[seul-edu] Re: File formats and distance learning

["Linux at DCE" <seul@dce.k12.wi.us>]

>>>> richl@mail.tfsd.sk.ca 01/29/03 09:21AM >>>
>> Now my suggestion; Make a "Create PDF" server using samba.  
>> You can use samba to create a network printer which accepts
>> a print job and creates a PDF file.  The user then can retreive
>> their new PDF via a windows share.
> 
>What would be the input format (that you are uploading via smb)?
>As well, what is the conversion software?

As far as Windows is concerned it is an Apple LaserWriter printer
on the network.  Apparently this driver makes pretty clean PostScript
output and is available natively on most versions of Windows.  You
might want to experiment with which driver you use.  I've found a very
big differerence in the quality of the fonts in the final PDF depending on
what driver is used.

ps2pdf (actually ps2pdf13 in my case) converts from PostScript to
PDF.  It is open source and available as part of the ghostscript package.
It creates a PDF 1.3 file which is compatible with Acrobat v4 and later.
If you need to support Acrobat 3 you could use ps2pdf12 instead.

>> If you are interested in the relevant part of my smb.conf file,
>
>I would be.

[pdfmaker]
   comment = PDF Generator
   path = /var/spool/samba
   printable = Yes
   print command = ps2pdf13 %s /shared/pdfs/%u-%s.pdf; rm %s

The bad part is that you often get nonsense filenames like 
johndoe-smbprn.000052.twOwpY.pdf.  The %u is replaced
by the login name of the user connected to the printer.  The
%s is the filename generated by Windows when it sends the 
print job. (Supposedly some versions of Windows or Office will
send the corect filename, but I haven't seen it happen yet.)

I imagine that if you can match user names up with e-mail 
addresses you could even e-mail the results instead of
dumping them in a shared folder.

One other "gotcha" that I have seen is that if the Linux box
doesn't have a font and no font substitution is done, the resulting
PDF will have errors.  In practice this has not been a problem
here.

If this is for a single PC it might be worth just getting a copy
of Adobe Acrobat for Windows, but as a server it can save
quite a bit of money vs. purchasing a bunch of Acrobat licenses.