(OT) Open source PCL to PDF converters?

[Fairlight]

Only Bill Campbell would say something like:
> 
> PDF (and PostScript) take a simple thing, ascii printing with a few control
> codes, and turns it into a graphics problem.

Well it sorta is, by the virtue of both allowing vector and raster
graphics, etc.  Is it even using fonts in the sense of stored fonts that
non-host-based printers used to have?  I thought it basically turns the
page into a raster that gets printed...that's how it stays so uniform
across all locations and gear.  If so, then it -is- a graphics issue,
definitely.

> My accounting software prints invoices, generating PostScript output by
> creating an ASCII file then running that through groff, but that's the
> exception rather than the rule.  The sql-ledger accounting system does
> something similar except they use TeX or LaTeX templates instead of groff.

LaTeX for the win!  I miss using that, after a fashion.  THE best
non-professional typesetting available, though.

What was it again that you needed a PDF for?  You've done these other
solutions (.dvi is printable from Windows, even, if memory serves).  Is
there something specific PDF is offering that LaTeX wouldn't/doesn't?

> At least with CUPSs and most open source software for *nix, Postscript
> processing is considered to be the standard with CUPS providing the
> translation from PS to different printer types.

You'd think someone would have written a ps2pdf.  They handled enough other
useless formats with all the x2y converters.

mark->
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