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Manuals in other formats? — Parallax Forums

Manuals in other formats?

GadgetmanGadgetman Posts: 2,436
edited 2005-01-17 14:41 in General Discussion
Greetings!

I have the 2.0 manual(Came with the BS2p kit I use) and recently downloaded the v2.1 .PDF file.
The manual is formatted for A4/Letter, which is OK when I browse it on my PC, but I'm one of those weirdos who prefer to have a printed manual, and then I find that A4 is a little large to lug around.
Therefore I usually print manuals in A5 format, but the BS2 manual doesn't resize well.
If I let Acrobat Reader resize it to the smaller format the text becomes too small to read, and if I let it crop it, becomes clear that the text is somewhat wider than A5(Not by much, though)

I even tried to copy the contents to the clipboard and importing it into OpenOffice, but that lost me all the figures and tables...

I'd buy the new printed manual, if it wasn't for the cost of shipping it halfway across the world...
(Maybe I'll buy it the next time I buy a new stamp, but at the moment, the netshop I usually use doesn't sell the manual on its own)

Comments

  • Paul BakerPaul Baker Posts: 6,351
    edited 2005-01-16 02:50
    This may just be a feature of my printer, but in printer options I can print 2 pages per page (printed in landscape) this may be too small for you.

    Paul
  • GadgetmanGadgetman Posts: 2,436
    edited 2005-01-16 12:29
    That's actually a driver/OS function, and is supported on just about any printer.
    (It even allows it on my old Canon BJ10sx)
    But the problem is that it scales it down too much.
    (64% according to Acrobat Reader)

    Using that function gives the exact same result as when I try to print directly to A5, but with the added job of cutting/folding the paper afterwards...
  • Jon WilliamsJon Williams Posts: 6,491
    edited 2005-01-16 19:45
    Formatting the current manual for physical printing is a MAJOR pain in the backside ... so I woundn't count on ever seeing it in a page size other than what we print to.

    ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
    Jon Williams
    Applications Engineer, Parallax
    Dallas, TX· USA
  • GadgetmanGadgetman Posts: 2,436
    edited 2005-01-16 22:04
    Yeah, I know.

    But if you ever decided to release a version that wasn't so... locked to a paper size...

    Now, if only I could talk my boss into letting me install Adobe Acrobat on my office PC...
    (He won't let me unless I also starts supporting the program on the Helldesk, and I'm not that much of an masochist)
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2005-01-17 14:41
    Actually, if you are in Windows XP, you can likely specify B5 paper and it will nicely shrink all to fit. And you may use the odd/even print feature to get a double sided book layout.

    Additionally, you might be able to buy pre-punched blank paper for a ringed binder and print the whole thing on that.

    The end result is pretty much the same as what you buy from Parallax (Oh, you should add a couple of covers, too.)

    I don't know exactly why, but it is working for me.

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    G. Herzog in Taiwan
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