is your default output media in the enscript.cfg (and $HOME/.enscriptrc) file and change it if needed. For example, to change enscript's default media A4 to Letter, you must to do the following change:

  # Default output media.
  DefaultMedia: A4
  =>
  DefaultMedia: Letter
  

  You can also set the default output media during the configuration step, just give configure script option

  --with-media[=media]

  If no media is given, it defaults to Letter.

• How can I change margins under enscript?
  You have to define a new output media which has better margins. This is quite easy, just define the new media in enscript's configuration file. For example, below is a new `A4BigMargin' media with bigger margins:

  # Media definitions:
  #	name		width	height	llx	lly	urx	ury
  Media:	A3		839	1190	18	17	821	1173
  Media:	A4		595	839	18	17	581	822
  Media:	A5		420	595	18	17	406	578
  Media:  Letter		612	792	18	17	597	776
  Media:	Legal		612	1008	18	17	597	992
  
  Media:   A4BigMargin	595	839	36	34	563	805
  

  You can select this media by giving enscript option `-M A4BigMargin' or by setting it to be your default output media by editing enscript.cfg:

  # Default output media.
  DefaultMedia: A4
  =>
  DefaultMedia: A4BigMargin
  

• Ghostscript does not show enscript's outputs correctly, what's the problem?
  There is one minor problem in enscript / ghostscript co-operation. Enscript's default output media is A4 (because I live in Europe) and GhostScript's default output media is Letter. There are three solutions for this problem:
  1. Tell Enscript that it should use the Letter media:

     $ enscript -MLetter other options and files
     

  2. Fix Enscript
     Add / edit following line to file enscript.cfg:

     # Default output media.
     DefaultMedia: A4
     
     =>
     
     # Default output media.
     DefaultMedia: Letter
     

  3. Fix GhostScript
     edit following line to file gs_init.ps:

     % Optionally choose a default paper size other than U.S. letter.
     % (a4) /PAPERSIZE where { pop pop } { /PAPERSIZE exch def } ifelse
     
     =>
     
     % Optionally choose a default paper size other than U.S. letter.
     (a4) /PAPERSIZE where { pop pop } { /PAPERSIZE exch def } ifelse
     

     or give ghostscript option -sPAPERSIZE=a4

• My PostScript printer supports only level 1 PostScript. How can I setup enscript to work with it?

  The level 2 features are protected by an if-else block in the generated output file. So, basicly everything should work smoothly. But, there is a but. As a default, enscript generates the page size selection code, and it might cause a syntax error on level 1 PostScript engines. This problem is fixed by disabling the page size generation. Just edit your .enscriptrc or enscript.cfg files and add the following line:

  GeneratePageSize: 0