[Info-vax] text to pdf converter for vms 8.3

[Craig A. Berry]

Joseph Huber wrote:
> David J Dachtera wrote:
> 
>  
>>> http://eisner.decus.org/~berry_c/TEXT2PDF.ZIP
>> How does one make the output useful?
>>
>> I transferred the output file to a PC, but Adobe Reader choked on it, no
>> matter how I sent it (Binary or ASCII - didn't matter). It says he file
>> is damaged and cannot be repaired.
>>
>> Any ideas?
> 
> My version of v1.2 of Phil Smith's text2pdf is working very well, 
> wether the output is produced by "PIPE text2pdf file > output",
> "define/user sys$output, then text2pdf file", or using the built-in
> redirection.
> The transfer should be ASCII, at least the PIPEd output is VFC record
> format, 
> and will not work if transferred in Binary mode.
> I tested o.k. with acroread on Linux and Windows XP.  
> 
> (and I fetched also the version from eisner site it works as well in my
> environment VMS 7.3-1,DECC 6.5).

I just tried my revision of Phil Smith's text2pdf (the one on eisner)
again too and had no trouble. This after compiling on OpenVMS I64
v8.3-1H1 with HP C 7.3, but I've also been using it with success for
some years on OpenVMS Alpha v7.1, compiled with DEC C 6.5.

I was opening the file with Acrobat Reader 8.1.2 on Windows XP. I ftp'd
the file down in both ASCII and binary and it made no difference.

I do tend to use the internal redirection:

$ mcr []text2pdf < myfile.txt > myfile.pdf

That creates a file with Stream_CR record format.

The results also look just fine on Mac OS X with Apple's Preview 4.1 and
Adobe Reader 8.1.4, and with XPDF 3.02 on OpenVMS Alpha v8.3.

So Dave, I don't know why you're running into trouble. Maybe try a
different version of Acrobat or an entirely different reader and see
what happens. Maybe try a different input file. Maybe the one you're
using has embedded control characters or something and that's bolloxing
things up.