The Linux Printing HOWTO: How to obtain an appropriate magic filter

6. How to obtain an appropriate magic filter

6.1 APS Filter

One of the nicest magic filter packages is aps filter, by Andreas Klemm. The Linux Software Map entry goes something like this:


Begin3
Title:          apsfilter
Version:        4.9.1
Entered-date:   Montag, 10. Juli 1995, 21:22:35 Uhr MET DST
Description:    magicfilter for lpd with auto filetype detection
Keywords:       lpd magicfilter aps apsfilter
Author:         andreas@knobel.GUN.de (Andreas Klemm)
Maintained-by:  sledge@hammer.oche.de (Thomas Bueschgens)
                andreas@knobel.GUN.de (Andreas Klemm)
Primary-site:   sunsite.unc.edu
                /pub/Linux/system/Printing/
                211KB aps-491.tgz
Original-site:  ftp-i2.informatik.rwth-aachen.de
                /pub/Linux/pak/APSfilter/aps-491.tgz
Platforms:      C-Compiler, gs Postscript emulator, pbmutils
Copying-policy: GPL
End

APS filter installs as an if filter for a print queue, and will translate from many common file types into your printer's command set. It understands, for example, text, PostScript, dvi, gif, and others.

6.2 Magic-filter

The magic-filter package, written by B.A.McCawley, works much the same way as does APSfilter, but since it is written in bash, it might be more easy to customize. The LSM entry:


Version: 0.4 
Description: Bash scripts to simplify the task of configuring lpd to
   auto-detect file types using /etc/magic. (As advertised in the
   printing-HOWTO).
   This package uses existing filters so it only prints file types for
   which one already has filters (or compressed versions
   thereof). Alterative magic filter approches are described in the
   printing-HOWTO.
Keywords: lpd, /etc/magic, printing, filter
Author: B.A.McCauley@bham.ac.uk (Brian McCauley)
Maintained-by: B.A.McCauley@bham.ac.uk
Primary-site: tsx-11.mit.edu pub/linux/sources/usr.bin
              magic-filter-0.4.tar.gz  5709
Copying-policy: GNU GPL