pstopnm(1) - man - phpMan

pstopnm(1)                             General Commands Manual                            pstopnm(1)



NAME
       pstopnm - convert a PostScript file into a portable anymap

SYNOPSIS
       pstopnm  [-stdout] [-forceplain] [-help] [-llx s] [-lly s] [-landscape] [-portrait] [-nocrop]
       [-pbm |-pgm |-ppm] [-urx s] [-ury s] [-verbose] [-xborder n] [-xmax n] [-xsize  f]  [-yborder
       f] [-ymax n] [-ysize n] psfile[.ps]

DESCRIPTION
       Reads  a  PostScript file as input.  Produces PBM, PGM, or PPM files as output.  This program
       simply uses GhostScript to render a PostScript file with its  PNM  device  drivers.   If  you
       don't have GhostScript installed (invoked by a gs command), or the version you have installed
       was not built with the relevant PNM device drivers, pstopnm will fail.  You can  see  if  you
       have  the proper environment by issuing the command gs --help .  If it responds and lists un‐
       der "Available Devices" pbm, pbmraw, pgm, pgmraw, pnm, pnmraw,  ppm,  or  ppmraw,  you're  in
       business.

       pstopnm  does  not  use  the Netpbm libraries to generate the output files, so may not be en‐
       tirely consistent with most Netpbm programs.

       psfile[.ps] is the name of the input file.  .pstopnm will add the ps to the end of  the  name
       you  specify if no file exists by the exact name you specify, but one with added does.  Use -
       to indicate Standard Input.

       If you use the -stdout option, pstopnm outputs images of all the pages as a multi-image  file
       to Standard Output.  Otherwise, pstopnm creates one file for each page in the Postscript doc‐
       ument.  The files are named as follows: If the input file is named psfile.ps, the name of the
       files will be psfile001.ppm, psfile002.ppm, etc.  The filetype suffix is .ppm, .pgm, or .pbm,
       depending on which kind of output you choose with your invocation options.  If the input file
       name  does not end in .ps, the whole file name is used in the output file name.  For example,
       if the input file is named psfile.old, the output file name is psfile.old001.ppm, etc.

       Note that the output file selection is inconsistent with most  Netpbm  programs,  because  it
       does  not default to Standard Output.  This is for historical reasons, based on the fact that
       the Netpbm formats did not always provide for a sequence of images in a single file.


       Each output file contains the image of a rectangular part of the page to which  it  pertains.
       The selected area will always be centered in the output file, and may have borders around it.
       The image area to be extracted from the PostScript file and rendered into a  portable  anymap
       is  defined by four numbers, the lower left corner and the upper right corner x and y coordi‐
       nates.  These coordinates are usually specified by the BoundingBox comment in the  PostScript
       file  header, but they can be overridden by the user by specifying one or more of the follow‐
       ing options: -llx, -lly, -urx, and -ury.  The presence and thickness of a border to  be  left
       around  the  image  area  is  controlled by the use of the options -xborder and -yborder.  If
       pstopnm does not find BoundingBox parameters in the input, and you don't specify  image  area
       coordinates on the command line, pstopnm uses default values.  If your input is from Standard
       Input, pstopnm does not use the BoundingBox parameters (due to the  technical  difficulty  of
       extracting that information and still feeding the file to Ghostscript), so you either have to
       specify the image area coordinates or take the default.

       Unless you specify both output file width and height, via  the  -xsize  and  -ysize  options,
       pstopnm maps the document into the output image by preserving its aspect ratio.

       It  has  been  reported  that  on some Postscript Version 1 input, Ghostscript, and therefore
       pstopnm, produces no output.  To solve this problem, you can convert the file  to  Postscript
       Version 3 with the program ps2ps.  It is reported that the program pstops does not work.


OPTIONS
       -forceplain
              forces the output file to be in plain (text) format.  Otherwise, it is in raw (binary)
              format.  See pbm(1), etc.

       -llx bx
              selects bx as the lower left corner x coordinate (in inches).

       -lly by
              selects by as the lower left corner y coordinate (in inches).

       -landscape
              renders the image in landscape mode.

       -portrait
              renders the image in portrait mode.

       -nocrop
              does not crop the output image dimensions to match the PostScript  image  area  dimen‐
              sions.

       -pbm -pgm -ppm
              selects the format of the output file.  By default, all files are rendered as portable
              pixmaps (ppm format).

       -stdout
              causes output to go to Standard Output instead of to regular files, one per page  (see
              description  of  output  files  above).  Use pnmsplit to extract individual pages from
              Standard Output.

       -urx tx
              selects tx as the upper right corner x coordinate (in inches).

       -ury ty
              selects ty as the upper right corner y coordinate (in inches).

       -verbose
              prints processing information to stdout.

       -xborder frac
              specifies that the border width along the Y axis should be  frac  times  the  document
              width as specified by the bounding box comment in the PostScript file header.  The de‐
              fault value is 0.1.

       -xmax xs
              specifies that the maximum output image width should have a size less or equal  to  xs
              pixels (default: 612).

       -xsize xsize
              specifies that the output image width must be exactly xs pixels.

       -yborder frac
              specifies  that  the  border  width along the X axis should be frac times the document
              width as specified by the bounding box comment in the PostScript file header.  The de‐
              fault value is 0.1.

       -ymax ys
              specifies  that the maximum output image height should have a size less or equal to ys
              pixels (default: 792).

       -ysize ys
              specifies that the output image height must be exactly ys pixels.


BUGS
       The program will produce incorrect results with PostScript files that initialize the  current
       transformation  matrix.   In these cases, page translation and rotation will not have any ef‐
       fect.  To render these files, probably the best bet is to use the following options:

          pstopnm -xborder 0 -yborder 0 -portrait -nocrop file.ps

       Additional options may be needed if the document is supposed to be rendered on a medium  dif‐
       ferent from letter-size paper.

SEE ALSO
       gs(1), pstofits(1), pnmtops(1), psidtopgm(1), pbmtolps(1), pbmtoepsi(1), pnmsplit(1)


COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (c) 1992 Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
       PostScript is a Trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated.

AUTHOR
       Alberto Accomazzi, WIPL, Center for Astrophysics.




                                            28 June 2000                                  pstopnm(1)