Star Micronics NX-10 User Manual

NX-10

USER’S MANUAL

NOT INTENDED FOR SALE

PN 80820128

Federal Communications Commission

Radio Frequency Interference

Thw rquipment generates and uses radio frequency energy and if not installed and used
properly. that is. in strl~“l accordance Lvith the manufacturer’s instructions, may cause in­terference to radio and [etexxion reception. It has been type tested and found to comply
with the limits for a Ctavs B computing device in accordance wth the specifications in
Subpart J of Part 15 of FCC Rules, ivhich are designed to provide reasonable protection
against such inrerfcl-ence in a residential installation. Ho~vever. there is no guarantee
that interfrr-ence ~?ll not occur- in a particular installation. If this equipment does ~tuse
interference to radio or telex-ision reception. which can be determined by turning the
equipment off and on. the user is encouraged to try to correct the interference by one or
more of the folk)\\-ing measures:

l Reorient the receiving antenna

oRelocate the computer \vith respect to the receiver

l Slovv the computer away from the receiver

l Ptug the computer into a different outlet so that computer and receiver are on dif-

fercnt branch circuits.

If necessary. the user should consult the dealer or an experienced radioitete\,isiorl techni­cian for additional suggestions. The user map find the following booklet. prepared h!
the Federal Communications Commission helpful: “Ho\r to Identify and Kesotve Radw
T\’ Interference Prohlrms.
PI-inting Office. LVashington. D.C.. 20402. Stock No. 001-000-00345-4.

For compliance with Federal Noise Interference Standard. this equipment requires a
shielded cable.

Radio interferences regarding this equipment has heen eliminated according to Vfg

lO-l6/1984 announced hy the DBP.
DBP has been informed about the introduction of this special equipment and has been
conceded the right to esamiw the whole series.
It is upon the responsibility of thv user to assume that his own asscmhted system is in ac
cordance with the technical regulations under Vfg lOltiilYX4.
To observe FTZ-regulations it is necessary. to establish all connections io the printer
\vith shielded cable.

” This hooklet is available from the I’.S. Government

Statement

Self Declaration

Trademark Acknowledgement

NX-10, grafstar: Star Micronics Co., Ltd.
r\pple, Apple II, ;2pple II - , Apple II e, Applesoft: Apple computer Inc

Commodore C-&l: Commodore Business Slachines. Inc.
Compaq: Compaq Computer Corporation
CI’IM: Digital Research
IBM Personal Computer, IHM LX: International Kusinehs Machines Corp.
Kaypro: Kaypro Corporation
Microsoft Rr\SIC: Microsoft Corporation
Osborne 1 : Osborne Compu~el- Corporation
TRS-80: Radio Shack. a division of Tandy Corporation

NOTICE

l A1l rights reserved. Reproduction of any part of this manual in any form what-

soever, without STAR’s express permission is forbidden.

l The contents of this manual are subject to change without notice.

l All efforts have been made to ensure the accuracy of the contents of this manual at

the time of going to press. However, should any errors be detected, STAR would
be greatly appreciate being informed of them.

l The above notwithstanding, STAR can assume no responsibility for any errors in

this manual.

Topyright 1986 Star Micronics Co., Ltd.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Setting Up Your Printer

Where shall we put it?
What have we here?

Removing the printer cover
Removing the packing tube
Installing the ribbon cartridge

Getting to Know Your Printer

Controls and parts of the printer

Parts of the printer
Controls and indicators
Extra functions

Other controls

Selecting and loading paper

Loading single sheets

Loading sprocket-feed paper
Adjusting the print head
Connecting the printer
Extra functions with the control panel

Self-tests

Hex dump

Panel mode

Italic mode
Italic and Panel mode
Setting print start position
Setting the left and right margins

7

Chapter 3 Basic Printing

Some basics of BASIC

A new language!
First steps
ASCII codes and the CHR$ function
Control codes
The escape codes
A note on command syntax

Some special kinds of text

Near Letter Quality characters
Italic printing
Underlining

Superscripts and subscripts

Changing the print pitch

Expanded print
Condensed print

Proportional printing
Making words stand out
Mixing print modes

Chapter 4 Formatting Text

Lines and line spacing

Starting a new line

Reverse line feeds

Changing the line spacing
Moving down the page without a carriage
return

Page control

Form feed
Reverse form feed

Changing the page length
Top and bottom margins
Setting left and right margins
Horizontal and vertical tabs

Horizontal tabs

One-time horizontal tabs

Vertical tabs

Vertical tab channels

Centering and aligning text

23

41

Chapter 5

Special Features of the Printer

Now hear this
Resetting the printer
Putting your printer to sleep
Printing the bottom of the sheet
Backspace, delete, and cancel text
Printing zeroes
Immediate-print
Adjusting the width of space between
characters
Uni-directional printing
The seven bit dilemma
Block graphics characters and special
symbols
International character sets
Printing characters in the control code area
Printing BIG characters
The optional sheet feeder
The macro control code
Reading a hex dump

61

Chapter 6 Creating Your Own Characters

Dot matrix printing
The print matrix
Defining your own characters

Rule 1: Draft download characters are eight
dots high
Rule 2: Dots cannot overlap
Add up each column of dots
Assigning a value to your character

Download character definition command
Printing download characters
Defining proportional characters
Defining NLQ download characters

81

Chapter 7 Dot Graphics

Comparing dot graphics with download
characters
Using the dot graphics commands

Specifying the number of columns of dots
Specifying the graphics data

Combining text and graphics
Printing a design or logo
Plotting with your printer

How the program works

High resolution graphics
Compatibility with existing software
More graphics programming tips

Redefining alternate graphics codes
g-pin graphics mode

Chapter 8 Caring for Your Printer

Cleaning the printer
Replacing the ribbon

Replacing the print head

Appendix A DIP Switch Settings

Switch functions

Appendix B

ASCII Codes and Conversion
Chart

Appendix C Character Fonts

Roman characters

Standard characters (Set #l and Set #2)
Special characters (Set #2 only)
International characters

Italic characters

Standard characters (Set #l and Set #2)
Special characters (Set #2 only)

101

123

131

135

143

Appendix D Function Codes

Commands to control print style

Font style controls
Font pitch controls
Special print modes

Controlling the vertical print position

Line feed and reverse line feed
Form feed and related commands

Top/bottom margins and vertical tabs
Controlling the horizontal print position
Download character commands
Dot graphics commands
Macro instruction commands
Other commands

165

Appendix E Command Summary in Numeric

Order
Appendix F Technical Specifications
Appendix G The Parallel Interface

Functions of the Connector Signals

Appendix H Connecting with Computer

Connecting with IBM-PC and COMPAQ

BASIC programming
Listing programs

Connecting with Apple Il computers

Applesoft BASIC
Listing programs

Connecting with TRS-80 computers

TRS-80 BASIC

Listing programs

Connecting with Kaypro, Osborne, and other

CP/M computers

Using MBASIC

Listing programs

209

213
217

221

CHAPTER 1

SETTING UP YOUR

PRINTER

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 1 include-

. Choosing a suitable place for your printer;

l Unpacking your new printer;
l Setting it up.

WHERE SHALL WE PUT IT?

Before you do anything else, give some thought to where
you’ll be using your printer. Obviously, it will be somewhere
near your computer. And both printer and computer will lead
longer, healthier lives if they like their surroundings. For in­stance, we recommend.. .

,

l Using the printer on a flat surface.
l Keeping it out of direct sunlight and away from heat-

producing units.

l Using it only in temperatures where you are comfortable.
l Avoiding areas with a lot of dust, grease, or humidity.
l Giving it “clean” electricity. Don’t connect it to the same

circuit used by large, noise-producing appliances (such as
refrigerators).

l The line voltage should be the same voltage that’s

specified on the identification plate - within 10% of the
recommended voltage.

2

WHAT HAVE WE HERE?

Now let’s take a look at what’s in the carton. Open it up and

check each item in the box against Figure l-l. There should be

four items.

. . -- -_ _

F

‘igure l- 1.

2) paper guide, 3) ribbon cartridge, and 4) user’s manual.

Check to make sure you have all four items: 1) printer,

Let’s move on the next step.

n Removing the printer cover

The cover is important for two reasons - it keeps dust and
dirt away from the printer’s delicate “innards,” and it quiets the
printer’s operation. Don’t take off the cover except when you
have to change the ribbon, or to make an adjustment.

Removing the printer cover is easy. Lift up the back of the
cover to disengage the two tabs at the front and then lift it off
the rest of the way. To replace it, just slide the tabs in at the
front and lower it into place. Figure 1-2 shows the proper posi­tion and movement for both removing and replacing the cover.

3

.I,

.gure 1-2. Remove the printer cover by lifting carefully.

n Removing the packing tube

The printer is shipped with a protective spiral tube to keep
the print head from being damaged in transit. We have to
remove this tube. First, remove the printer cover. See the tube
on the carriage rail (Figure l-3). Pull it off carefully.

.

Figure 1-3.

Remove the protective tube from the carriage rail.

Up to this point, we’ve been clearing the decks for action, so
to speak. Only one more thing left to do before we can start
printing - install the ribbon cartridge.

n Installing the ribbon cartridge

This printer uses a neat, easy-to-change ribbon cartridge so
you don’t have to spend a lot of time threading a ribbon. And get­ting your hands all dirty to boot.

Telling you how to put in a ribbon is like explaining how to tie
your shoelaces - it takes a lot longer to tell than to do. You can

just follow the illustrations if you wish; they’ll tell you all you
really need to know.

Or, if you feel better following written instructions, read on.

1. Turn off the power and remove the printer cover.

2. Now slide the print head gently to the center of the
printer.

Warning: The print head gets hot during operation, so

let it cool off before you touch it.

5

Figure 1-4. Press the cartridge into place until the holdmg springs

snap into place.

3. Using the guide holders as a fulcrum with the ribbon fac­ing away from you, as shown in Figure 1-4, lightly press
the cartridge down until the two holder springs snap shut
to hold the cartridge firmly in place.

4. Check that the cartridge fits so that the drive pins engage
the cartridge teeth.

5. Gently slide the print head carriage manually all the way
to your right or left until the ribbon automatically slips
down into its proper place between the print head and the
silver ribbon guide.

.

6. Put the printer cover back on and you’re finished. (A
special switch on the printer prevents the printer from

working when the cover is off.)

6

Print head

Figure 1-5.

All you have to do is to slide the print head carriage
manually to your right or left, then the ribbon slips down by itself into
its proper position.

CHAPTER 2

GETTING TO KNOW

YOUR PRINTER

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 2 include -

l Parts of the printer -

to use them;

l Paper selection and loading;
l Adjustment;
l Connecting your printer to the computer;

l Extra functions with the control panel.

CONTROLS AND PARTS OF THE PRINTER

H Parts of the printer

First, we’ll go over the parts of the printer. You saw most of
these when you unpacked your printer. Now we’ll give you a
brief explanation of what they do. (For details on the initial set­up of this printer, with all components in place, see Chapter 1.)

what they’re for and how

PRINTER COVER - This protects the ribbon and the print

head from dust and dirt, and cuts down the sound of the printer.
PAPER GUIDE - As you’ve guessed, this flat plastic
molding guides the paper during printing (it is raised for single
sheets and lies flat for sprocket-feed paper).
POWER CORD - This cord connects the printer to its power
source, usually a wall outlet. It’s located at the left rear of the
printer.
PRINT HEAD - This is the unit that does the actual printing.
Like the strike lever in a typewriter, tiny, stiff wires in the print
head hit the paper through a ribbon.

r

Tractor feed unit

’ I

nterf

\

Power cord

Figure 2- 1.
TRACTOR FEED UNIT - The drive gear and sprockets of

the tractor feed unit move sprocket-feed paper through the
printer.

Front and rear views of the printer

’ Power switch

PLATEN - This is the rubber cylinder that carries paper to
the print head.
INTERFACE CONNECTOR - On the back of the printer,
this connector is used to connect your computer to the printer.

n Controls and indicators

Now let’s take a tour around the controls, starting with the
control panel on the right. There are seven indicators and four
keys on the control panel.

9

I.

Figure 2-2. The control panel.

POWER INDICATOR - Glows red when the power is on or
blinks when the printer is out of paper or some other error
occurs.
BOLD KEY and INDICATOR - Pressing this key selects
boldface printing.
DRAFT INDICATORS (80,96,136) - Glows green to in­dicate the number of characters per line when the printer is in

‘the draft mode (set by the Mode key or the software control).

NLQ INDICATOR - Glows green when the printer is
printing in the Near Letter Quality (NLQ) mode (set by the
Mode key or the software control).
MODE KEY - Changes the print mode every time it is
pressed.
PAPER FEED KEY-Advances the paper one line at a time
when the On Line indicator is off. If you hold the key down,
you’ll get consecutive line feeds, one after the other. If you push
the On Line key while holding this key, you can advance the
paper to the top of the next page or a new form.

.

ON LINE KEY and INDICATOR - Glows green when the
printer can receive data from your computer (on line). When the
printer is off line, it sends a signal to the computer indicating
that it cannot accept data. Pressing the On Line key switches
the printer on line and off line.

I

10

n Extra functions

There are eleven more functions that are not directly

specified on the control panel. You can use six of them by press­ing a key (or keys) when you turnon the power; five others are
activated by pressing two control keys at once.

For details, please refer to the end of this chapter.

n Other controls

There are other controls, not connected to the control panel

board. Some of the more important ones are:

POWER SWITCH - The switch to turn the printer on is at
the back, on the left side.
PLATEN KNOB - This knob is at the middle of the right
side and lets you turn the platen by hand, just like a typewriter.
Caution: Turn this knob only with the Power switch off. Turn-

ing it with the power on could damage the platen drive
gears.

RELEASE LEVER - The release lever is on top of the
printer, near the left rear corner. You’ll be using it often - it
controls how strongly the paper is held against the platen. The
release lever has four positions: the top setting is used for inser­ting paper, the next is for single sheets, the third is for sprocket­feed paper, and the bottom one is used when adjusting the

pwfl.
PAPER BAIL - The bail is the movable bar that holds the

paper against the platen. Its position depends on the setting of
the release lever.
DIP SWITCHES - These are a set of ten switches and a set
of six switches that are used in interfacing the printer to your

computer. There are also switches to set page length, character

style, perforation skipping, and selecting the international
character sets. See Appendix A for a complete list and explana­tion.

SELECTING AND LOADING PAPER

Your printer can handle the two basic types of paper-single
sheets (stationery, envelopes, multipart business forms, etc.)
and continuous paper (fan-folded perforated paper).

This is a good place to tell you about the release lever, which

11

you’ll be using often. This lever controls the pressure of the
paper against the platen.

It has four settings:

g - The top setting is used when you want to load paper in the

printer.
c - The second setting is for normal single sheets.
fi - The third is for sprocket-feed paper.
4 - The bott om one is used when you want to release the

paper completely to adjust it.

The paper bail holds the paper against the platen according to
the setting of the release lever. The bail is opened when the
release lever is in the top position, closed when the lever is in
the second or third positions, and opened by the printer when
the lever is in the bottom position.

I -

I

I

Release lever

.

’ Paper bail

L---L

Figure 2-3.

continuous paper.

n Loading single sheets

Now, instead of feeding the paper in manually by turning the
platen knob, we’re going to use the release lever (the printer
must be turned on). Remember what we told you about this
lever? It allows you to advance the paper according to its posi­tion.

Use friction feed for single sheets and tractor feed for

19

OK? Let’s start.

1. Move the sprockets on the tractor feed unit all the way to
the ends.

2. Slide the sheet guide all the way to the right.

3. With the ribs of the paper guide toward you and the
sliding adjuster at the bottom left, insert the guide into
the slot at the back of the printer cover.

Sheet guide

/ Sprocket

‘igure 2-4.

Raise the paper guide for loading single sheets.

4. Insert the guide stand in the notches provided for it and
use it to prop up the paper guide.

5. Position the adjuster at the triangle marked on the guide
for standard margins, or set it according to your re­quirements.

6. Set the release lever for single sheets-the second posi­tion from the top.

7. Align a sheet of paper on the guide along the adjuster.

8. Turn on the power switch. (The Power indicator will
blink because there is no paper.)

L

Figure 2-5.

l’rop up the paper guide by inserting me guise stana in

the notches provided for it.

‘igure 2-6.

You can insert a sheet of paper by using the release

lever.

. . . .

. .

. . *.

1

1

14

9. Now set the release lever to the auto-feed setting-the
top position. The printer will advance the paper
automatically.

10. When the paper stops, set the release lever for single
sheets again.

To align paper that is not in straight-

. Set the release lever to the adjustment setting.

l Straighten the paper and adjust it for the margins you

want.

l Move the release lever back to its original setting.

n Loading sprocket-feed paper

This is the familiar computer paper, with the holes along the
sides and perforations between the sheets. It is also called
sprocket, punched, fan-fold, or just plain “computer paper.” It
can be as narrow as 4”) and up to 10” wide.

Figure 2-7 shows the tractor unit. Please identify the parts of
the tractor.

1. Turn on the printer and set the release lever for sprocket­feed paper.

2. If the paper guide is installed, remove it.

3. Place a stack of fan-fold paper behind the printer.

4:Open the sprocket covers, on the right and left sprocket

units, as shown in Figure 2-7.

Figure 2-7. Open the sprocket covers to expose me sproaet teem.

15

5. Flip the clamp levers backward. This allows the two
sprocket units to move freely right and left so you can
align them with the holes in the paper.

6. Feed the end of the paper into the slot next to the platen
cover plate.

7. Fit the holes in the paper over the sprocket pins so the
paper is even, and clamp the sprocket units in place.

8. Check that the paper is still positioned correctly, and
close the sprocket covers (Figure 2-8).

9. The Power indicator should be blinking. Turn the platen
knob to feed the paper until the indicator stops blinking.

10. Now turn the platen knob the other way just a bit, until
the indicator starts blinking again.

11. Set the release lever to the auto-feed setting. The printer
will advance the paper automatically.

12. When the paper stops, set the release lever for sprocket­feed paper again.

13. Finally, install the paper guide on the printer (Figure
2-8). Now you’re ready to roll!

“igure 2-8.

Ready to run with sprocket-feed paper.

ADJUSTING THE PRINT HEAD

The distance between the print head and the platen must-be
adjusted to accommodate papers of different thicknesses. To
make this adjustment, move the adjustment lever, which is
under the printer cover and immediately in front of the release
lever (Figure 2-9). Pulling the adjustment lever towards you will
widen the gap; pushing it away from you will narrow the gap.

Figure 2-9.

The adjustment lever allows for different thicknesses

of paper.

There are four positions; you can feel the lever clicking into
the various notches. The first step (illustrated) is the one most
commonly used for single sheets of paper.

You shouldn’t have any trouble finding the right gap setting
for your paper. If necessary, experiment; you’ll soon find the
best position for the paper you’re using.

CONNECTING THE PRINTER

Now that you have assembled your printer, it’s time to use it
for what you bought it for - print information from your com-

puter. But first you have to connect it to your computer. Please
follow the instructions in the order listed below.

17

1. Make sure both your computer and printer are turned
off.

2. Connect one end of the interface cable to the connector
socket at the right rear of the printer as shown in Figure
2-10.

3. Connect the other end of the cable to your computer as
described in the computer manual.

/-

Figure 2-10.

‘EXTRA FUNCTIONS WITH THE CONTROL PANEL

This is how you connect the cable.

There are many functions that are not directly specified on
the control panel. In this section, we’ll show you these extra
functions.

Italic mode

Italic and Panel mode

Figure 2-11.

_I

L Panel mode

Extra functions while turning on the printer.

18

n Self-tests

Your printer has two built-in programs that print out sample
lines of letters, numbers, and other characters-to show you
that everything’s in good working order. Self-test 1 is the long
version, and self-test 2 is the short one. You can use either one
to show the characters available in the printer, to check the in­stallation of the ribbon and paper, and to check the adjustment
of the head-to-platen gap.

Best of all, you don’t have to wait another minute-you can
print the self-test without hooking up the printer to your com­puter! It’s as simple as 1, 2, 3. . .

1. Plug in the printer (don’t turn it on yet).

2. Insert a sheet of paper (or sprocket paper, either one).

3. While holding down one of the following keys, turn on
the power switch:

Paper Feed key-Self-test 1 (long)
On Line key-Self-test 2 (short)

'igure 2-12. The self-tests show you what the printer can print.

Were you surprised? It’s fast, isn’t it? About 120 characters a

second, to be exact.

When you want to terminate the self-test function, turn off the

power switch.

n Hex dump

Can you guess what a “hex dump” is? No, it’s not where

witches throw away useless spells. A hex dump is an advanced

ability of your printer that you can use, in certain cases, to find a

problem with your system. Fortunately, such problems rarely

arise but the hex dump is available if one does. We’ll go over
hex dump in Chapter 4. Right now, we’ll just tell you how to
make a hex dump:

1. Plug in the printer (don’t turn it on yet).

2. Insert a sheet of paper, as you did for the self-tests.

3. While holding down both the Paper Feed and Mode keys,
turn on the power switch.

W Panel mode

As you’ll learn in Chapter 5, this printer has many software
controls. But if you want to print in one mode, ignoring the con­trol codes, the “Panel” mode takes effect for you. To set the

“Panel” mode, follow the procedures:

1. Plug in the printer (don’t turn it on yet).

2. While holding down the Mode key, turn on the power
switch.

< Notice that this mode stays on until you turn off the printer.

n Italic mode

Sometimes, you may want to print with italic characters with
Draft mode as the power-on default. You can set the Italic mode
with the following procedures:

1. Plug in the printer (don’t turn it on yet).

2. While holding the Bold key, turn on the power switch.

This mode stays on until you send the cancel command to
your printer. This mode re-activates when you send the reset

command to your printer.

n Italic and Panel mode

You can combine with the “Panel” mode and the “Italic”
mode at a time. To set these modes at a time follow the pro­cedures below:

1. Plug in the printer (don’t turn it on yet).

2. While holding both the Mode and Bold keys, turn on the
power switch.

Right margin set

**: Hold down

L- Left margin set

~---____

Figure 2-13.

the control panel keys while in the Off Line mode.

You can set many functions by the combinations o

n Setting print start position

When you want to align the print start position, you can set it
by the micro-feed operation with the control panel, instead of
turning the platen knob manually.

1:Set the Off Line mode by pressing the On Line key.

2. While holding down the On Line key, press one of the
following keys.

Paper Feed key - Forward micro-feed
Mode key - Reverse micro-feed

3. When you can set the print start position, release the
Paper Feed key or the Mode key first, then release the
On Line key.

n Setting the left and right margins

As you’ll learn in Chapter 4, you can set the left and right
margins with control codes. In addition, you can set them by the
following procedures.

1. Set the Off Line mode by pressing the On Line key.

2. While holding the Bold key, press one of the following
keys.

f

1

Mode key - Left margin set
Paper Feed key - Right margin set

3. While holding the two keys, the print head moves across
the page step-by-step.

4. When the print head goes to the position where you want
to set margin, release the two keys. So the printer
acknowledges the margin with the sound of beep.

22

MEMO

CHAPTER 3

BASIC PRINTING

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 3 include­* Listing BASIC programs on the printer;

l How a program prints things;
l Control codes, escape codes, and command syn-

tax;

l Near letter quality (NLQ) characters;
l Fixed and proportional character spacing;
l Special printing -

Printing in italics,
Underlining,
Superscripts and subscripts,
Boldface and emphasized text,
Mixing print modes.

To show you how to control your printer from a program, we

,

choose BASIC because it is easy to learn and easy to use. Also,
more personal computer users program in BASIC than in any
other language.

The rest of this manual will show you a little BASIC - just
enough for.you to use your printer. We’re not going to try to
make you an expert programmer, though, only get you started.
There are many excellent books that will teach you BASIC, so if
you discover that you like to program you should have no
trouble learning more about it.

SOME BASICS OF BASIC

H A new language!

Many people who meet BASIC for the first time are in­timidated. Some are put off by the idea of learning any new

24

language, perhaps recalling the rigors of high-school Latin.
Others are unnerved by anything having to do with computers.

Well don’t be! In the first place, BASIC may well be the
easiest language you could learn: it has a vary limited
vocabulary, a simple but precise grammar, and its dialects ­unlike those of English - usually different from each other only
in minor detail. Without programming, a computer is a useless
collection of chips and wire - why should we think of it as
something special? Anyway, computers are here to stay - let’s
accept them with good grace.

n First steps

The first things that a beginner learns to do are to list a pro­gram and to print a character string. Certainly these are the
easiest operations one can do, but even they may depend on
what computer you have. In Microsoft BASIC, we can list all
the steps in a program by entering LIST. This lists them on the
CRT screen; if we want to print them on a printer, we prefix the
command with an L (enter LLIST).

The Microsoft BASIC command for outputting information is
PRINT. Like the LIST command, this displays the information
on the CRT screen so we have to add an L (+ LPRINT) if we

want to use the printer. Just put whatever you want to print
between quotes and after LPRINT (anything enclosed in quotes

is called a character string). For example, we would use
LPRINT “Hello!” to output “Hello!” to the printer. We’ll see
later how to LPRINT things other than character strings.

We started with Microsoft BASIC because it is the most wide­ly used version of BASIC around. The programs in this manual
are written in Microsoft BASIC so they should run on most com­puters. But if strange things happen when you try to run a pro­gram, check the BASIC manual that came with your computer.

Let’s talk about Apple II computers for a minute. These
enormously popular computers use their own brand of BASIC.
To use an Apple II, enter the following -

PR#l
LIST

PR#O

The PR#l tells the Apple to send everything to the printer,

the LIST or PRINT command sends it, and the PR#O returns

PR#l
PRINT "Hello! It
PR#O

25

output to the screen.

Other computers, notably the Commodore C-64, require you
to open the printer as a numbered device then to direct output to
that device. For example, you might type the following to print

“Hello!” or to list a program in the C-64’s memory.

OPEN4,4
CMD4
LIST

CLOSE 4

Here, the first line says that the printer is device number 4,
the second directs output to it, the third does the printing, and
the last line closes down device number 4.

Appendix H gives more information about listing programs on
the various computers. Find the part that applies to your com­puter and try it.

Now that we know how to address the printer, let’s try listing
a BASIC program. Load a program into memory ready to pro­gram printer operation - just as soon as we learn a little bit
about the ASCII codes.

W ASCII codes and the CHR$ function

You talk to your computer in BASIC, but your computer and
your printer talk to each other in what are known as ASCII
codes. In the ASCII code, each number from 0 to 255 has a par­ticular meaning - 36, for example, makes the printer print a
dollar sign. Some numbers cause the printer to do other things,
too. For instance, sending a 7 sounds the printer’s bell.

Taken together, these numbers and their meanings make up
the ASCII code (pronounced ask-key), which stands for the
American Standard Code for Information Interchange. There are
ASCII codes for all the letters of the alphabet (upper case and
lower case), 0 to 9, most punctuation marks, and some (but not
all) of the functions of the printer.

There are a number of different ways to represent an ASCII
code, depending on how you are using it. For example, the
ASCII codes for the letter “A” are 65 (decimal) or &H41 (hex­adecimal). Or you can just call it “A”. Appendix B shows all of
the ASCII codes.

BASIC uses the CHR$ function to represent ASCII
characters and many functions. To print the letter “A” we

OPEN4,4
CMD4
PRINT "Hello! 'I

CLOSE4

would enter LPRINT CHR$(65). To make the printer’s bell
sound, we would LPRINT CHR$(7). In general, we print a
character by entering LPRINT CHR$(ASCII code) to the
printer.

We can also use hex ASCII codes. Although we use only
decimal ASCII codes in this manual, you should understand at
least what a hex code is. “Hex” is short for hexadecimal and
refers to a base-16 number (the numbers we use in everyday life
are base 10). Since the hex system needs 16 digits, it uses the
numerals 0 through 9 and also the letters A through F. You can
always tell that a number is in hexadecimal by the “&H” im­mediately preceding it. The ASCII code for the letter “A” (65 in
decimal) is &H41 in hex.

n Control codes

ASCII codes with values of 32 or less do not have their own
keys. These codes control many of the printer’s functions, so we

call them control codes. To enter a control code from the
keyboard, we have to press two keys at the same time - the
“control” key and one other. The other key determines what
code is sent - pressing the control (CTRL) key and A sends
ASCII code 1, CTRL B sends ASCII code 2, and so on.

Your printer has a lot of control codes to let you do some real-

ly nifty things. Let’s try one that we’ve mentioned several times
already:

1 Demo of ASCII code

10
20 LPRINT CHR$(7)
30 END

RUN

That’s the printer’s bell (we call it that even though it sounds
like a buzzer). We’ll learn more about it in later (we just wanted
to show you a control code that would get your attention right
away).

There are four common ways of referring to a control code:
the name of the code or its abbreviation, the decimal ASCII
value, the hexadecimal ASCII value, and the “CTRL-” value.

For example, the ASCII code that causes the printer to advance

the paper one line is decimal 10. This code may be referred to

by any of the following.

27

line feed -the name of the code

UJ’)

ASCII 10
ASCII &HOA -its hexadecimal value (the &H signifies

CHR$(lO)
CTRL- J

Of course, most of the time we don’t need to bother with
these. Our computers are smart enough to know that when we
press the “A” key we want to print the letter “A” - they take
care of all the intermediate steps.

Appendix B is a table that shows the various names for each
code so you can convert back and forth. The microcomputer
world is not very consistent in describing ASCII codes, so it’s
important that you have a basic knowledge of them.

n The escape codes

Back when the ASCII system was set up, computer equip­ment was relatively simple and thirty-three control codes were
considered sufficient at the time. The American Standards
people realized that, eventually, more control codes would be
needed so they included the escape (ESC) code to allow almost
any number of additional codes to be defined when they became
necessary.

ESC allows us to “escape” from the ordinary set of control
codes so we can specify additional functions and other informa­tion needed for a printer function. In this manual, we’ll write the
ESC code inside broken brackets, like this - (ESC).

(ESC) - ,decimal 27 - is always followed by at least one
other number; it is never used alone. The whole series of related
numbers is called an escape sequence.

-its abbreviation

-its decimal value

hex)

-the way it’s used in BASIC

-the way you send it from a keyboard

W A note on command syntax

Because the readers of this manual will be running such a

wide variety of applications on so many different computers, we

just can’t show the exact way of sending codes to the printer for

each one of them. Instead, as we introduce you to each new com­mand, we will show the commands as in this example:

(ESC)

“W” 1

28

This command that turns on expanded printing. (ESC), as we
mentioned earlier, is the escape code (which is ASCII code 27).
A letter or number in quotes (such as the “W” above) means that
the character should be sent to the printer (without the quotes).

In our example, you should send a capital W following the
escape code. In BASIC, you could do this in a couple of ways: by
sending the character itself (e,g, LPRINT “W”;), or by using the

CHR$ function to send the ASCII code for the character (e.g.

LPRINT CHR$(87);).

Many of printer commands end with a 1 or 0. When shown as

in the above example (i.e. no quotes and no “CHR$“), you can
use either ASCII code 1 (i.e. CHR$(l)) or the character “1”

(which is ASCII code 49). The same idea applies to commands

ending with 0.

So for out example above, any of these BASIC statements will

have the same result:

LPRINT CHR$(27>;"W";CHR$(l>

LPl-lINT CHR$(27);"W';CHR$(49)

LPRINT CHR$(27);"Wl"

Even though, there are many commands that require the use
of ASCII code 0; the character “0” (ASCII code 48) cannot be
substituted. In these cases, instead of an unadorned 0 we will
show ‘CHR$(O) each time these commands are referenced.

That’s it for the basics. You are now ready to learn how to use
the many features of your printer.

SOME SPECIAL HINDS OF TEXT

If you looked carefully at your printer’s self test, you noticed
that it can print in italics. But there’s more! Your printer can
underline characters, print superscripts and subscripts, and
perhaps most exciting, print near letter quality characters.

n Near Letter Quality characters

This printer’s Near Letter Quality (sometimes abbreviated as
NLQ) character set is ideal for correspondence and other impor­tant printing, for it takes a keen eye to detect that it is from a

dot matrix printer. Normally, your printer prints draft quality
characters. This is adequate for most work and it prints fastest.

But for the final printout, try NLQ. The program below shows

how.

29

10 1 Demo

20 LPRINT
30 LPRINT
40 LPRINT
50 LPRINT

of NLQ character set
CHR$(27);"xl";
"This line shows NEAR LETTER QUALITY!
CHR$(27);"xO";
"This line shows standard print."

In this program, line 20 selects NLQ characters with (ESC)
“~“1 command. Line 30 prints a sample before line 40 switches
printer back to draft printing with an (ESC) “~“0. When you
run the program you should get this:

This line shows NEAR LETTER QUALITY!

-)_ 1-7 j. ::i :I. i II e 55 II C) w E:i E;t,~ilCl~~r-d pr i nt n

Table 3-1

Near letter quality commands

Function Control code

Near letter quality ON (ESC) “x” 1

’ Near letter quality OFF

(ESC) “~“0

n Italic printing

Italic letters are letters that are slanted to the right. Your
printer can print all of its letters except NLQ characters in italic
as well as the roman (standard) letters you are accustomed to.
Italics can be used to give extra emphasis to certain words. The
command codes to turn italic on and off are shown in Table 3-2.

Table 3-2

.

Function

Italic ON (ESC) “4”
Italic OFF

Italic commands

Control code

(ESC) “5”

Use this program to see italic characters:

f Demo of italic and

roman

:; LPRINT CHR$(27)*"4"*

30 LPRINT "This li;e ii
40 LPRINT CHR$( 27);"5y
50 LPRINT "This line is

in ITALIC characters."

in ROMAN characters."

Here is what you should get:

In this program, line 20 turns italic on with (ESC) “4”, and

line 40 turns italic off with (ESC) “5”.

W Underlining

Not only can your printer print all styles of printing in both

roman and italic, but it can underline them too. The control

codes are shown in Table 3-3.

Table 3-3

Underline commands

Function

Underline ON
Underline OFF

Control code

(ESC) “-“l
(ESC) “-“0

Again, that’s simple. Let’s try it with this program:

' Demo of underlining

:; LPRINT CHR$(27)*"-1".

30 LPRINT "This ph;ase is UNDERLINED;";
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"-0";
50 LP-RINT It this is not."

It should come out like this:

This phrase -I& UNDERLINED; this is not.

31

In this program underline is turned on in line 20 with (ESC)

“

-“l, and then off in line 40 with (ESC) “-“O. There’s a new
little wrinkle in this program, though. The semicolons at the
end of the first three lines told BASIC that those lines were to
be continued. Therefore, BASIC didn’t send a carriage return
and line feed at the end of those lines. We just did this to il­lustrate that all these control codes can be used in the middle of
a line. It’s easy to underline or italicize only part of a line.

n Superscripts and subscripts

Your printer can print in two different heights of characters.

The smaller characters are called superscripts and subscripts and
are half the height of normal characters. Superscripts print even
with the tops of regular printing while subscripts print even with
the bottom of regular printing. They are frequently used to
reference footnotes, and in mathematical formulas.

Table 3-4 has the codes for using superscripts and subscripts.

Table 3-4

Superscripts and subscripts commands

Function

Superscript ON

Control code

(ESC>“S”O
Subscript ON (ESC)“? 1
Super and subscript OFF

(ESC)“T”

Try this program to see them work:

10 1 Demo

of superscripts

and subscripts

20 LPRINT "Look! ";,

30 LPRINT

CliR$(27);"SO";
40 LPRINT "SUPERSCRIPTS ";
50 LPRINT

CHR$(27);"T";

60 LPRINT "& ";
70 LPRINT

CHR$(27);"Sl";
80 LPRINT "SUBSCRIPTS ";

90 LPRINT

CHR$(27);"T";
100 LPRINT "on one line."

I i ne .

32

Here line 30 turns on superscripts with (ESC) “SO. It’s turn-

ed off in line 50 with (ESC) “T”. Then between printing text,
subscripts are turned on in line 70 with (ESC) “S’l, and finally
off in line 90. Again, everything prints on one line because of the
semicolons.

CHANGING THE PRINT PITCH

In “printer talk,” the number of characters that can be printed

in one inch is called the print pitch or character pitch. Normally,
your printer is set for 10 characters per inch, which is called pica
(and is the same as the pica pitch on some typewriters). This

works out to 80 characters per line.

You can also print 12 characters per inch (elite pitch). This

gives you 96 characters per line.

You can set these pitches by using the Mode key on the con-

trol panel manually, or by software as shown in the table below.

Table 3-5

Print pitch commands

Pitch

Pica

Elite

Characters/inch

10
12 (ESC) “M”

Control code

(ESC) “P”

Try this program to see how these two pitches work. Be sure

to set the printer to draft mode.

10 '

Demo of pica and elite pitches

20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"M";

30 LPRINT "This line is ELITE pitch."
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"P";

50 LPRINT "This line is PICA pitch (normal)."

When you run this program you should get this:

This line is ELITE pitch.
This line is F’ICC’r pikC:h (nor-mal).

33

Line 20 turns on elite pitch with (ESC) “M”. Line 30 prints a
line at 12 characters per inch. The (ESC) “P” in line 40 resets
the printer to pica pitch and line 50 prints a line in pica pitch.

W Expanded print

Each of the print pitches can be enlarged to twice its normal
width. This is called expanded print. Try this program to see
how it works:

10 ’ Demo of expanded print
20 LPRINT "Demonstration of 'I;
30 LPRINT CHR$(14);
40 LPRINT "EXPANDED";

50 LPRINT CHR$(20);
60 LPRINT " printing."
70 LPRINT "Notice that I';

80 LPRINT CHR$(14);

90 LPRINT "EXPANDED mode"
100 LPRINT "automatically turns off at the end

of a line."

Expanded print set with CHR$(14) is automatically cancelled
at the end of the line. This is convenient in many applications,
such as for one line titles. Note that you didn’t need to put an
(ESC) in front of the CHR$(14), although (ESC) CHR$(14)
works just the same.

You can also cancel one line expanded print before a carriage
return with CHR$(20), as done in line 50.

Sometimes you may wish to stay in expanded print for more

than one line. Change your program to this:

10 ' Demo of permanent expanded mode
20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"Wl";
30 LPRINT

"Permanent expanded"
40 LPRINT "mode stays on until"
50 LPRINT "is is ";
60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"WO";
70 LPRINT "turned off."

34

Now the results look like this:

When you turn on expanded print with (ESC) “W”l it stays

on until you turn it off with (ESC) “W”0.

Table 3-6 Table 3-6

Expanded print commands

Expanded print commands

n Condensed print

Each of the print pitches also can be condensed to its normal
width. This is called condensed print. Try this program to see
how it works:

f Demo of condensed print

10
20 LPRINT "Demonstration of ";
30 LPRINT CHR$(15);
40 LPRINT "CONDENSED";
50 LPRINT CHR$(18);
60 LPRINT If printing."

Ihwmstt-at:i cm of CONDENSED pr-inkirrq.

. Condensed print set with CHR$(15) stays on until you turn it
off with CHR$(18). Note that you don’t need to put an (ESC) in
front of the CHR$(15), although (ESC) CHR$(15) works just
the same.

Table 3-7

Condensed print commands

Function

Condensed ON
Condensed OFF

Control code

CHR$(15) 01 (ESC) CHR$(15)
CHR$(18)

By combining expanded print and condensed print with the
two pitches, this printer has eight different character widths
available.

Enter this program to see how the print pitches, expanded
print and condensed print can be combined:

' Demo
LPRINT
LPRINT

LPRINT
LPRINT
LPRINT

LPRINT
LPRINT
LPRINT

100 LPRINT
110 LPRINT
120 LPRINT
130 LPRINT
140 LPRINT
150 LPRINT

of various print pitches
CHR$(15);

CHR$( 27);wy

"This line is CONDENSED ELITE pitch."
CHR$(27);"P";
"This line is CONDENSED PICA pitch."
CHR$(18);
CHR$(27);"M";

IfThis line is NORMAL ELITS; pitch."

CHR$(27);"P";

"This line is NORMAL PICA pitch."

CHR$(27);"Wl";

CHR$(lS);
CHR$(27);"M";
"This line is EXPANDED CONDENSED

ELITES."

160 LPRINT
17 0 LPRIN,T

PICA."
180 LPRINT
190 LPRINT

200 LPRINT
210 LPRINT
220 LPRINT
230 LPRINT
240 END

"This line is EXPANDED CONDENSED
CHR$(18);

CHR$(27);"M";

"This is EXPANDED ELITE."
CHRS(27);"P";

"This is EXPANDED PICA."
CHR$(27) ;"WO"

Here’s what you should get from this program:

This line is CONDENSED ELITE pitch,
This line is CONDENSED PICA pitch.

This line is NORMRL ELITE pitch.

l-l-1 :i, vii :I. :i n e :i, 5;

111 IX? Pi u I,,.,

P 1: c:: (4 fl:, i t c3 t-l n

This line is EXPANDED CONDENSED ELITE.
This line is EXPANDED CONDENSED PICA.
l-h i .!si

'-'["" #--r -j. K;.

n Proportional printing

i?z EXF'ANDED ELI-i-E,

ji- cc;;;

Ef:: :,I;: g.3 &'::, 11"*,[ :J-J, E; :/j-J

1':" J:: #-:y; $-II _

Have you ever noticed in books and magazines? Doesn’t it
look nice? The main reason is that each character is given an
amount of space proportional to its actual width. A typewriter
(and most printer), on the other hand, give every character the
same amount of space, no matter how wide it is. (Pica pitch, for
example, gives a “w” and an “i” l/10 of an inch each. Look these
letters closely and you’ll see that a “w” is two or three times as
wide as an “i”.)

Well, you too enjoy professional-looking proportional print­ing. You can turn proportional printing on and off with the
following command.

Table 3-8

Proportional commands

Function

Proportional ON

Proportional OFF

Control code

(ESC)“p”l
(ESC)“p”O

Try this program to see how the proportional spacing works.

10 ) Demo of proportional printing
20 LPRINT CHR$(~~);"M~;

30 LPRINT "This line is NORMAL ELITE printing."
4-O LPRINT CHR$(27);"pl";

50 LPRINT "This line is PROPORTIONAL ELITE."
60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"P";

70 LPRINT "This line is PROPORTIONAL PICA."
80 LPRINT CHR$(~~);~~~O~Q

90 LPRINT "This line is NORMAL PICA printing."
100 END

When you run this program you should get this:

This line is NORMAL ELITE printing.
This line is F’ROF’ORTIONAL ELITE.

“r1.7j.:~ :/.j.I-\e j.!ii; r~~I::;(:)~::~(::)~~1-~Ol\lnj... p:I:C::A.
T l-1 i 5;

1. :i. r1 e i 5

NC:) R PI Ci L.. F’ I: CA

1:) r i n .t i ri g y

Line 20 selects the elite pitch and line 40 turns on the propor­tional printing with (ESC)“p”l. Line 50 prints a line with pro­portional elite pitch. Then, line 60 selects the pica pitch, so that
line 70 prints a line with proportional pica pitch. Finally, line 80
resets the proportional printing and line 90 prints a line in nor­mal pica pitch.

NOTE: When you change the print pitch by the MODE key on

the control panel,

this proportional spacing should be

automatically cancelled.

MAKING WORDS STAND OUT

Your printer has very good print density when it’s just print-

ing regularly. But sometimes you may want something to stand

<out from the rest of the page. This printer provides two ways to

do this: boldface and emphasized print. Both of these go over
the characters twice, but they use slightly different methods to
darken the characters. Let’s try them and see what the dif­ference is.

The following table shows the control codes for getting into

and out of boldface and emphasized modes.

Table 3-9

Print emphasis commands

38

Try them now with this little program:

f boldface and emphasized

2': ~PEE EHR$(~~) ;"G";

30 LPRINT
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"E";
50 LPRINT

"This iine is BOLDFACE printing."

"This line is BOLDFACE and

EMPHASIZED."

60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"H";
70 LPRINT

"This line is EMPHASIZED printing.'*
80 LPRINT CHR$(~~);"F";
90 LPRINT "This line is normal printing."
100 END

Run this program. The results will look like this:

This line is BCLUFUCE printing.

This line is BOLDFACE and EMPHASIZED.
This line is EMPHASIZED printing.

‘I-t.1 :i. 5 :I, :i. n e j, 5; f-1 I::) r” ma :I. p r :i_ n t. j. n (3 .

-

Line 20 turns on boldface with (ESC)“G” and line 30 prints a

line of text. In line 40 ‘emphasized is turned on with (ESC)“E”.
Line 50 prints a line of text in boldface and emphasized. Line 60
then turns boldface off with (ESC)“H” so that line 70 can print
in emphasized only. Finally, line 80 turns emphasized off, so

your printer is set for normal printing.

Look closely at the different lines of printing. In the line of

boldface printing each character has been printed twice, and

they are moved down just slightly the second time they are
printed. In emphasized printing, they are moved slightly to the
right the second time your printer prints. The last line combined

both of these so that each character was printed 4 times. Now

that’s pretty nice printing, isn’t it?

MIXING PRINT MODES

We have learned how to use the various print modes in-

dividually and together. Now we’ll see how to combine them

39

more efficiently.

You have at your disposal a unique command that lets you
choose any valid combination of print modes and pitch. This is
the Master Print mode command. It looks like this:

(ESC) “!” n

Here, the value of n defines the print style to be selected. The
value of n can range from 0 to 255, which is the range of values
that can be stored in one eight-bit byte. If you look at each bit in
this byte, you’ll find that each one represents a printing style
variation. Adding the binary values of the selected bits gives the
value of n for a particular combination of print styles.

Table 3-10 shows the decimal values of the bits in the Master
Print byte. To calculate the value n for a particular combination
of printing styles, just add the values of the features that you
want to combine.

Table 3-10

Values of mixing print styles for Master Print

1 Bit 1 Print stvle Decimal value

1 Elite print 1
2 Proportional print 2
3 Condensed mint 4

14

5
6 Expanded print 32
7 (Not used)

1 Emphasized print

Boldface print 16

- 1

I

8

18 I‘ ’ Underline 128

For example, if you want to select elite expanded boldface

print, you would calculate the value of n like this:

Elite 1
Boldface 16
Expanded 32

n=

The command would look like this:

CHR$(27);“!“;CHR$(49)

49

I

1

To better understand the way the print modes work, consider

that each mode except pica (pica is the default) has a separate
switch that can turned on and off via software. Once the switch
is on, it stays on until turned off. When two modes that conflict
are turned on at the same time, the printer must choose which
one to use.

For example, suppose you turn on both Elite and Emphasized

modes. Since these cannot combine the printer must make a
choice; in this case, the printer chooses Elite.

Summary notes

1) Pica is the default pitch and is active when Elite is turned
off.

2) When two modes conflict, the one of lesser priority is
cancelled. For example, Condensed and Emphasized can
not be printed at the same time, printing is Emphasized.

3) Elite cancels Emphasized.

4) Underline, and Expanded modes combine with any print
modes.

5) Emphasized will not mix with Elite or Condensed.

CHAPTER 4

FORMATTING TEXT

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 4 include­* The carriage return and line feed;

l The amount of space between lines;

l Moving to the next page;

l The number of lines on a printed page;
l Horizontal and vertical tabs;
l Setting margins-

l Centering and aligning.

Chapter 3 showed us all the basic techniques of using the
printer. Now we’re ready for the more advanced ones. We’ll con­centrate on changing the appearance of the page to suit our
needs.

left, right, top and bottom;

ilNES AND LINE SPACING

n Starting a new line

Up until now the only time we have thought about printing on
a new line is when we didn’t want it to happen. We learned that
putting a semicolon (;) at the end of a BASIC line will not end the
line of printing. So somehow, the computer telling the printer
when to end one line and start another.

There are two codes that are used to end one line and start
another. They are carriage return (CHR$(13)) and line feed
(CHR$(lO)). Like the escape code, they have been given ab­breviations which you’ll find many texts (including this one):

<CR > and < LF > . The codes are simple, but their action is a
little confusing (especially with BASIC). Carriage return is the
easiest. Each time that the printer receives a CHR$(13) it
returns the print head to the left margin. It does not advance the
paper (if DIP switch 1-8 is on; see below).

42

Line feed is more complicated. Each time the printer receives
a CHR$(lO) it both advances the paper one line and returns the
print head to the left margin, ready to start a new line.

Now to add a little confusion-most (but not all) versions of
BASIC add a line feed (CHR$(lO)) to every carriage return
(CHR$(13)) that they send. If your version of BASIC doesn’t do
this, then you should turn DIP switch l-8 off so that your printer
will add the line feed for you. When you have DIP switch l-8 off
the printer will do the same thing when it receives a carriage
return as it does when it receives a line feed.

If you find that your printer double spa-es when it should
single space, then you probably need to turn DIP switch l-8 on.

n Reverse line feeds

Your printer has a unique capability: it can move the paper up
or down! Its unique tractor design allows the paper to be fed in
either direction without jamming. This allows you to move

around the page at will. You can use this feature to print several

columns of text side by side, or print a graph and then move
back up and insert descriptive legends. As you experiment
you’re bound to come up with more uses!

The simplest form of reverse paper feeding is a reverse line
feed. The code is (ESC)( LF), which causes the paper to move

down (in effect, moving the printing up) one line. A “line” used
in a reverse line feed is the same size as a line in a regular line
feed (this is normally l/6 inch). When you change the line spac-

ing (which you’ll read about next), you change it for both for-

ward and reverse line feeds.

Table 4-1

Line feed commands

Function

Control code

Return print head to left margin CHR$(13)

Advance paper one line

Reverse paper one line

CHR$(lO)

(ESC)CHR$( 10)

n Changing the line spacing

When you turn your printer on the line spacing is set to 6 lines

per inch. This is fine for most printing applications, but
sometimes you may want something different. Your printer
makes it easy to set the line spacing to whatever you want.

Try this program to see how easy it is to change the line spac-

ing:

NEW

( Demo of line spacing

10

FOR I=1 TO 25

20

IF 1=13 THEN 60

LPRINT CHR$(27);"A";CHR$(I);

2

LPRINT "THIS LINE SPACING IS SET TO";1

2:

NEXT I
LPRINT "LINE SPACING IS SET TO 1/6 INCH

70

(NORMAL) .I!
LPRINT CHR$(27);"2"

80

END

90

This is what you will get:

! ‘f

.J!! ,’ :

I

.!i

.-

\

..,. II IIn

IIMF

\ .:L
L I NE
I- I lIEi:

I- :I: NE

l-l-l I s I.._ I tw SF AC 1: NC< I 5 SET 1-a 112

T 1-l I: S I_ :I: i’.l E SI:-’ A[:: :C N[17 :I: S S Et: T

T t.4 1: S I.... 1: NE:

SI”‘A!I I NG :I: s SE:T 1-o 1.5

T t-1 I s I- :I: IIE 6~’ A c :I: la (~7 :I: s I-; if:. T

T ti :C S I__. 1: I\1 E..: SF-’ G C: 1: l’\l G :I. SZ

SfYl” 1-C:) :L iI
S Et:: “I- ‘Tel 1 I

‘1” cl 1. 4.

T [:I 1 6

cz; 1x:-r -r f-1

3, 7

43

Line 40 changes the line spacing. The command (ESC)“A”
CHR$(n) changes the line spacing to n/72 of an inch. The loop
that is started in line 20 increases the value of n (the variable I in
this program) each time it is executed. So the line spacing in­creases as the program continues. Line 30 just shortcuts the
loop when I= 13, since BASIC won’t let us send CHR$(13)
without adding an unwanted CHR$(lO) to it. Finally, the (ESC)
“2” in line 80 resets the line spacing to 6 lines per inch. This is a
shortcut that is the same as (ESC)“A”CHR$(12).

When you run this program with the DIP switch l-6 off (IBM
mode), you cannot get the printout as shown above.

The (ESC) “A” CHR$(n) command in IBM mode only defines
the line spacing as n/72 of an inch; the (ESC) “2” command
changes the line spacing to the amount defined by the previous

(ESC) “A”.

So: you need to change the following lines to the previous pro-

gram as shown below for the IBM mode:

40 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"A";CHR$(I);CHR$(27);w2';
80 LPRINT CHR$(27);

"A";CHR$(12);CHR$(27);"2"

You may wonder why they picked l/72 of an inch as the incre­ment for the line spacing command. There’s a good reason: the
dots that the printer makes are l/72 inch apart. So this means
that you can vary the line spacing in increments as fine as one
dot - unless you want finer spacing, like one third dot spac­ing.

The (ESC)“3”CHR$(n) command sets the line spacing in in­crements of l/216 inch. Change line 40 in your program so it is
like this:

40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"3";CHR$(I);

. and run the program again. Now the results will look like this:

45

The program works just the same as before, but the line spac­ing are just one-third what they were. This is because (ESC j“3”
CHR$(n) sets the line spacing to n/216 inch.

Table 4-2 shows all the line spacing commands, including
several “shortcut” commands for commonly used line spacings.

Table 4-2

Line spacing commands

n Moving down the page without a carriage return

So far, all the commands that move the paper also move the
print head to the left margin. And normally this is what you
want. Sometimes, though, you may wish to move down the page
without moving the printhead back to the left margin. The
following commands do just that.

The (ESC)“J”CHR$(n) command causes the printer to make
one line feed of n/216 inch, but does not change the setting of the
line spacing. Try this program to see how it works:

46

NEW
10 '

Demo of' one-time line feeds

20 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 1."
;; LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 2.";

' One-time line feed

50 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"J";CHR$(loO);

60 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 3."

70 LPRINT "LINE NUMBER 4."
80 END

Here is what your printer will produce:

i-:1: IW I\Il.JMEE:FI I. I

I__ I Ntx I’dJMBER 2 n

I.... I NE NIJMBEH 3.

L.:I: NE: NCJMBER 4 ,s

The (ESC)“J”CHR$(lOO)

in line 50 changes the spacing to

100/216 inches for one line only without moving the printhead.
The rest of the lines printed with the normal line spacing.
Notice that both line 30 and line 50 end with semicolons. This
prevents the normal line feed from occurring.

The ‘( ESC)“j”CHR$(n) command works the same way except
that the paper moves in the opposite direction. Try this simple
change to your program and see what a difference it makes!

( One-time reverse line feed

40

50 LPRINT CHR$.(27);"j";CHR$(lOO);

L:C NE W..IME:EK 3 m

I__ 1 :;.I E tq I,_! pl E: E: Fi. it ”
Iem 1: i\! - i’%] I,..! 1’1 E: 1: F: j, .

iv 1 NE N!..!tqE:ER :z .

-

47

PAGE CONTROL

Now that we have seen how to control line spacing, we can go

on to page control - positioning the printing on the page and ad-

justing the paper length.

n Form feed

The simplest forms control code is the form feed. Form feed

(or < FF > ) is CHR$(12) and causes the printer to move the
paper to the top of the next sheet. Try it by changing lines 40
and 50 to this:

t form feed

40

50 LPRINT CHR$(12);

Before you run the program, turn your printer off and adjust
the paper so that the top of the sheet is even with the top of the
ribbon guide on the print head, then turn the printer back on. If
you don’t remember how to do this, review Chapter 2. When
you run the program, the results will look like this:

u I

---- o J ------------­‘T

1. 1 :.: 1. NE Nf- .- iVl.JlviHl~R IWMBER 2. 3. .

,

f

0 I

.

The form feed (CHR$(12)) in line 50 caused the printer to

move to the top of a new page before printing the last two lines.

n Reverse form feed

Just as your printer can perform a reverse line feed, it can do a
reverse form feed. This code moves the paper so that the print
head is positioned at the top of the current page. This can be us-

.t w-c

0

I

-----------

0

pi;;; ;;;g ;I

I

ed, for example, to print text in a multi-column magazine for­mat; print the first column, then reverse form feed back to.the
top of the page to start the second column. The code for reverse
form feed is easy to remember: < ESC > < FF > .

Table 4-3

Form feed commands

1 Function

Advance paper to top of next

1 Control code

CHR$(12)

paw
Reverse paper to top of current

(ESC)CHR$(12)

page

W Changing the page length

You may have some computer forms that you wish to use with
this printer that are not 11 inches high. That’s no problem,
because you can tell your printer how high the forms are that
you are using. There are two commands for doing this, shown in
this table.

Table 4-4

Form length control

Function

Set the page length to n lines
Set the page length to n inches

Control code

(ESC)“C”CHR$(n)
(ESC)“C”CHR$(O)CHR$(n)

Let’s set up a 7 inch high form length, which is typical of

many computer checks. The following program will do it.

NEW

' Demo of variable form lenffths

10
20 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"C";CHR$(O>jCHR$(7);
30 LPRINT "PAY TO THE ORDER OF:"
40 LPRINT CHR$(12);
2; ;;;INT "FAY TO THE ORDER OF:"

This program should print “PAY TO THE ORDER OF:”
twice, and they should be 7 inches apart. Line 20 sets the form
length to 7 inches. After line 30 prints, line 40 sends a form feed

49

advance the paper to the top of the next form. Line 50 then
prints its message.

After you have run this program, turn off the printer and ad-

just the top of form position. When you turn the printer back on

the page length will reset to its normal setting (usually 11 in­ches).

TOP AND BOTTOM MARGINS

Many programs that you use a printer don’t keep track of

where they are printing on the page. This causes a problem
when you get to the bottom of a page because these programs
just keep on printing, right over the perforation. This makes it
very hard to read, especially if a line happens to fall right on the
perforation. And if you separate the pages then you are really in
trouble.

Of course your printer has a solution to this predicament. This
printer can keep track of the position on the page, and advance
the paper so that you won’t print too near the perforation. There
are two commands to do this. One controls the space at the top
of the page and the other controls the space at the bottom of the
page. The control codes are given in the following table.

Table 4-5

Top and bottom margin commands

Function Control code

Set top margin to n lines (ESC)“r”CHR$(n)
Set bottom margin to n lines

(ESC )“N”CHR$(n)

Cancel top and bottom margins (ESC)“O”

In both cases the value of n tells your printer how many lines

to skip, although there is a slight difference in the usage. When
you set the top margin with (ESC)“r”CHR$(n), the value of n

tells the printer what line to start printing on. When you set the
bottom margin with (ESC)“N”CHR$(n), the value of n tells the

printer how many blank lines should be left at the bottom of the
page.

Let’s try a simple application to see how these margins work.

Enter this program, which will print 150 lines without top and
bottom margins.

10 ' Demo of top and bottom margins
60 LPRINT CHR$(12);

70 FOR I=1 TO 150

80 LPRINT "THIS IS LINE";1

:' form feed

90 NEXT I
110 LPRINT CHR$(12)

:' form feed

120 END

When you run this program it will print 150 lines right down
the page and across the perforations. When it’s done line 110
sends a form feed to advance to the top of the next page. Look at
the lines that have printed near the perforations. Separate the
sheets and see if any of the lines have been torn in half. These
are the problems that the top and bottom margins will solve.

Now add the following lines to your program. (Don’t forget
the semicolons or you won’t get quite the same results that we
did.)

1 Leave 6 blank lines at the bottom of page

20
30 LPRINT CHR$(27);"N";CHR$(6);

40 ' Start top of page at line 6
50 LPRINT CHR$(27);"r";CHR$(6);
100 LPRINT CHR$( 27) poff;

I clear top and bottom

margins

Now when you run the program, your printer skip the first six
lines and the last six lines on each page. Always send a form
feed after setting the top margin, or it will not work on the first
page printed. That’s because the top margin only takes effect
after a form feed.

Line 50 sets the top margin, line 30 sets the bottom margin,
and line 100 clears both margins when we are done.

THIS IS LINE 1
THIS IS ILINE 2

THIS IS LINE :
THIS IS ILINE 4
THIS I5 LINE 5
THIS IS ILINE 6
THIS IS LINE 7
THIS IS LINE R
THIS IS LINE 9

; THIS
I THIS
’ rHIS
; THIS
, THIS
I THIS

I

O1

ITHIS IS LINE 56

b-

THIS IS LINE 164
THIS IS LINE 105
THIS IS LINE 106

0

THIS IS LINE 107
THIS IS LINE 108
THIS IS LINE 109

0

THIS IS LINE 116

0
0

--­0

50

LINE
LINE 51

LINE 52
LINE
LINE 54
LINE 55

53

0

THIS IS LINE 111

THIS IS LINE 112

0

THIS IS LINE 113
THIS IS LINE 114
THIS IS LINE 115

0

THIS IS LINE lib
THIS IS LINE 117
THIS IS LINE 118

0

THIS IS LINE 119
THIS IS LINE 120

9

SETTING LEFT AND RIGHT MARGINS

The left and right margins of this printer work just like a
typewriter - once they are set all the printing is done between
them. The commands to set the margins are given in the follow­ing table:

Table 4-6

Left and right margin commands

Try setting the margins with this program:

10 ' Demo of margins

20 GOSUB 70

30 LPRINT CHR$(27);"l";CHR$(lO);
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"Q";CHR$(70);

50 GOSUB 70
60 END
70 FOR I=1 TO 80

80 LFRINT "XI';
90 NEXT I
100 LPRINT
110 RETURN

The first thing that this program does is to branch to the
subroutine that starts in line 70 . This subroutine prints 80 X’s
in a row. The first time that the subroutine is used, all the X’s fit
in one line. Then line 30 sets the left margin to 10, and line 40
sets the right margin to 70. Once again the subroutine is used,
but this time the X’s won’t all fit on one line since there is now
only room for 60 characters between the margins.

Run the program. The results will look like this:

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

XxXXXXXXXxXXXXXxxxXXxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

53

When you want to reset the margins to the default values, you
have two choices. You can either turn the printer off and back
on, or you can set margin values equal to the default values.
This means that you should set a left margin of 0 and right
margin of 80 in pica pitch.

If you change the pitch of your printing after you set your
margins, the margins will not change. They stay at the same
place on the page. So if you set the margins to give you 65 col­umns of printing when you are using pica type, then you change
to elite type you will have room for more than 65 columns of
elite printing between the margins.

HORIZONTAL AND VERTICAL TABS

Suppose you need to move across the page to a certain posi­tion several times in a document. It’s not much fun to type in
space after space. And you don’t have to - you can “tab” your

way across the page.

Your printer’s tabs are like those on a typewriter, but much

more powerful. You have both horizontal and vertical tabs
which can be used for both text and graphics - and they’re real­ly handy for indenting paragraphs and making tables.

,M Horizontal tabs

Horizontal tabs are set automatically every eight positions. To

move the print head to the next tab position, send CHR$(S).

Try this program to see how the default tabs work.

10 1 Demo of horizontal tabbing
20 LPRINT "ONE";CHR$(g);"TWO";CHR$(9);"THREE";

CHR$(g);"FOUR"

Here’s what you should get-

Even though the words are different length, they are spaced

out evenly by the horizontal tabs.

Now add the following line to your program to set different

horizontal tabs:

15 LPRINT CHR$(27);"D";CHR$(7);CHR$(l4);CHR$(21);

CHR$(O)

(ESC)“D” is the command to begin setting horizontal tabs. It

must be followed by characters representing the positions that
you want the tabs set. In our program we are setting tabs in col­umns 7, 14, and 21. The CHR$(O) at the end ends the string of
tabs. In fact, any character that is not greater than the previous
one will stop setting tabs. This means that you must put all your
tab values in order, from least to greatest, or they won’t all get
set.

When you run the program now it produces this:

The words are now closer together, but still evenly spaced.

The words are now closer together, but still evenly spaced.

Turn your printer off and on again to reset the default tabs. Turn your printer off and on again to reset the default tabs.

Table 4-7 Table 4-7

Horizontal tab commands Horizontal tab commands

Function Function

Advance to next tab position

Advance to next tab position CHWW CHWW
Set tabs at nl, n2, etc. Set tabs at nl, n2, etc.

Control code Control code

(ESC)“D”CHR$(nl) (ESC)“D”CHR$(nl)

CHR$(nZ).....CHR$(O) CHR$(nZ).....CHR$(O)

n One-time horizontal tabs

Suppose you need to move to a position across the page, but

you only need to do it once. It doesn’t make much sense to set

up a tab to use only one time. There must be an easier way ­and of cause there is.

The solution is called a one-time tab. Table 4-8 show the com-

mands.

Table 4-8

One-time horizontal tabs

Function

Absolute horizontal tab
Relative horizontal tab

Control code

(ESC) ‘3” CHR$(nl) CHR$(nZ)
(ESC) “\” CHR$(nl) CHR$(nZ:

55

The aboslute horizontal tab command moves the print head to
a specified position on the page. The position that you want the
print head to move to (meaured from the left margin) is
specified by the values of $21 and n2 in l/60-inch units using the
formula nl + n2 x 256.

Try this program to see how this works.

10 1 Demo of absolute horizontal tabs

20 FOR I=60 TO 70 STEP 2

30 LPRINT I;'+++++';
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"$";CHR$(I);CHR$(O);
50 LPRINT 'Horizontal tab."

60 NEXT I

70 END

In this program, the print head is positioned before the “H” in

“Horizontal” is printed.

The relative horizontal tab command can move the print head
right form the current position. The formula for calculating how
much the print head moves is the same as in the absolute
horizontal tab command. However, the units by which the print
head actually moves vary’in l/120-inch units.

Try this program to see how this works.

10 FOR I=1 TO 3

20 LPRINT "Relative";

30 LPRINT CHR$(27>;'\';CHR$(I*2O);CHR$(O);

40 LPRINT 'Horizontal";

50 LPRINT CHR$(27);"\';CHR$(I*lO);CHR$(O);

60 LPRINT "Tab."

70 NEXT I

80 LPRINT
90 END

W Vertical tabs

Vertical tabs have the same kinds of uses that horizontal tabs
do - they just work in the other direction. Horizontal tabs allow
you to reach a specific column on the page no matter where you

start from. Vertical tabs are the same. If you have a vertical tab
set at line 20, a vertical tab (or <VT >) will move you to line 20
whether you start from line 5 or line 19.

The vertical tab is not set at the power-on default. If you send

a CHR$(ll), which is the ASCII code for <VT > , before we
have set up tabs advance the paper one line. Enter this program
to see how this works.

' Demo of vertical tabs

10
40 LPRINT CHR$(ll);"FIRST TAB."

50 LPRINT CHR$(ll);"SECOND TAB."
60 LPRINT CHR$(ll);"THIRD TAB."
70 LPRINT CHR$(ll);"FOURTH TAB."

Now, let’s set some vertical tabs of our own. Add these lines

to the program:

20 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"B";CHR$(lo);CHR$(20);
30 LPRINT CHR$(4O);CHR$(5O);CHR$(O);

(ESC)“B” is the command to set vertical tabs. Like the

horizontal tab setting command, tab positions must be defined

in ascending order. Our example sets vertical tabs at lines 10,
20, 40 and 50. Then the CHR$(ll) in each of the following lines
advances the paper to the next vertical tab. The printout is
shown below.

1-I-i I HC) TAM I

wx.m-1-i-4 -rAb.

Add one more line to the program to demonstrate one more

feature of vertical tabs.

80 LPRINT CHR$(ll);"FIFTH TAB."

Now when you run the program the first page looks just like
before, but line 80 sends one more <VT> than there are tabs.
This doesn’t confuse your printer - it advances the paper to the

next tab position which happens to be the first tab position on

the next page. That’s nice, isn’t it?

Table 4-9

Vertical tab commands

Advance paper to next tab posi-

n Vertical tab channels

Vertical tab channels are especially helpful in two situations.
The first occurs when you are writing a program to accompany
a preprinted form that can accommodate various types of
responces. The second occurs when you create a multipage
form or report with different vertical tabs on each page.

Table 4-10

Vertical tab channel commands

Function

Set vertical tabs at nl, n2, etc.

as channel n0

Select vertical channel n0

Control code

(ESC)“b”CHR$(nO) CHR$W)

CHR$(nZ).....CHR$(O)

(ESC)“I”CHR$(nO)

You can store up to eight channels of tab stops. They are

numbered from 0 to 7. If you have already stored a set using

(ESC)“B” command, your printer has labelled it as channel 0.

Try this program how to see the vertical tab channels work.

10 1 Demo of vertical tab channels
20 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"b';CHR$(l>;CHR$(lO);CHR$(2O);

CHR$(O) ;

30 CLHPRHl~oT)CHR$(27);"b";CHR$(2);CHR$(15);CHR$(25);

.

2

40 ~~~~~~)CHR$(27);"b";CHR$(3);CHR$(l7);CHR$(28);

;

65: FOR 1 Use I=1 vertical TO tab channels

3
70 LPRINT "TOP OF FORM"
80 LPRINT CHR$(27);"/";CHR$(I);
90 LPRINT CHR$(ll);
100 LPRINT "1ST TAB OF CHANNEL";1
110 LPRINT CHR$(ll);
120 LPRINT "2ND TAB OF CHANNEL";1

130 LPRINT CHR$(12);
140 NEXT I
150 LPRINT CHR$(27);"@"
160 END

When you run this program you should get like this.

TOP OF FClRM

TOF’ OF FORM

1ST TAB OF CHANNEL 2

ZND TAB OF CHANNEL 2

TOP OF Fllh’t’l

1ST TAB OF CHANNEL 1:

2ND TRB CIF CtiRNNEL. 3

f-w

In this program we set tabs at 10 and 20 in channel 1 in line

20. In line 30 we set tabs 15 and 25 in channel 2, and in line 40
we set tabs 17 and 28 in channel 3.

Because the channels are stored, you must make the printer to
recall one before you use it, so we used (ESC)“I”CHR$(nU) in
line 80.

CENTERING AND ALIGNING TEXT

Text can be arranged in any of three formats: left aligned (nor­mal printing with “ragged” right margin), centered between the
margins, or right aligned. These are selected by the following
commands.

Table 4- 11

Aligning commands

Function

Left-aligned printing
Centered printing
Right-aligned printing

Control code

(ESC)“a”CHR$(O)
(ESC)“a”CHR$(l)
(ESC)“a”CHR$(2)

Try this program to see how easy it is.

10 "Demo of aligning and centering
20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"1";CHR$(20);
30 LPRINT CHR$(27);"Q";CHR$(60);
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);"a";CHR$(O);
50 LPRINT "THIS LINE IS LEFT-ALIGNED."
60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"a";CHR$(l);
70 LPRINT "THIS LINE IS CENTERED."

80 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"a";CHR$(2);

90 LPRINT "THIS LINE IS RIGHT-ALIGNED;"

When you run this program, you should get like this:

Tl-I I s L. I NE

:I: t;- I.-.E:FT’-.I-Il.... I GI’.lEw:) ”

-r 1.4 :[ s I._ :I. I\I EZ

1 s w :I: G 1.4 -r --. 4 I....

I G 111 E 12 m

CHAPTER 5

SPECIAL FEATURES OF

THE PRINTER

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 5 include-

* Printer’s bell;

l Master reset;
l Uni-directional printing;

l International character sets;
l Printing BIG characters;
l The optional sheet feeder;
l Macro instruction;
l Reading a hex dump.

In the previous chapters we have learned about several
groups of control codes. In this chapter we will look at more con­trol codes. These codes don’t fit neatly into any of the groupings
that we have studied, but they add a lot of capability to your
printer. So here goes.

n Now hear this

You may have heard the printer’s bell if you have ever run out
of paper. And you may have wondered why it’s called a bell
when it beeps instead of ringing! It’s a long story that goes back
to the early days of computers, when teletype machines were us­ed for computer terminals. These mechanical marvels had a bell
in them that could be heard for blocks. This bell was used to
signal the operator that somethings needed attention. The code
that the computer sent to the teletype machine to ring the bell
was, reasonably enough, called a bell code. Well the name bell

.

code is still with us, even if the bell has changed to a beeper, and
a lot of people still call the beeper a bell, even if it doesn’t sound
like one. So with our trivia lesson out of the way, let’s see how
we can “ring the bell.”

The code to sound the “bell” is CHR$(7), which is ASCII code
7 or (BEL). Any time your printer receives this code it will

62

sound the bell for a quarter of a second. This can be used to re­mind an operator to change the paper or to make another adjust­ment to the printer.

You can try this by typing:

LPRINT CHR$(7)

n Resetting the printer

Up to now when we wanted to reset the printer to the power
on condition we have had to either turn the printer off and then
on again, or to send the specific codes that reset the particular
features. There is an easier way. The control code (ESC) “@”
will reset all of the printer’s features to the power on condition
(as determined by the DIP switches), with two exceptions.
Those exceptions are that (ESC) “a” will not erase any
characters that you have stored in the printer’s RAM memory

(Chapter 5 tells you how to create your own characters), and it

won’t erase the macro if you have one stored in the printer’s

RAM (this chapter will tell you how to create a macro).

In addition, if you set the “Panel” mode, “Italic” mode, or
“Italic and Panel” mode by the control panel settings at the
power on, these functions will be remain with this control code.

n Putting your printer to sleep

You know how to put your printer off line with the On Line
key on the control panel. Your printer has another off line state
that can be controlled from your computer. When you turn the
printer off line from your computer, this printer will ignore
anything that you send it, except for the code to go on line again.
CHR$(lS) is the code to turn your printer off line; CHR$(17)
turns your printer to on line status.

n Printing the bottom of the sheet

Sometimes when you are using individual sheets of paper you
may want to print near the bottom of a sheet. The paper-out
detector usually stops the printer when you are about 1 inch
from the bottom of the sheet. This is notify you if you are runn­ing out of continuous paper.

Your printer has the ability to print right to the bottom of the

sheet. You can disable the paper-out detector so that it doesn’t

stop the printer. This will allow you to print to the end of the

sheet, and even beyond if you are not careful. The codes to con­trol the paper-out detector, along with the other codes that we
have just learned are in the following table.

Table 5-1

Some miscellaneous commands

Function

Sound bell 1 CHRU7J

1 Master reset

I Off line

On line

Paper-out detector off

1 Control code

1 (ESC) “a”
1 CHRW

CHR$il

WC)

Paner-out detector on (ESC)

I Move mint head back one sDace I CHRW

Delete last character sent
Cancel text in print buffer

I Print “slash zero”

I Print “normal zero”

Immediate-print on
Immediate-print off

n Backspace, delete, and cancel text

CHR$(127)

CHR$(24)

I (ESC) “-‘I 1

1 (ESC)’

(ESC) “i”1
(ESC) “i”0

0

“-“0

Backspace (CHR$@)) “backs up” the printhead so that you
can print two characters right on top of each other. Each time
your printer receives a backspace it moves the printhead one
character to the left, instead of to the right. You can strike over
multiple letters by sending more than one backspace code.

Delete (CHR$(127)) also “backs up” one character, but then it
“erases” the previous character (it’s erased from your printer’s

buffer, not from the paper).

Cancel text (CHR$(24)) deletes all the text in the print buffer;

that is, in the line before the delete text command. Since your
printer prints one line of text at a time, only that line will be
deleted.

The following program shows how these codes works.

,

10 LPRINT
20 LPRINT
30 LPRINT
40 LPRINT

"BACKSPACE DOES NOT";

CHR$(8>;CHR$(8);CHR$(8);
~I=== WORK"

"DELETE DOES NOT";

50 LPRINT CHR$(127);CHR$(127);CHR$(l27);

60 LPRINT "WORK"

70 LPRINT

80 LPRINT CHR$( 24);

"CANCEL LINE";

90 LPRINT "DOES NOT WORK"

Here is what this program will print:

The backspace codes in line 20 move the printhead a total of
three spaces to the left so that the first part of line 30 will over­print the word “NOT”. The delete codes in line 50 “erase” the
three letters in the word “NOT” so that it doesn’t even print.

In line 80, CHR$(24) deletes the words in line 70. The
semicolon at the end of line 70 prevents a line feed from causing
that line to print before the printer receives the CHR$(24) code.
The text in line 90 prints as it normally would because it is after

CHR$(24).

n Printing zeroes

Believe it or not, there are two types of zeroes. There is of

course the type we use every day - 0 - and this is what your
printer will print if you don’t do anything.

The other type is used almost exclusively in computers and

engineering. It is called the “slash zero” and is written like this -

0. The line through the number is supposed to prevent you from
misreading it as the letter
printers were available, this was a good idea but you really have
no need for it (although you may want to use the slash zero for
special effect).

W Immediate-print

This printer can print at fine rate of 120 characters per se-

cond. But it will also print more slowly at the speed of your typ­ing. In immediate-print mode, the printhead prints one character
at a time, as you send it. This printer also moves the paper up so
that you can see the current line and then down to continue
printing.

“0”. Back before high-quality

65

You can turn immediate-print mode on with (ESC) “i” 1. But
before looking at it, let’s review the normal operation of the
print buffer. Enter this program.

20 A$="" : INPUT

30 IF A$="" THEN 50

" TYPE A CHARACTER ",A$

40 LPRINT A$; : GOT0 20
50 LPRINT

: LPRINT CHR$(27);"@"

Now type several characters, and after each press the
RETURN key. True to form, the printer just stuffs the
characters into its buffer while it waits for a carriage return
code. (In this program the RETURN key doesn’t send a car­riage return code.) To end this program and print the contents
of the buffer, press RETURN alone.

Now add this line:

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"il";

And RUN the program. Your printer responds to your typing -

immediately.

’

When you are finished, press RETURN alone.

n Adjusting the width of space between characters

This printer provides a command that adjusts the space be­tween the NLQ characters that it prints when the DIP switch l­6 is set on. The (ESC) CHR$(32) CHR$(n) command adds blank
space between the characters. The units of space that are added
vary in l/60-inch units.

Try this program to see how this works.

10 ’

Demo of adjusting spaces

20 LPRINT CHR$( 27);"xl";

30

FOR I=10 TO

1 STEP -2
40 LPRINT CHR$(27);" ";CHR$(I);
50 LPRINT "This line is added";I;"spaces."

60

NEXT I

70 LPRINT "This line is Normal space."
80

END

This
This line is
This line is
This line is
This line is added 2 spaces.

This line is Normal space,

line is added 10 spaces.

added 8 spaces.

added 6 spaces.

added 4 spaces.

This command can be used to produce micro-justification,

which is a method of justifying lines by incresing the space be-

tween each character.

n Uni-derectional printing

Uni-directional printing is a big word that means printing in

one direction only. Your printer normally prints when the print­head is moving in both directions. But once in a while you may

have an application where you are more concerned about how

the vertical lines align than with how fast it prints. This printer

lets you make this choice. The table below shows the commands

for controlling how this printer prints.

Table 5-2

Printing directin commands

Function

Print ih one direction
Print in both directions (ESC) “U”0
One time mint in one direction (ESC) “0’

Control code

(ESC) “U”l

Try this program to see the difference that printing in one

direction makes.

10 ) Demo of uni-directional printing

20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"1";

30 FOR I=1 TO 10

40 LPRINT 11 1"

50 NEXT I
60 LPRINT : LPRINT

70 LPRINT CHR$(27) ;"Ul";

80 FOR I=1 TO 10

90 LPRINT "I"
100 NEXT I
110 LPRINT CHR$(12);CHR$(27);"@"

67

Here is what you will get. The top line is printed bi-directional­ly, and the bottom is printed uni-directionally. You will have to
look hard because there isn’t much difference.

Let’s analyze the program. Line 20 sets the line spacing to
7/72 of an inch so that the characters that we print will touch top
to bottom. Lines 30 - 50 print 10 vertical line characters. Then
line 70 sets one-direction printing and the vertical lines are

printed again. Finally line 110 sends a form feed to advance the

paper to the top of a new page, and then uses the master reset to
restore the printer to the power on condition.

You can also set the printer to print in one direction for one
line only by using the (ESC) “(” command. This command im­mediately moves the printhead to the left margin and then
prints the remainder of the line from left to right.

W The seven bit dilemma

Certain computers (but not the IBM-PC fortunately!) don’t
have the capability to send eight bits on their parallel interface.
They can only send seven bits. This would make it impossible
for these computers to use this printer’s block graphics
characters and special symbols if our engineers hadn’t thought
of a solution. (All of these characters have ASCII codes greater
than 127 which means that the eighth bit must be on to use
them.) The solution lies in the three control codes given in the
following table:

Table 5-3

Eighth bit controls

Function Control code

Turn the eighth bit ON (ESC) “>”
Turn the eighth bit OFF (ESC) “=”
~ec~~~~;t~ bit “as is” from ( ESC > ,,#,,

n Block graphics characters and special symbols

Besides the upper and lower case letters and symbols that we
are by now familiar with, your printer has a whole different set
of characters that are for special uses. These characters include
block graphics for drawing forms and graphs, and special sym­bols for mathematical, engineering and professional uses. The
special characters are included in two character sets. The
character set you normally use with IBM mode is called
character set #l. The special characters are printed out when
you send ASCII codes 160-255 to the printer.

Your printer also offers character set #2 which is almost the
same as character set #l except for the addition of ASCII codes
3-6,21, and 128-159. Character set #2 is selected with (ESC)
“6”; to go back to character set #l, use (ESC)“7”.

You can also specify the power-on default character set by set­ting DIP switch l-7 on for character set #l and off for character
set #2. The following program will print out all of the graphics
characters available:

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"0";
20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"6";

30 FOR J=3 TO 6
40 LPRINT "

d';J;CHR$(J.);CHR$(9);

50 NEXT J

60 LPRINT " 20 ";CHR$(20)

70 LPRINT

80 LPRINT " 21

';CHR$(21);CHR$(g);
90 LPRINT " 26 ";
100 LPRINT CHR$(26)
1'20 LPRINT
130 FOR ~=128 TO 254 STEP 5
140 FOR I=J TO J+4
150 IF I>254 THEN 170
160 LPRINT I;CHR$(I);CHR$(g);
170 NEXT I
180 LPRINT : LPRINT
190 NEXT J

69

Figure 5- 1. Character set #2

70

Figure 5-l shows what this program will print. If your chart

doesn’t 1001 like this because it has regular letters and numbers
instead of the special symbols, then your computer is only using
seven bits. You can get the correct printout by changing line

160 to this:

160 LPRINT I;CHR$(27);">";CHR$(I);CHR$(27);"=";

CHR$(9);

A note for the IBM-PC users.

When you run this program, you cannot get the right-pointed

arrow (CHR$(26)) with the IBM-PC computers. This is because

the IBM-PC does not send this code to the printer.

There is a solution to avoid this problem. Change lines 100

120 to the either set of the following lists.

and

100

O=INP(&H379)

110

OUT &H378,26 : OUT &H37A,5 : OUT &H37A,4

120

LPRINT : LPRINT

: IF 0~128 THEN 100

100

O=INP(&H3BD)

110

OUT &H3BC,26 : OUT &H3BE,5 : OUT &H3BE,5

120

LPRINT : LPRINT

SO

show are all of these strange characters used? Here is a
short program that demonstrate how the graphics characters
can be combined to create a figure: the 5 of clubs.

: IF 0~128 THEN 100

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"6"; -.
20

LPRINT CHR$(218);CHR$(l96);CHR$(l96);
cHR$(l96);CHR$(l96);CHR$(l96);CHR$(19l)

30

LPRINT CsR$(l79);CHR$(53);CHR$(32);cHR$(32);
CHR$(32);CHR$(32);CHR$(l79)

40

LPRINT CHR$(l79);CHR$(32);CHR$(5);CHR$(32);

CHR$(5);CHR$(32);cHR$(l79)

50

LPRINT CHR$(l79);CHR$(32);CHR$(32);cHR$(5);

.

CHR$(32);CHR$(32);CHR$(179)

60

LPRINT CHR$(l79);CHR$(32);CHR$(5);CHR$(32);
CHR$(5>;CHR$(32>;CHR$(179)

70

LPRINT CHR$(l79);CHR$(32);CHR$(32);CHR$(32);

CHR$(32>;CHR$(53);CHR$(179)

80

LPRINT CHR$(l92>;CHR$(l96);CHR$(l96);

CHR$(l96>;CHR$(l96>;CHR$(l96);CHR$(217) -

90

LPRINT CHR$(27);"7"

71

If you have a 7-bit interface, add the following lines to the pro-

gram given above:

15 LPRINT CHR$(27);">";
95 LPRINT CHR$(27);"="

In this program line 10 selects character set #2 so that all the

graphics characters can be used (including the “club” sym­bol). Then lines 20-80 print the 5 of clubs figure. Line 90
cancels character set #2 (which is the same as selecting
character set #l).

Here is what this program prints:

,H International character sets

Your printer is a multi-lingual printer for it can speak in

eleven languages! Your printer changes languages by changing

12 characters that are different for the different languages.

These sets of characters are called international character sets.
The control,codes to select the international character sets are

given in Table 5-4.

72

Table 5-4

International character set commands

I Countrv

The characters that change are shown beneath their ASCII

code in Table 5-5.

Table 5-5

International character sets

Country ~35~36~64~91~92~93~94~96~123~124~125~12

U.S.A I#lsl@lcl\lll*l’lcl:l,l~

IFrance

I Germany l#l$lsl~l~lul^l’l~lal~lR

England

Demark type I #$@E~L-zi;;-

Sweden

Italy

n Printing characters in the control code area

When you refer the Appendix B, you’ll find many characters
are printed in the control code area. (Remember that the low­order control codes are the ASCII codes 0 through 31 plus 127,
and the high-order control codes are 128 through 159 plus 255.)

These codes don’t normally print symbols on paper, rather
they cause the printer to change modes. To make them print as
normal symbols requires an extra command. For example, the

al~lrl~lil~l~l~l~l~l-

f .I. G I.

#rl~At5AUBZ~Bi.i

73

command to “normalize” the high-order control codes is (ESC)
“6”. Try this program with the DIP switch 1-6 on.

10 ’ Demo of characters in the high-control code

area

20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"6";

30 FOR I=128 TO i59

40 LPRINT CHR$(I);

50 NEXT I

60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"7"

70 END

When you run this program you’ll get like this:

That’s where the italic international characters have been

stored. So the (ESC)“G” command without the (ESC)“R” gives
you access to the international characters. The (ESC)“7” turns
these characters back into control codes.

The low-order control codes can also be defined, but not all of
them can be printed with ease. The (ESC)“I” 1 command
makes them printable, and the (ESC)“I”O command returns
them normal.

Just as the higher control codes hide the italic international
characters, the lower control codes hide the roman international
characters.

Let’s see how these commands work with the following pro­gram:

* Demo of characters in the control code a?e

;: LPRINT CHR$(27);"11";

30

FOR I=0 TO 6

40

LPRINT CHR$(I);

50

NEXT I

60

LPRINT CHR$(16);CHR$(17);

70

FOR I=21 TO 31

-80

LPRINT CHR$(I);

90

NEXT I

100

LPRINT

no FOR 1=128 TO 134
120

LPRINT CHR$(I);

74

130 NEXT I
140 LPRINT CHR$(144);CHR$(145);
150 FOR I=149 TO 159
160 LPRINT CiSS(I);
170 NEXT I
180 LPRINT CH?.$(27);"10"
190 END

When you run this program you should get like this:

Table 5-6

Control code area co

lmmands

Function

Printable code area expansion

Control code area expansion

C

kkct undefined codes as characters

(Cancel undefined codes as characters

n Printing BIG characters

Control c

(ESC)“G”
1 (ESC>“7”
I (ESC)“I”l

. .

I (ESC)“I”O

You can even enlarge your character sets for attention-grabb­ing headings or special effects. There are six commands you can
use. Everything following any of them will be enlarged as
shown below, until the cancel code is entered.

Table 5-7

Big character corn

Function

Double-high enlarged print

Quad-high enlarged print

1 Double-high lower-half enlarged mint

.Double-high upper-half enlarged print

Quad-high lower-half enlarged print

Quad-high upper-half enlarged print

I Cancel enlarged print

1 (ESC)“h”(

1 (ESC)“h”(

mands

Control c

(ESC)“h”(

:HR$UJ I

(ESC)“h”CHR$(2)

:HR$(3)

(ESC)“h”CHR$(4)

(ESC)“h”(

;HR$(5)

(ESC)“h”CHR$(G)

ZHR$(O)

I

Try this program to see the big characters.

10 ' Demo of BIG characters

20 LPRINT "THIS IS I';
30 LPRINT
40 LPRINT "DOUBLE";
50 LPRINT CHR$(27) ;"h";CHR$(O);
60 LPRINT "

70 LPRINT
80 LPRINT "THIS IS I';
90 LPRINT

100 LPRINT

110 LPRINT

120 LPRINT "

130 END

When you run this program, you will get like this:

CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(l);

SIZED PRINTING."

CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(2);

"QUAD";
CHR$(27>;"h";CHR$(O);

SIZED PRINTING."

75

As you can see, when the big character command is used, the
baseline for each character does not align. When you want to
?lign the baseline, try this program:

Demo of aligning BIG characters

10 ’

20 LPRINT "THIS IS 'I;
30 LPRINT
40 LPRINT
50 LPRINT "DOUBLE";
60 LPRINT
70 LPRINT
80 LPRINT " SIZED PRINTING."
90 LPRINT :LPRINT :LPRINT
100 LPRINT "THIS IS 'I;
110

LPRINT
120 LPRINT
130 LPRINT
140 LPRINT
150 LPRINT
160 LPRINT " SIZED PRINTING."
170 LPRINT
180 END

CHR$(27);"j";CHR$(21);
CHR$(27);"h";CHRS(l);

CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(O);
CHR$(27);"J";CHR$(18);

CHR$(27);"j";CHR$(63);
CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(2);
"QUAD";
CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(O);

CHR$(27);"J";CHR$(63);

:LPRINT

When you run this program, you will get like this:

n The optional sheet feeder

The automatic sheet feeder is a handy option that feeds single
cut sheets automatically. Work done on cut sheets looks better
that done on computer paper, and you don’t have to tear the

“ears” off each sheet as you must with fan-fold paper.

The automatic sheet feeder feeds a new sheet automatically
every time the printer receives or generates a form feed. Any
time you wish, you can turn the auto-feed unit on and off by
using control codes.

Table 5-8

Automatic sheet feeder commands

When the automatic sheet feeder is installed, you must set the

DIP switch 1-5 on to detect the paper-out condition.

In addition, following functions are ignored when the auto-

matic sheet feeder is installed:

Setting of the page length
Top and bottom margins
Vertical tab settings

n The macro control code

The last of our group of miscellaneous codes is definitely not

the least. It is a user-defined control code, called a macro control
code. The term macro is from the jargonese macro-instruction

77

which refers to an instruction that “calls,” or uses a group of nor­mal instructions. In computer programming macro-instructions
(which are similar to subroutines) save programmers a lot of
time and effort. Your printer’s macro can save you a lot of time
and effort also.

Here is how the printer’s macro works. You define macro by
telling the printer what normal control codes are to be included
in the macro. Then you can use the macro any time that you
want and the printer will do all the things that you included the
macro definition. You can include up to 16 codes in a single
macro. You can even use the macro to store a frequently used
word or phrase. There are two control codes for the macro: one
to define it, and one to use it. They are given in the Table 5-9.

Table 5-9

Macro instruction commands

Function

Define macro
Use macro

Control code

(ESC)“+“...(codes you include)
. . .

CHR$(30)

(ESC)“+“CHR$(l)

To see how this works we can build a macro that will reset the
printing style to normal, no matter what style it may be to start
with. The following program will define a macro to do this.

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"+";

'Start macro

20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"h";CHR$(O); 'Big character

off

30 LPRINT CHR$(27);"!";CHR$(O>; 'Select normal

pica

40 LPRINT ~~~$(27);"Tfl; 'Super &

subscripts off

50 LPRINT ~H~$(27);'*211;

lSet l/6 inch

line spacing

60 LPRINT CHR$(27);"a";CHR$(O); 'Left-aligned

printing

70 LPRINT CHR$(30)

'End macro

definition

As the comments in the program, we started to define macro

in line 10. Line 20 cancels the big character printing. Line 30
sets the normal pica, and also this command cancels the propor-

78

tional pitch, condensed print, expanded print, boldface, em­phasized, and the underlining. Line 40 cancels the superscripts
and the subscripts. Line 50 sets the line spacing to l/6 inch, and
line 60 sets the left-aligned printing. Then, line 70 ends the
macro definition. This printer will remember this macro until
the power is turned off or until a new macro is defined. A macro
can hold up to 16 bytes (characters) of information. The one that
we defined contains thirteen.

Now that you have defined a macro, let’s see how to use it.
This program will print one line using several printing features.
Then it “calls” the macro in line 60. When line 80 prints the
style is “plain vanilla” because the macro has reset it.

10 LPRINT CHR$(2'7);"Q";CHR$(40);
20 LPRINT CHR$(27);"af';CHR$(2>;
30 LPRINT CHR$(27);"-1";
40 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"h";CHR$(l);
50 LPRINT "TESTING ABCD"

60 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"t";CHR$(l);

;; g;I?INT "TESTING ABCD"

TIES-b I INI: AIBC::ll2

_.__.,_-.-,.. - _.-..... - -.... - ..-..,. “___I-.......-...

lIZ.S'T 1: IG AECI?

n Reading a hex dump

We’ve seen how to make a hex dump in Chapter 1, but it’s not
really clear what we can do with one. We need a little
background first.

The BASIC in some computers changes ASCII codes before
they send them to the printer. If you run into problem because
of this, try this hex dump to check the ASCII codes.

First turn off the printer and run the following program. Hold
down both the Paper Feed key and Mode key and turn on the
printer.

10 FOR I=0 TO 255
20 LPRINT CHR$(I);
30 NEXT I
40 LPRINT
50 END

79

If your system passes the codes directly to the printer without

changing them, you will get like this. (You can print out the last
remaining line in the print buffer by putting the printer off line
with the On Line key.)

a:,,:, 01 02 I:)? 04 05 06 07

If.1 11 I:: 1.3 14 15 16 17
20 21 2” 23 24 25 26 27
70 ?I 3? 7, 34 3s 36 37
40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47
50 St s2 53 54 55 56 57
60 61 62 6: 64 65 66 67

71) 71 72 73 74 75 76 77
80 Al 02 Es? 04 El5 86 87
70 71 72 73 94 75 96 97
60 01 A2 a3 44 a5 Cl6 F17
PO RI H2 83 B4 B5 Rh B7
co Cl C2 C3 c4 cs Cb c7
DO Dl D2 D: D4 D5 Db D7
EO El Er) E3 E4 E5 Eb E7
FL> Fl F2 F3 F4 FS Fb F7
ou Oh

28 29 20 2H 2C 2D X ?F

7.8 39 3a 3” TC 3D 7E 7;f’
48 49 40 48 4C 41) 4E 4F
58 59 5f1 5% 5C 5D 5E 5F

4R 69 6A 6P 6C 6D 6E 6F

78 79 7A 7B 7c 7D 7E 71.
BE 89 RA BB EK RD SE rjf­98 99 9A 9B 9C 9I.I 9E 9F
648 F19 AA FIR AC RD fiE FIF
BE3 B9 BFI RH BC SD BE BF
CE C9 CA CB CC CD CE CF
DB D9 DCI DR DC DD DE DF
ES E9 EA EB EC ED EE EF
FE F9 F0 FE FC FD FE FF

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

* ; “#9X?!’

0127.4sh-7B9: :

l~~RCDEFT7tiJ.Jt’LMNO
PORSTlJVWXYZC\ I”,-

‘nhcdef qhi -ib 1 mm

pqrstuvwxyz:ll”.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

................

................

.....

................

................

. .

Most BASICS, however, are not quite that straight forward.

For example, the IBM-PC prints like the following.

Or:, 0 1 02 03 Q4 05 06 07
0F 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

’ 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

‘I.0 31 32 33 34 35 36 37
40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47
50 51 52 s3 54 55 56 97
60 61 h:! 63 64 65 66 67
70 71 72 73 74 7s 7h 77
En 01 82 93 84 85 Oh 87

71.1 91 92 93 94 95 96 97
ra1.J at A2 a.3 A4 05 aa 07

HO Bl B? R3 B4 85 86 R7
CO Cl C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7
DO Dl DI! D3 D4 D5 Dh D7

EO El E2 E3 E4 E5 E6 E7
F0 Fl F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7
0D UFI

00 09 OA OB IX 0D I:Ii? 0E

17 18 19 lB 1C ID 1E if-

28 27 20 28 2C 2D 2E “F
38 39 74 3f1 7.C 3D TE :.F
4R 49 40 4R 4C 41, 4E 4F­50 59 sa 5R SC 51) 51-I 5f­6R 67 60 6B 6C 6D 6E 6r
7R 79 7FI 7H 7C 7D 7E 7F
RR 87 RR Elf3 BC nu RI7 I-IF
9R 99 90 9B 91: 9D 9E 9F
At3 A9 Ah AR FIG RD AE nF
BEI B9 PA RB EC BD BE Bt­CO C9 CF\ CR CC CD CE r:F
DO D9 DA DR DC DD DE DF
ES E9 EA EB EC ED Et: EF
FB F9 Fe FB FC f=D FE FF

. . . . . . . . . . . .

‘;~~k*zv o*+,-./

,:,I 2.3456789: : .C = %-­I~nBTDEFStiI.J~L.FINO
KIRRTUVWXY7C\l”-

‘ahcdefghiiI.lmno

pqr.‘.tLlvW:<y;ICI:“.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. .

ox+.-./

...........

<Y’>”

Notice that your printer is receiving decimal code 13 (hex OD)

is coming with hex OA, which is really decimal 10. In addition,

your printer does not receive decimal code 26 (hex 1A).

Your printer prints hex numbers 16 per line, with printing the
characters on the right side. If it receives less than 16, it sits in a
holding pattern, awaiting more data. Taking the printer off line

80

dumps the characters to the paper.

To debug a program quickly, just use the hex dump capabili­ty. Appendix B will help you translate the hex codes to ASCII
equivalents.

CHAPTER 6

CREATING YOUR

OWN CHARACTERS

Subjects we’ll cover in Chapter 6 include -

l Designing and printing your own characters;
l Designing proportional characters ;
l Designing your own characters with NLQ.

In the previous chapters of this manual you’ve learned how to
control the printer to give dozens of different typefaces. By us­ing various combinations of pitches, character weights, and font
selections, you can create nearly any effect you want to in text.
And with international character sets and the special text and
big characters described in Chapter 5, you can print almost any
character you think of.

But if “almost any character” isn’t good enough for you, then
it’s a good idea you have this printer! With it you can actually
create your own characters. As you’ll see in this chapter,
download characters can be used to print a logo, special

characters for foreign languages, scientific and professional ap-

plications, or any other specific printing task.

DOT MATRIX PRINTING

In order to create download characters, you’ll need some

understanding of how dot matrix printers work. They’re called

“dot matrix” because each character is made up of a group of
dots. Look closely at some printed characters produced by your
printer and you will see the dots. Figure 6-1 shows how the let­ter “C” is formed by printing 15 dots.

The printhead in this printer consists of nine wires stacked
one atop the other. Figure 6-2 shows an enlarged schematic
view of the front of the printhead, showing the ends of the wires
and their relationship to the printed draft characters. As you can

see, the capital letters use the top seven wires of the printhead,
and the descenders (such as the lower case “p” shown) use the
bottom seven pins. As the printhead moves across the page (in
either direction - that’s what is meant by bi-directional print­ing) it prints one column of dots at a time. Each time a dot is sup­posed to print an electromagnet inside the printhead causes the
appropriate wire to strike the ribbon (making this printer an im-

pact printer).

I

Figure 6- 1.

The letter “C” is created by printing 15 dots.

1

5gure 6-2.

As the printhead moves across the page, each of the

wires prints one row of dots.

THE PRINT MATRIX

All of the standard characters that this printer prints are form-

ed from patterns of dots that are permanently stored in the
printer’s ROM (read-only memory). This includes all of the stan­dard ASCII characters, and special characters, the international

83

character sets, and the NLQ characters.

But there is another area of memory in this printer reserved

for user-defzked characters. These are characters that you can

design and download into the printer. When download
characters are defined they are stored in RAM (random access
memory), which allows you to define or modify them at any
time.

Each of these characters, whether it is from the standard
character ROM or in download RAM, is constructed on a grid
which is six “boxes” by nine “boxes” high. In addition, a dot can
straddle any of the vertical lines. As an example, take a look at
the enlarged “9” superimposed on the grid in Figure 6-3. As you
can see, some dots are inside the boxes, and some are centered
on the vertical lines. This, in effect, makes the character grid 11
dots wide by 9 dots high. To see how the rest of the characters

in the standard character ROM are constructed, take a look at

Appendix C.

L

Figure 6-3.

Dots can be inside boxes or straddle the vertical lines

___ _ . -..

of the grid.

DEFINING YOUR OWN CHARACTERS

You’ve seen how these characters are designed by using a
grid to layout the dots. Now you can define characters exactly
the same way. Make up some grids (photocopy Figure 6-4 if you
wish) and get ready to be creative! (Just in case you are not feel­ing creative, and to make our explanations a little clearer, we’ll
be using a picture of a chemist’s flask as an example of a draft

download character. You can see how we’ve laid it out in Figure
6-5. Later in this chapter we’ll use this character to create a
small graph.)

m,m,m,m.m,m,m,m,m,m,,m,,

ASCII Code

Descender

32

16

Total

E

Tigure 6-4. Use this grid (or one similar to it) to define your owr

Start column
End column

M, = Descender l 128 + (Start * 161 + End

draft characters.

You’ll notice that Figure 6-4 includes a lot of informatior
around the grid. Don’t be intimidated; we’ll explain each item as
we come to it in our discussion of defining and actually printing
download characters. You may have noticed another difference
between this grid and the one sh.ow in Figure 6-3: it’s only eight
boxes high. Which leads us to . . .

H Rule 1: Draft download characters are eight dots high

As you noticed in Figure 6-2, capital letters, most lowercase
letters, and most special characters use only the top seven pins
of the printhead. Draft download characters can go one better:
they can use as many as eight of the nine wires in the printhead.
So our grid is eight dots high.

It’s also possible to use the bottom eight pins, just as the “g”,

“-73 “ >9

19 P7

“q”, and “y” of the standard character sets do. These

are called descenders (because the bottom of the character
descends below the baseline of the rest of the characters).

i
1

1

85

One bit in the download character definition command is to be
treated as a descender or not. We’ll get to the command in due
time. For now, if your character uses the top eight dots, write in
a one next to the word “Descender” on the layout grid; if it uses
the bottom eight dots, write in a zero. In our example, we’ll
want to the bottom of the flask to line up with the baseline of the
other characters, so it will not be a descender. As shown in
Figure 6-5, we’ve written in a “1” on out grid.

m,m,m,m.m,m,m,m,m,m,,,m.,

128

64

32

16

8

4

2

1

blal

Figure 6-5.

We’ve designed a character and decided that it woulc

ASCII Cede

Descender

Start column
End column

M. = Descender l 128 + (Start l 161 + End

1

not be a descender, hence the “1” written in.

n Rule 2: Dots cannot overlap

As you can see in Figure 6-5 our flask has a nearly continuous
outline. But, you may ask, why not make it a really solid line and
print all the intermediate dots, as shown in Figure 6-6? Because
the dots that straddle the vertical lines in the grid actually
overlap those inside the boxes. If we tried to print overlapping
dots, the printhead would have to slow down and back up to
print both dots - not very efficient! To avoid this inefficiency,
this printer will not allow you to define a character like Figure 6-

6. (Actually, you can define it, but when it prints, your printer

will leave out the overlapping dots, so that it would print like

Figure 6-5.)

m m, m, m, m. m. m m, m. m m

1

ASCII Code

WRONG!

64

32

16

4

2

1

Tolal

Figure 6-6.

cots cannot overlap; those in immediately adjacent

“half columns” will be ignored when the character is printed.

W Add up each column of dots

Now it’s time to give our creative side a break and get down to
some basic arithmetic. That’s where the numbers down the left
side of the grid come in. Notice that there is a number for each
row of3 dots and that each number is twice the number below it.
By making these numbers powers of two we can take any com­bination of dots in a vertical column and assign them a unique
value. Some examples will make this clearer. As shown in
Figure 6-7, if we add the numbers for the dots that print in a col­umn, the sum will be a number in the range of 0 to 255. Each
number from 0 -

255 represents a unique combination of dots.

Descender

Start column
End column

M, = Descender l 128 + (Slat1 * 16) + End

i

128

64

32
/ 16
/ - 8

!

Sum

0 - 64
0 - 32 . - 32

4

o-4

2

o-2

1

O-l

~ ___

103 58

0 16 ­O-8

O-2

O-128
0 - 64
l - 32
0 - 16
o-8
O-4
o-2
O-1

255

Figure 6-7. By adding the values of each dot in a column, you’ll get

a unique description for any combination of dots.

87

So add up the values of the dots in each column using this
system. In Figure 6-8 we’ve shown our grid with the sums of the
columns filled in across the bottom (see if these agree with your
answers!). Across the top of the grid you’ve probably noticed
the cryptic labeling of each column: ml, m2, m3, etc. These
labels correspond to the labels in the command syntax state­ment, which we’ll get to shortly.

m. m, m, m. m, m, m, mR mp m,,. m,,

128

64

32

16

pigure 6-8. Add the values of the dots in each column and write

the sum of each column at the bottom.

n Assigning a value to your character

ASCII Code

Descender

Start column
End column

M, = Descender * 128 + (Start * 16) + Enc

We’ve done a pretty through job of designing and describing a
user-defined character. But this printer has room for 96
download characters - how does it knows which standard

character we want to print: every character is assigned a unique
number.

The standard characters are assigned the ASCII codes ­numbers from 0 to 255. For the download character sets you can
also define any positions between 0 to 225. This means that
once a character is defined and assigned a value (and the
download character set is selected, you can use that character
on the printer the same way you would any standard character.
You can send the character with the same ASCII value. You can

I

/

also access the character from a BASIC program with the CHR$
function.

There are no rules or restrictions on the use of numbers. This
means you can use whatever is most convenient for you ­perhaps seldom-used keys can be replaced by more useful

characters. In our example, we’ll assign the flask a value of 60,
which is the code for the character “(” in the ASCII characters.
A rather arbitrary selection, but this printer doesn’t care!

Our chart would hardly be complete with just a picture of a
chemist’s flask, so in Figure 6-9 we’ve made completed grids for
some other symbols: an automobile and a gun (quite a strange
mix of characters!). The information on the grids is now com­plete (except for proportional width data - a more advanced
topic we’ll take up shortly).

Tigure 6-9. Character designs for the three graph symbols.

89

n Download character definition command

You’ve read through a long explanation of download
characters and we haven’t even told you the command syntax
yet! Now the wait is over. This is the most complex command in
your printer repertoire and now you’ve got the necessary
knowledge to implement it. Here it is:

(ESC)“&“CHR$(O) nl n2 m0 ml m.2 m3 m4 m5 m6 m7 m8 m9

ml0 ml1

Like the other printer’s commands, it starts with an (ESC)
(CHR$(27)). The next character is an ampersand (&) (CHR$(38))
followed by a CHR$(O).

nl and n2 are used to specify the ASCII values of the
characters you are defining. The reason that there are two bytes
reserved for this is that your printer allows you to define many
characters with just a single command. nl is used to specify the

beginning of a range of characters to be defined; n2 specifies the

end of the range. For instance, if you wanted to change the ap-

pearance of the numerals from 0 to 9 (which have ASCII codes
48 through 57), the command would begin with (ESC) “&”
CHR$(O) CHR$(48) CHR$(57) . . . Of course, you can also define

individual characters by making nl and nZ equal.

m0 is called the attribute byte, for it describes two attributes

of the character we have designed: descender data and propor-

tional width information. A byte consists of eight bits. In the at­tribute byte, the first (high order) bit is used for the descender
data, and the last seven bits are used for proportional widths.
We’ll be discussing proportional character widths in detail later
in this chapter; for now, we’ll leave it at 11. The descender data
was descussed earlier: to use the top eight pins, this bit should
be 1; to use the bottom eight pins this bit should be 0. Figure 6-

10 shows the bits of the attribute byte as we’ll use them for our

flask character. By now you’ve probably seen an easier way to

determine the value of the attribute byte. Instead of translating
everything to binary, merely assign the descender data a value
of 128 (the value of the first bit) if you don’t want descenders, or
0 if you want descenders. Then just add the descender data to
the proportional width. This way, it’s simply a matter of adding
two decimal numbers. (In our case, it’s 128 + 11 = 139.)

0 000 1011 = ll(decimal)

Descender Starting Ending

date print column print column

L

Figure 6-10. The attribute byte-(M) for our flask character.

You’ll probably recognize ml . ..mll from the top of our
layout grid. That’s right, each column is described by one byte.
Now we’ve got everything we need to download one character
to the printer. The complete command for our flask character is
shown below:

CHR$(27);CHR$(38);CHR$(O);CHR$(GO);CHR$(6O);CHR$(l39)

;CHR$(2);CHR$(5);CHR$(8);CHR$(241);CHR$(O);CHR$(O)
;CHR$(241);CHR$@);CHR$(5);CHR$(2);CHR$(O)

Now let’s send the information to the printer. The following
program will send the character definitions for all three
characters to the printer. Turn off the printer and set DIP
switch 2-l off. Then turn on the printer. Enter the program and
run it.

10 LCRINT CHR$(27);"&";CHR$(O);CHR$(60);CHR$(62);
20 FOR N=60 TO 62

30 FOR M=O TO 11

40 READ MM
50 LPRINT CHR$(MM);

60 NEXT M
70 NEXT N
80 LPRINT

90 END
100 DATA 139, 2, 5, 8,241, 0, 0,241, 8, 5,

110 DATA 139,124, 0, 66, 4, 64, 36, 16, 2, 16,

120 "@A 139, 46, 16, 2, 60, 0, 48, 0, 48, 0,

When you run this program, it looks like nothing happens.
That’s OK. We’ll see why in just a moment. Save this program.
We’ll need it again shortly.

2, 0

12, 0

9 0

PRINTING DOWNLOAD CHARACTERS

You’ve now defined and sent three characters to your printer.

But how do you know that? If you try printing those characters

now you don’t get a flask, car and gun. Instead you get . . ( = ).
That’s because the download characters are stored in a different
part of the printer’s memory. To tell it to look in download
character RAM instead of standard character ROM it requires
another command:

(ESC)“%“CHR$(n);CHR$(O)

This command is used to select the download character set (if

n=49) or to select the standard character set (if n =48). Let’s

try it out. Enter this program:

10 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"%1";CHR$(O);

20 LPRINT CHR$(6O>;CHR$(61>;CHR$(62)

30 LPRINT CHR$(27>;"%O";CHR$(O)

40 END

Voila! It should have printed out the three characters we defin-

ed. Your printout should look like this:

(If it doesn’t, check the last program we ran for errors, then

rerun it.)

Let’s find out if there are any other characters in the

download RAM. Try this program:

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);"%1";CHR$(O)
20 FOR I=32 TO 126
2; ;;X";N; U-W(I);

50 LPRINT

60 FOR I=160 TO 254

'7; g;;"; CHR$(I);

90 LPRINT
100 LPRINT CHR$(27);"%O";CHR$(O)
110 END

92

Nope! Just three characters in the download set. This is incon­venient for a couple of reasons. First, every time you wanted to
use a download character you would have to switch back and
forth between character sets. Knowing that you wouldn’t want
to do that, your printer won’t even allow it. So we have made it
an easy task to use mostly standard characters with just a few
special characters thrown in. This command copies all the
ASCII characters from the standard character ROM into
download RAM:

(ESC)“:“CHR$(O);CHR$(O);CHR$(O)

Since it will copy all characters into download area, it will
wipe out any characters that are already there. So it’s important
to send this command to the printer before you send any
download characters you want to define. With that in mind, add
this line to the program we used to send the characters to your
printer:

5 LPRINT CHR$(27);":";

CHR$(O);CHR$(O);CHR$(O)

Now try the download printout test program again. Your

results look like Figure 6-11.

Figure 6- 11. Printout of the dqwnload character set, into which all

the ASCII characters have been copied, and the (, = and > have been

changed.

To demonstrate how to use these characters, let’s use this

character set to print a small graph. This program, which has
been built around the first program in this chapter, will do just
that:

10 LPRINT CHR$(27);":";

CHR$(O);CHR$(O);CHR$(O);

20 LPRINT CHR$(2~>;"&";CHR$(O);CHR$(6O);CHR$(62);

30 FOR N=60 TO 62

40 FOR M=O TO 11

50 READ MM
60 LPRINT CHR$(MM);

70 NEXT M
80 NEXT N
90 LPRINT
100

DATA

139, 2,

8, 5, 2,

5, 8,241,

0

110 DATA 139,124, 0, 66, 4,

16 12

DA% 139: 46: 160, 2, 60, 0, 48, 0,

120

L%NT"~H~~~27;~"D"-cHR$(ll)CHR$(0)

130

LPRINT CHR$(27)f"h";CHR$(l);'

140
150 LPRINT "

LPRINT cHR$(27>;"h";c~~$(o);

160

LPRINT CHR$(27);"~l";CHR$(O);

170

LPRINT "AUTOS";CHR$(9);

180

U.S. EXPORTS"

0, 0,241,

64, 36, 16,

190 FOR I=.4 TO 9.3 STEP .4

LPRINT CHR$(61);

200

NEXT I

210

LPRINT

220

LPRINT "CHEMICALS";CHR$(g);

230

FOR I=.4 TO 8.7 STEP .4

240

LPRINT cHR$(So);

250

NEXT I

260

LPRINT

270

LPRINT "GUNS";CHR$(g);

280

FOR I=.4 TO 1.4 STEP .4

290

LPRINT CHR$(62).;

300

NEXT I

310

LPRINT

320

LPRINT CHR$(g);"+--";

330

SCALE$=“--+--‘I

340

FOR I=2 TO 8 STEP 2

350

LPRINT SCALE$;

360

NEXT ‘I

370

LPRINT "--+"

380
390 LPRINT CHR$(9);" ";

FOR I=2 TO 8 STEP 2

400
410 LPRINT " ";I;

NEXT I

420

430 LPRINT CHR$(27);"$O";CHR$(O)

LPRINT CHR$(27);"SO";

440.
450 LPRINT CHR$(9);"MILLIONS OF DOLLARS"

LPRINT cH~$(27);"~"

460

END

470

93