1MPAGE(Local) MPAGE(Local)
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6 mpage - print multiple pages per sheet on PostScript printer
7
10 mpage [-1248aAceEfHloOrRStTuUvVxX] [-b papersize] [-B[num[lrtb]]...]
11 [-C [encoding]] [-da|p] [-D dateformat] [-F fontname] [-h header]
12 [-j first[-last][%interval]] [-J startpageno] [-L lines]
13 [-m[num[lrtb]]...] [-M[num[lrtb]]...] [-p[prprog]] [-P[printer]]
14 [-s tabstop] [-W width] [-z printcmd] [-Z printcmd_args] [file ...]
15
21 mpage reads plain text files or PostScript documents and prints them on
22 a PostScript printer with the text reduced in size so that several
23 pages appear on one sheet of paper. This is useful for viewing large
24 printouts on a small amount of paper. It uses ISO 8859.1 to print
25 8-bit characters.
26 The following options are recognized (note that arguments to options
29 may be separated from the option by spaces, except for -B, -m, -M, -p
30 and -P): Also when mpage encounters -- as option it will stop parsing
31 arguments and the remaining arguments are interpreted as filenames.
32 -1 Print 1 normal page per sheet (included for symmetry).
35 -2 Print 2 normal pages per sheet.
38 -4 Print 4 normal pages per sheet (default).
41 -8 Print 8 normal pages per sheet.
44 -a Toggle layout of the pages on the sheet so that successively
47 numbered pages run down the sheet, as opposed to left to right.
48 (default updown) .
49 -A This option is deprecated, see -b. Prepare output for A4 sized
52 paper. For default see 'mpage -x'.
53 -bpapertype
56 Prepare output for selected paper type. Papersize can be A3 for
57 European A3, A4 for European A4, Letter for US Letter or Legal
58 for Legal sized paper. For default see 'mpage -x'. To see the
59 list of currently available types, just give the 'mpage -bl' or
60 'mpage -b?' command (Note: mpage exits after finding such option
61 use.)
62 -B[<num>[lrtb]*]
65 Setup a box around a particular part of your page. Specify text
66 box margins and line thickness. The default is 0 columns
67 (lines) for both left and right (top and bottom) margins and 0
68 line thickness. Specifying -B solely toggles printing of the
69 box. l, r, t or b set the left, right, top or bottom margin
70 respectively to <num> columns (lines). Not specifying any of
71 the sides, will set the line thickness when <num> is given. For
72 example -B1 sets the line thickness to 1. Sides with negative
73 margins will not print.
74 -c Toggle concatenation off pages from different files on single
77 sheets (default off).
78 -C[encodingfile]
81 Specify the character encoding file. The file should be in the
82 mpage library directory (/usr/share/mpage). Mpage has an inter‐
83 nal default encoding based on Latin-1 or IBM codepage 850.
84 Depending on compile time option this encoding definition is on
85 or not. Not specifying an encodingfile will toggle the usage of
86 the internal encoding.
87 -da|p Force input to be taken as ascii (a) or postscript (p) text.
90 This way you can print your postscript code as text, or print
91 postscript code that mpage does not recognise. When using -dp,
92 make sure that the the postscript code contains %Page page sepa‐
93 rators or else things will probably look odd.
94 -Ddateformat
97 Set the date format as in strftime(3) to be used in date/time
98 representations (e.g. in headers). (Note: to be useful you
99 probably need the -H option.)
100 -e Print 2 normal pages per sheet in duplex mode. Every first and
103 fourth page or on one side and every second and third on the
104 other side. This is more or less a combination of the -O and -E
105 option but then in one pass.
106 -E Print 2 normal pages per sheet. However, this option will print
109 every second and third page of every set of four pages. This
110 option will ignore -a and -l. See also the -O option. Using
111 these options double sided prints can be created without a
112 duplex printer.
113 -f Toggles folding lines longer than page width (default off) .
116 -Ffontname
119 Specify font. (default Courier). Check your printer for sup‐
120 ported fonts. Note: this has almost nothing to do with the fonts
121 used for your X-windows/KDE/Gnome environment.
122 -hheader
125 This is used only when the -p or -H switch is used and is passed
126 as the "-h header" option to pr(1) or as the header for -H.
127 -H Create header line for each logical page separated from page
130 text by a horizontal line. Unless -h is given, the header con‐
131 sist of last file modification time, filename and page number,
132 all in bold and slightly larger font. This option only applies
133 to non-postscript files.
134 -Iindent
137 Indent text by indent characters.
138 -jfirst[-last][%interval]
141 Print just the selected sheets, specified by a number, starting
142 at 1. Here last defaults to the end of data, interval to 1.
143 Several -j options can be given (upto MAXJARGS, default 100) to
144 create a complex selection of pages. Thus -j1-10 selects the
145 first 10 sheets, while -j 1%2 prints just the odd-numbered
146 sheets and -j 2%2 prints just the even ones.
147 You can do double-sided printing, in two passes, as follows. If
149 you use 3-hole punched paper, put it in the printer such that
150 the holes will appear at the top of the page -- on the right as
151 you pull out the printer tray, in our Laser writer II NTX.
152 Print the odd-numbered sheets with
153 mpage ... -j 1%2 ...
155 Note the number of pages it reports. (Only half this many will
157 really be printed). When printing finishes, if mpage reported
158 an odd number of pages, remove the last one from the stack,
159 since there will be no even-numbered sheet to match it. Then
160 arrange the stack of paper for printing on the other side. (If
161 it's punched, the holes will now be on the left.) On our II
162 NTX, the paper comes out blank-side up; replace it in the tray
163 still blank-side up but rotated 180 degrees. For other print‐
164 ers, you figure it out. Now print the even-numbered sheets in
165 reverse order with
166 mpage ... -r -j 2%2 ...
168 hoping no one else reaches the printer before you do.
170 -Jstartpageno
173 Set the start value of the sheet page count to startpageno
174 instead of 1.
175 -k When mpage finds a %%TRailer or %%PSTrailer in the postscript
178 input file it normally assumes this is the end of the postscript
179 file and stops reading the input file. But when the PS file
180 includes EPS files, %%Trailers might be anywhere. Using this
181 option ignores the %%TRailer and %%PSTRailer lines.
182 -l Toggle printing landscape or portrait mode. Landscape pages are
184 55 lines long by 132 characters wide by default. Portrait pages
185 are 66 lines long by 80 characters wide by default. (default
186 portrait.)
187 -Llines
190 Adjust the page reduction parameters so that lines lines will
191 fit in the space of one page. This overrides the default values
192 normally supplied. (See -l.) If used in conjunction with -p
193 then this value is passed to the pr(1) as well. As a side
194 effect this changes the font size as well (as will the -W
195 option.) So while there is an option to change font family,
196 there is no explicit option to change font size!
197 -m[<num>[lrtb]*]
200 Specify sheet margin. The default margin is 20 points. Only
201 specifying -m sets left margin to 40 points. l, r, t or b set
202 left, right, top or bottom margin respectively to <num> points.
203 Not specifying any of the sides will set all sides when <num> is
204 given. <num> defaults to 40 points. For example -m10 sets all
205 margins to 10 points. -ml50tb sets left margin to default 40
206 and top and bottom margin to 50 points. -m50l25bt30r set bottom
207 and top margin to 25, left margin to 50 and right margin to 30
208 points. Margins can have negative numbers.
209 -M[<num>[lrtb]*]
212 Specify logical page margins. For syntax, see -m option.
213 Defaults are 4 for -M solely, and 8 for <num>. Margins can be
214 negative. This way large white borders in your (postscript)
215 documents can be reduced.
216 -o Toggle printing of outlines around each reduced page (default
219 on).
220 -O Print 2 normal pages per sheet. However, this option will print
223 every first and fourth page of every set of four pages. This
224 option will ignore -a and -l. See also the -E option. Using
225 these options double sided prints can be created without a
226 duplex printer.
227 -p[prprog]
230 Pipe input through prprog command (including specified options)
231 before printing (assumes the input is a text file). When no
232 command is specified, it defaults to pr(1).
233 -P[printer]
236 Specify the printer to which the PostScript output will be sent
237 (e.g.lpr -Pprinter). Using -P with no printer specified will
238 send the PostScript to the default printer queue (e.g. lpr).
239 Using -P- will return output to stdout, useful in combination
240 with MPAGE environment variable. Without -P output will be send
241 to standard output.
242 -r Reverse printing. The last sheet is printed first. The way of
245 arranging reduced pages on the sheets doesn't change.
246 -R Switch to left to right mode, starting first page on left bottom
249 corner. This might be useful for landscape postscript files.
250 (Note: using -l after -R undoes -R, and switches to normal land‐
251 scape mode.
252 -stabstop
255 Set tabstop width (default 8 characters). Should by >= 2.
256 -S Accept non-square page reduction. By default, pages are shrunk
259 equally in X and Y, even if this wastes some space on the sheet.
260 With -S, reduced pages are larger but slightly distorted. (only
261 used when printing postscript files.)
262 -t Toggle printing on both sides of the paper. This will toggle
265 duplex mode of the printer. Use this option only if your
266 printer is capable of printing in duplex mode. (default off).
267 -T Toggle tumble of every second pages when printing in duplex
270 mode. Use this option only if your printer is capable of print‐
271 ing in duplex mode and together with -t.
272 -u Toggle checking for UTF-8 input (not relevant for postscript
275 input).
276 -U This option is deprecated, see -b. Prepare output for US Letter
279 sized paper. For default see 'mpage -x'.
280 -v Toggle printing a count of the number of sheets produced for
283 printing (default off.)
284 -V Print version information and exit.
287 -Wwidth
290 Adjust the page reduction parameters so that a line with width
291 characters long will fit in the space of one page. This over‐
292 rides the default values normally supplied. (See -l.) If used
293 in conjunction with -p then this value is passed to the s pr(1)
294 program as well. See also the -L option on font sizes.
295 -x Force usage display, which also shows current defaults.
298 -X [header]
301 Print header on the left and the page number on the right of
302 each physical page (sheet). If no header is given, the default
303 is the current filename (note influence of -c), the filename of
304 the first file on the page is used.
305 -zprintcommand
308 Specify command to use to send output to. Default is lpr [22m(1)
309 for BSD style spooler, lp (1) for SYSV style spooler. You can
310 specify command line options, but note -Z. For example -zlp for
311 system V Unix.
312 -Zprintprog_queuename_arg
315 Specify what option to use for the "-z printcommand" to specify
316 a printqueue. For example -zlp -Z-d for system V Unix. Default
317 is -P for BSD style spooler, -d for SYSV style spooler.
318
321 mpage examines the PRINTER (or LPDEST for SYSV style spooler) environ‐
322 ment variable to override its default printer.
323 The MPAGE_LIB environment variable can be used to control where the
326 character encoding files (-C) can be found.
327 mpage also examines the MPAGE environment variable for default option
330 settings. Any option or combination of options can be specified in the
331 MPAGE environment variable. For example, if MPAGE is set to the
332 string:
333 -2oPqms -L60
335 it would (in the absence of other command line arguments) print 2 pages
337 per sheet, 60 lines per page, with outlines, on the printer named qms
338 (overriding the PRINTER/LPDEST environment variable, if it exists.) In
339 the environment variable, white space is used as an option delimiter,
340 and no quoting is recognized.
341 Any command line options will override both the PRINTER and MPAGE envi‐
344 ronment variables.
345
348 /usr/tmp/mpageXXXXXX
349 /usr/share/mpage
350
353 Suffers under the burden of far too many switches. (But you wanted the
354 choices!)
355 NULL characters in a postscript input file will cause mpage to crash!
357 Many others, we're sure.
359 Mpage is year 2000 compliant, as long as the underlying operating sys‐
361 tem is!!!
362
365 Version 2.5.6, Released Januari 2008.
366 Location:
367 http://www.mesa.nl/pub/mpage
369 ftp://ftp.mesa.nl/pub/mpage
370
372 Marcel Mol <marcel@mesa.nl> (current maintainer).
373 Mark P. Hahn (Original author)
375 2008/01/14 MPAGE(Local)