Skip to content

dpavlin/Printer-EVOLIS

Folders and files

NameName
Last commit message
Last commit date

Latest commit

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Repository files navigation

NAME
    Printer::EVOLIS - pixel-exact driver for EVOLIS Dualys two-side card
    printer in perl

DESCRIPTION
    This is experimental support for EVOLIS Dualys 3 printer with black
    ribbon (K) to provide pixel-exact driver with support for two-side
    printing.

    Existing cups driver is available at

    http://www.evolis.com/eng/Drivers-Support/Product-support/Dualys-3

    but I haven't been able to make it print on both sides of cards, partly
    because using dumplex option in cups seems to segfault GhostScript
    and/or `rastertoevolis' cups filter depending on combination of duplex
    options.

    I also needed pixel perfect transfer to printer, and cups bitmap format
    is always in color, leaving final pixel modifications down to cups
    filter which always produced differences between file sent to printer
    and perfect black and white rendition of it.

SCRIPTS
    Current toolset consists of following scripts:

  scripts/inkscape-render.pl card/template.svg 201008159999 login Name Surname
    Generate pdf files from Inkscape SVG template in `card/' using
    `print-front' and `print-back' object IDs. Layers doesn't work since we
    can't toggle visilbity easily. To print more than one object gruop them
    and change ID of group.

    After pdf files are created, GhostScript is used to rasterize them into
    pbm (monochrome) bitmaps.

  scripts/evolis-driver.pl front.pbm back.pbm > evolis.commands
    Provides driver which generates printer command stream to print
    two-sided card from pbm files.

  scripts/evolis-simulator.pl evolis
    Simulator for EVOLIS printer commands which is useful for development.
    It creates one pbm file per page printed.

  scripts/evolis-command.pl
    Command-line interface to send commands to printer and receive
    responses. Supports readline for editing and history. Requires local
    parallel port connection, probably to USB parallel device.

EXAMPLE
    Following is simple walk-through from svg image in Inkscape to evolis
    command stream which can be executed in top-level directory of this
    distribution:

      ./scripts/inkscape-render.pl card/ffzg-2010.svg 201008159999 Ime Prezime
      ./scripts/evolis-driver.pl out/201008159999.front.pbm out/201008159999.back.pbm > evolis
      ./scripts/evolis-simulator.pl evolis
      qiv evolis*.pbm