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Free PDF Development Sneak Peek
This will be a wild and wooly page which is updated often on the web site.
There is a lot happening in development and in the Message Board posts. This
page is just an attempt to collect some of that information about what's
comin' round the corner in development and late breaking news.
It may not be as pretty, gramatticaly correct, or even make much sense (like
the rest of the site does) but that will make it easier to keep it updated.
If you are reading this offline it is probably already out of date! Don't
forget to go back to the real website, and look for a newer version with
more features.
Skip ahead down to the
New Features Availabe
in v0.98f Private Beta
Late Breaking Gadgets
 The Free PDF Gadget
Page where you'll find some Gadgets
which The ZipGuy is considering adding to his site including...
LeeLou Viewlets
for Install process!
It's like a movie of how to do it
Descriptions you can use for Free
PDF
Allows you to Make PDF's For Free by printing from Windows Applications
Lets you to Make PDF's for Free by just by printing from Windows Applications
and view your new PDFs. Setup takes some effort, but well worth it. Required
Programs are RedMon and Ghostscript. Links to them on the home site. The
ZipGuy says Enjoy!
Make your Resume into a professional looking PDF Portable Document Format
Viewable/Printable w/ Acrobat Reader on any platform. Lets you make PDF's
for Free by printing from Windows Applications and view your new PDFs. So
slick you'd think it's done with mirrors. Setup requires a little effort,
but well worth it. RedMon & Ghostscript are required. Links to them on
the home site.
Make your Resume into a professional looking PDF Portable Document Format
Viewable/Printable with Acrobat Reader on any platform. If you don't do it
your competition MAY. Catch the latest craze It's Hot . How'd you like to
be able to create your own PDFs files for free? All you have to do is simply
print to your 'Free PDF' printer from any Windows Application and you then
get a standard 'Save PDF as...' Dialog Box. Next you can optionally view
your PDF in a PDFViewer Acrobat Reader or another of your choice. So slick,
you'd swear its it's done with mirrors 8->. Finally a way to create PDF
files for Free from your own output on Win9x/ME Setup is a little bit of
a bother but well worth it, since you only have to do it once. Even people
on Macs and Unix can read your output. You can print Web Pages from your
Browser Great for archivng and documentation. No more worrying about what
kind of printers other people have. You can put your PDFs on your website
or E-Mail them. Full documentation and Python/TCL Source Code included Requires
Aladdin Ghostscript 6.01 and GhostGum's RedMon version 1.5 which are also
freeware for end user non-commercial use. Links to them on the Site. The
ZipGuy says Enjoy.
The Latest News and Private Beta
of v0.98f available
Free PDF v0.98f Private Beta...
Dateline 8/17/00 ... Free PDF v0.98f Private Beta is in testing right now!
You can download it and help test it!
This candidate release will hopefully become the v0.98 Public Beta.
check out the New Features
Availabe in v0.98f Private Beta
In this Release:
New version coming SOON! No More RedRun!
Wed Sep 13, 2000 3:44 pm - Greets to all the Free PDF Customers.! The ZipGuy
has a new feature working in the Development version, which is currently
v0.98g Private Beta. This feature is that Free PDF can accept the input DIRECTLY
from RedMon by using something called the "STDIN" channel. This means that
with this version (or beyond):
-
In your "Port Propeties" dialog you can have RedMon call freepdf.exe instead
of redrun.exe
-
No Arguments or paramters are required for Free PDF
-
This greatly simplifies the setup
-
You can still call Free PDF with two parameters (i.e. blank first one and
the full path and filename in the second) to ensure backward compatibilty,
and to allow you to call Free PDF yourself when you have a Postscript file
that you want to convert (see the "Alt. Method") page.
This release unfortunately, as the changes occur in the Free PDF module,
will require a download of the newer compiled "freepdf.exe" which will be
about 600k on it's own.
Look for the new version soon!
ZipGuy Version Master
The new architecture is not for the Free PDF program itself, but it the way
that the Free PDF program is executed. This approach incorporates the new
"ZipGuy Version Master" (ZGVM) Program. Source code for ZGVM
will not be released.
What happens with ZGVM is that you will not call a program called
"frpdf098.exe" any more but instead
will call a program called
"freepdf.exe". This program
will still be called as an argument to RedRun like
c:\freepdf\freepdf.exe "%1"
just as the old one was (v0.95) was called with
c:\freepdf\frpdf095.exe "%1".
However, note that the version number is NOT PART OF THE EXECUTABLE's name!
The program that you will call
("freepdf.exe"), will do 1 of 2
things. It can either
-
Do a "Normal" Run of the Latest Free PDF program on your Hard Driver by
-
Dynamically determining the latest version of the Free PDF program's source
code on your Hard Drive
-
compiling and run it on the fly!
-
Or be called back from a "normal" run of Free PDF and do an Update Check
where it
-
Check to see if a newer version is available
-
Download the latest version's description and show it to you
-
Lets you Download the Latest version in source
code form (which should be only about 50k UNZIPPED!!!!)
-
Runs the newest version automatically the next time you make a PDF
without any reconfiguring!
-
Allows you to delete a newer version (if it causes problems) and run the
older version automatically the next time you make a PDF.
This approach has many advantages :
-
make updating Free PDF much easier and much faster from version 0.98e on
-
allow you to have multiple versions of Free PDF installed
-
allow you to switch between multiple versions of Free PDF simply by renaming
them (for troubleshooting for example)
-
Download a tiny executable source code file and yet run it as an executable
Current Status and
v0.98f Private Beta Download are HERE below!
Almost everything is working. There is a version of Free PDF v0.98f
available for download.
There are some problems....
Because of a mysterious problem that downloading text files small text files
from the new site does not work!, It currently uses the old site for the
source of the Update checker text files. That is, instead of looking
for a file on the new site called
"http://www.webxd.com/cv.text"
it looks for the old site
"http://www.geocities.com/the_zipguy/cv.text
This will be changed in the next private beta when this problem is resolved
and will require a full download of the executables (approx 1.2Meg)
The Free PDF program and the ZGVM program, which are both TCL scripts (part
of Python/TCL), are about 50k. When compiled into an .EXE they both are about
600k. The ZipGuy wanted to have this program (ZGVM) call the latest
version of Free PDF source code (only 50k or so) directly, compiling it on
the fly, to run it from your hard drive. Unfortunately, this does not
work. So what he has done for now is to include a version of Dennis Labelle's
wonderful FreeWrap Program which can compile and run the latest version of
Free PDF source code instead. THIS WORKS, but adds another 560k to the download!
Hopefully this will be changed so that the 560k of overhead that this approach
causes can be eliminated.
So if you feel daring, and can't wait for the the final Public Beta version
go ahead and download
Free PDF v0.98f Private
Beta 1.1 Mb (Executables only. No DOCS).
To install it, assuming you have a working version of v0.95 Public Beta,
just
-
Run it and let it put the new files into the c:\freepdf folder
-
Modify your port settings on your "Create PDF" printers properties to execute
(as an argument to RedRun)
c:\freepdf\freepdf.exe "%1"
instead of
c:\freepdf\frpdf095.exe "%1".
If you use the Private beta, use it with the understanding that You will:
-
Let the ZipGuy know how it works
-
Not get mad if problems arise
-
Be ready not to complain when the new real version of v0.98 Public Beta has
to be Downloaded in full (the executable part)
-
Be ready to ignore the extra console windows that may be there in case error
messages pop up in the Private Beta
-
Be Aware that this version will do spurious Downloads if you do an update
check so that the Update checker can be tested!
-
Enjoy the new features before anyone else!
New Features Availabe
in v0.98f Private Beta
THE GOOD News: The ZipGuy has got a
bunch of new features working in the development
version which is downloadable now! Go here for it
Here's the new Configuration screen:
The first two are for
"When Name for PDF recieved from
RedMon"
"Push 'Save_as' Button Automatically" |
| The new version "receives" the name of the file
being printed from RedMon. and uses this to
"guess" what you want to call the new PDF. So if you're editing
"ReSume.doc", theoretically Redmon will pass Free PDF "ReSume" and the next
version will default to creating "ReSume.pdf" in the new default
"Windows\Desktop" folder so you get an Icon for it. How well this feature
works will depend on what the application sends RedMon, and what it in turn
sends FreePDF. The GIGO rule is quite active in this case. The
Zipguy would guess that Word probably passes the name of the file to RedMon
and should work. More testing needs to be done, though. Especially as the
code to do this was nasty and hard to get working. It depends upon what RedMon
passes. The ZipGuy has to test various applications to see how many pass
this parameter successfully. He may need help as he DOES NOT HAVE MS OFFICE! |
"Replace Existing File" |
| The new version if it "receives" the name of the
file being printed from RedMon. and uses this
to "guess" what you want to call the new PDF. Gives you the option
to overlay any existing PDF witht that name. If it doesn't receive the name
from RedMon, this option and the one above are not active, EVEN IF THEY ARE
TURNED ON. |
|
"Always Skip PDF Viewer" |
| The newer development release has the ability to "Always Skip PDF Viewer"
which (believe it or not) people asked for. |
"ALWAYS USE SAME NAME and FOLDER (Last
one)
for PDF (Overwrites)" |
| This is a specialty option for people who need a predictable name for
the PDF produced by Free PDF. An example, of why people want this, is that
they may then use an FTP program to uplaod the newly created PDF to web site. |
"New checks that the input file
exists" |
| The newer development release has the ability to
"Test Free PDF and Ghostscript Part" by clicking
on a "Test Free PDF" shortcut in the Free PDF folder (c:\freepdf) which
runs a supplied Postscript File through Free PDF. |
"Rerun the last PS file" |
| The newer development release has the ability to "Rerun the last PS file"
through by clicking on a "rerun.bat" file which is dynamically created each
time a PDF is converted! This newer version copies the temporary PS file
being converted to the Free PDF directory under the imaginative name of
"lastfile.ps" (assuming of course that you are not rerunning it ((hehe))
as that would delete the input file). |
"You get ICON for your
PDF!" |
| The newer development release defaults to create the output pdf in the
Desktop folder. This means that a PDF ICON shows
up on your desktop and you can click on it to open it. Or, you can
Drag and drop it places like your e-mail (hehe).
This change was snuck back into the V0.95 (on 7/1/00 at 2:00 am GMT-5)
vesrsion without changing the CODE! The sample .ini file had it's default
"pdfoutdir" changed to "c:\windows\desktop"
For users of the current release you can do this by just "Save as..." to
the Desktop Folder. |
"Test Free PDF and Ghostscript/PDFViewer
Part" |
| The newer development release has the ability to
"Test Free PDF and Ghostscript Part" by clicking
on a "Test Free PDF" shortcut in the Free PDF folder (c:\freepdf) which
runs a supplied Postscript File through Free PDF. |
"Update Checker" |
| The Zipguy has decided that the next
release with these features, or at least the "Recieve File Name"
feature, will NOT be released without a new "Check
for Newer Version" being included. At some point the Free PDF
will be good enough that people will be tempted to keep using outdated versions,
and not even be aware of newer ones with bug fixes (hopefully few) and
significant new features (hopefully many). This feature works in the development
version, but is rudimentaty in some aspects.
If a new version is found on the web you get a notification with a summary
of what's going on, where the webfiles are, and a new window describing
the features
When a download is available, a window pops up with a short description
the features of the latest couple of versions, and "Download" and "Exit"
buttons.
It does need a little more tweaking because as of 7/4/00 it just does the
download and gives no feedback at all. The ZipGuy is adding a dialog
box for that thread which will Give you the classic "n,nnn bytes downloaded
so far of n,nnn,nnn bytes" type message as well as the obligatory gas guage
graphic, AND A CANCEL Button (as there is no way to cancel the download in
development version once you start it).
GOOD NEWS! The Update Checker's Working! Here's what it looks
like:
And a success message when it's done
|
Gee ZipGuy, this sounds terrific, I want these
features!
Drawing Board
some doodling here (hehe) |
Here's a link to the new Splash screen ( also in news section on Home
Page)
You Have to See this - Here's
a Sneak Peek at the upcoming
outrageous Splash Screen for Free PDF which is only 34k. The link is
to a zip file which is 12k! That's as small as a banner ad. Take a look.
Everyone loves it. It was made by the 'Mizer' who is a wizard and a
ZipGuy Cohort. They call him the Mizer because he writes excellent
VB stuff and it is so small! He may be collaborating with the ZipGuy
and perhaps writing the "update checker" module.
And here's a new ZipGuy logo!
And a new Free PDF Logo
Courtesy Zipguy's Cohort 'Webxd' and
LockerGnomie extrodinaire
 |
This is a text description of how the Update Checker component of the
ZGVM works
ZGVMaster -- ZipGuy Version Master
This is a general purpose update checker and Version Master.
It does two VERY DIFFERENT THINGS depending on the
presence or absence of a file called 'zgvmastr.txt' .
If the File is ABSENT then
it is a normal run and it's job
is to find and run the Most Recent Version
(passing the parameters it was passed)
Else (if the file is PRESENT)
it's job is to Handle the Update Checking Process
including availability determination and downloading.
The Version Master Part is that it will Dynamically determine
the name of the latest version of a given TCL Script given
the nonversion dependent portion of the name.
It then calls the most recent version
WITH the parameters it was passed and exits
So for example, FreePDF's executable name stem is
frpdfxxx.tcl where xxx is the version number,
the 'Stem' is "frpdf???.tcl"
"?" is for single character matching.
So if frpdf095.tcl and frpdf098.tcl exist,
in the same directory as this program, it will
call frpdf098.tcl in a new interpreter.
IF THE FILE is present then this module does the
Update Checker Function
It receives it's input from the file 'zgvmastr.txt'
This is a text file which has a fixed format (see below)
The second place from which get's told what to do and where
to find files is a web based file known as a cvxxxx.txt (see below)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
zgvmastr.txt - When this program starts it looks for the presence of and
reads the contents of zguptchk.ini. This file has the following format
All Five lines are mandatory though the last four may be in any order.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
MRV=
CVURL=
FIRSTWORD=
PGMNAMEBEINGUPDATED=
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Explanation of Fields:
MRV= This field is the vesion of the current intalled program
which will be compared with whatever is available on the web
3 character numeric recommended (e.g. v1.07 = 107).
CVURL= This Field is the URL where to look for the CV (or current Verison)
file. This file on the web is also a plain text file (see below).
FIRSTWORD= This should be a short word (usually the name of the program)
which will be used a check when the update CV file is retreived
and read on the web. If this word is not found in the correct
place in the CV then this is an error condition. This is here.
to guard against reading the wrong CV file (for another program)
PGMNAMEBEINGUPDATED= This Field is just displayed on screen and should
be the name and version of the program bieng updated.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
cvxxxxx.txt - This is the file pointed to by the CVURL field is
read from the contents of zguptchk.ini. This file has
only one long line in the following fixed format with Spaces delimiting
fields. The second line is just a long line of text which tells the
customer what to do if the download works, for installation instructions.
In this second line,
\n-means carriage return
\t-means tab
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
mrv vvv url1 url2 filename.ext
Download Sucessful!\nIf Everything went according to plan...\n
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Explanation of Fields:
mrv - required just a constant to help indicate this is a valid "cv" file
vvv - Numeric version number. This is the version number of the most recent
version available on the web. This will be compared to the contents
of the MRV= field from the zguptchk.ini file. If this value is higher
numerically, then an update is available. Otherwise a suitable message
is displayed saying "You are running the most current version thanks
for checking".
url1 - This is the URL for the text file that describes the new versions
features. This file will be retrieved and displayed in a
the "New Version Description" window. The customer will have a
"Download" and "Exit" button on this window.
url2 - This is the location, from which, a download will be attempted if the
customer hits the "Download" button on the "New Version Description"
Window.
filename.ext - This is the name under which the downloaded file will be saved
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The second line will be displayed in an "Ok" dialog box,
IF the download was successful!
Note that the variable "$filenameext" may be used in the message and will be
replaced with the name of the file which was downloaded.
|
|
Testing alternate Message Board here
In any case the new code needs exercise, so at least another beta will be
forthcoming soon (hopefully within days rather than weeks).
Wish the ZipGuy Luck!
below is a snip from the message board which discusses a potential new feature
or two
You realize that all the Clients PCs will have to have Free PDF installed
and configured?
Assuming they did, from which applications will they print to create PDFs?
Each application would have to be tested to verify that it works and passes
an "acceptable" name to (RedMon, RedRun and subsequently to) Free PDF.
In the new development version, with the new "Receive Name" feature, as it
stands now, they will be able to configure it so that all they do is
hit 'ok' in the
"Save as.."
and hit 'yes' in the
".. already exists. Do you want to replace it?"
dialog boxes.
IF Free PDF does not receive a name from the calling application, it will
prompt them . What would you want it to do instead?
Also keep in mind that they could use a network drive as a "Save as..." Target
and that would effect the transfer on a LAN to the server.
Check back SOON (days rather than weeks), 8-P
PDF (Portable Document Format) is
Copyright ©2000 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved.\
Brought to you Courtesy of The ZipGuy
These pages, and their contents, are Copyright ©2000-2005 BMRWare. All rights reserved
Some
Topics:
ZipGuy Topics
:
ZipGuy
Home |
Free PDF |
FreeWare |
Shortcut Magic |
Color Picker |
Kitty
AOLPress |
Organize Folders |
PDF Links |
TCL Freeware |
TCL Links |
WMatch32
|
