[Gimp-developer] Gutenprint 5.0 snapshot

[Robert L Krawitz]

I've posted a Gutenprint 5.0 snapshot.  Please test it.

I've also cleared up some null pointer references in debug code in the
Ghostscript and CUPS drivers that cause problems on some platforms (I
never caught them because the glibc printf handles null string
pointers gracefully, but someone reported them on Solaris).  I think
I've caught all of these problems; they've been around for a long
time.

GIMP folks, your big change is #9.  I'm still waiting to hear whether
2.3 or 2.4 should be the cutover point for this (I could make it be a
specific 2.3 point release, but I'd rather not).  The documentation
now refers to the Gutenprint plugin as an "enhanced Print plugin for
the GIMP".

A) MAJOR CHANGES BETWEEN GUTENPRINT 5.0.0 RELEASE CANDIDATE 3 AND
   GUTENPRINT 5.0.0:

  1) A serious problem with margins when printing from CUPS in some
     cases was introduced in Gutenprint 5.0.0-rc3.  The symptoms are
     that when printing certain kinds of material on certain printers,
     the print is positioned incorrectly on the page (too far to the
     right and too far down the page).  This problem has been fixed.

  2) The Ghostscript driver used with Foomatic now prints all pages of
     a document correctly.  Previously it did not print any page
     except the first page of a document, or printed all other pages
     with possibly incorrect settings (bug 1501816).

  3) The Postscript driver now handles PPD files with non-integer
     imageable areas correctly in all locales (the PPD files certain
     HP inkjet printers using the HPIJS driver have non-integer
     imageable areas for some paper sizes).  In 5.0.0-rc3, this was
     handled incorrectly in locales that do not use the decimal point
     (".") for separating fractions from integers.

  4) The PPD file parameter is now always accessible when using the
     Postscript driver in third party Gutenprint-enabled applications.
     This was not an issue with the enhanced Print plugin for the
     GIMP.

  5) The Epson driver now chooses unidirectional vs. bidirectional
     mode more intelligently on new printers that are capable of
     producing excellent quality in bidirectional mode at high
     resolutions.  This improves printing speed with the default
     settings in certain cases and in some cases improves print
     quality.

  6) The Epson driver offers the same quality choices as 5.0.0-rc2 for
     certain new printers such as the R800, R1800, and R2400.  Certain
     quality choices (in particular Super Photo and Ultra Photo) were
     not available in 5.0.0-rc3.

  7) Various minor problems in the PPD files have been fixed.  The
     most notable change is that the names of the option groups have
     been shortened so that they are shorter than 40 characters in all
     cases except for one case in French.

  8) The French, Danish, Hungarian, and Swedish translations have been
     updated.

  9) In the GIMP 2.4 and above (forthcoming as of Gutenprint 5.0
     release), the enhanced Print plugin will be named "Print with
     Gutenprint" so as not to collide with the GtkPrint-based plugin
     bundled with that version of the GIMP.  The Print plugin bundled
     with GIMP 2.0 and 2.2 is based on Gimp-Print 4.2; the Print
     plugin in this package simply replaces the Print plugin in those
     versions of the GIMP.