Copyright: Copyright ©1995 ETS Inc.
Citation: TOPS - Text Output Paper Saver for Windows


  Contents

 Getting Started

TOPS - File Menu	 TOPS - Options Menu

 Open	 Misc Setup

 View File in Memory	 Headers and Footers

 About File	 Page Layout

 Print Preview	 Sheet Margins

 Print	 Text Margins

 Printer Setup	 Border Styles

 Font Selection

 Recall / Save Setup

 Change Window Looks

Built in Customer Support

 Common Questions & Answers

Contacting ETS

 Phone Numbers

 ETS Mailing Address

 Customer Support

 Other Products


Print Preview
    File - Print Preview

Sheet Number:

Enter the Sheet Number you want the screen preview to display. This is the fastest way to preview different sheets of very large documents.

Approximate Image: Fast, but imperfect when zoomed out.

Uses a very fast algorithm to generate the four print preview images. The 100% and 50% images may not look perfect (ie: lines may overspill or underspill panels).

Example of APPROXIMATE image (at 50% zoom)

 ... Lines may appear too wide at 50% zoom..

Exact Image: Slow, but perfect.

Creates the screen image based on the dots per inch (up to 300 dpi) print device selected in the TOPS Printer Setup. If this happens to be a Laser Printer, this will be 300 dpi. A Fax is usually about 200 dots per inch. The preview generated by Exact image will be precisely the same image which is sent to your print device.To create an exact image of a letter sized sheet of paper at 300 dpi requires over 1Meg of ram. The computer then takes more time to create the 200% image from this 1Meg exact image. That is the reason exact images take much more time to create than approximate images.

Example of EXACT image

   ... All zoomed images are exact.

Hint: You can use Print Preview to bring an on screen preview back to life if it was erased.

How to erase an on screen preview:

1 - Press ESC when the TOPS Main Window has keyboard focus, and a preview is visible.

2 - Press the Left Mouse Button on the Minus Box in the Preview Zoomtools Box.

 (if no file has been opened, this menu item will be disabled)


File Open - Select File Mask
We try to help you by creating a little list of commonly used file "masks" inside this pull down listbox. You may find the file mask you need right here in this list, instead of typing it in every time. Hint: unless you know exactly what the last 3 characters of your filename is (past the "." in the file name), you had better use the "*.*" (match anything) file mask, or you may never find your file, even though your file is there. (somewhere).


  Getting Started

What TOPS is all about

Using TOPS to print a document


ascii text
about ascii text files

The terms ascii, text, text file, ascii text and dos text are interchangeable. Text files serve the basic purpose of transferring text documents from one program to another. These generic computer files contain only text, spaces, carriage returns and page break characters. ASCII (pronounced "askee") stands for "American Standard Code for Information Interchange", and equates to characters that can be written by a typewriter.


File Open - Filename Edit Field
This little box is called an "edit field". It is the only box in the dialog which will accept typewritten characters. The funny word you see here is called a "filter mask". The little "star" character is called a wild card. The wild card tells Windows to "match any characters" when searching for a file. If you see two wild cards separated with a period, Windows will search for any file starting with "anything" and ending with "anything".

Example: to search for any file ending with the letters ".TXT", you would type "*.TXT"  into this field, then press Enter.


File Open - Directories
The sentence below the word "Directories" is called the "current search path". This means that the files listed to the left are inside the Disk Drive and Subdirectory shown in this sentence. You will normally have many subdirectories on your "C:" drive, and you may have to look in each subdirectory to find your file!

Rule 1: a disk drive is always 1 letter (A-Z), followed by a colon. Your "C" drive would be "C:".

Rule 2: a subdirectory will always be preceded by the "\" (backslash) character.


File Open - File List Box
This little box is called a "listbox" in Windows terminology. This box will contain a list of all files which Windows could find, which match the following criteria:

 1 - Match the filename "mask" above.

 2 - Are in the currently selected disk drive.

 3 - Are in the currently selected subdirectory on that drive.

If you see the file you want inside this listbox, simply double click the left mouse button on the filename, and you have completed your task. Your file just been selected when you have done that!


whitespace
whitespace: Blank characters or lines in a document. The space character between words would be whitespace. Lines which contain only a carriage return create 1 line of whitespace. Tabs characters create a variable amount of whitespace, depending upon their position in the line.


Viewing your File
  File - View File in Memory

This Window allows you to view your text file in it's raw ascii text format.

This View File Window is the only item in TOPS that can be minimized away from the main program window. If you leave it minimized and Exit TOPS, it will be automatically cleaned along with TOPS.

 Note: If a file has not been opened yet, the View File option will be grayed-out, and you cannot select the View option.

 Note: The red line numbers to the left are not part of your file, they are only artificial guides to assist you in counting lines.

 Note: If your file contains Page Breaks at the end of a line, the TOPS View File Window will add an artificial Carriage Return / Line Feed pair immediately before the Page Break character. This forces the Page Break to be shown on the next line down, (on a line by itself) creating an extra line in the View Window which is really not in your Text File. Don't worry about this, because if your file contains Page Breaks, the TOPS engine will separate your pages like a champ.


line numbering in viewer

  Line numbering in file viewer

Line number guides

 The red line numbers which appear in the left side of the viewer are not actually part of the ascii text file, but are simulated by the viewer. Use these line numbers as guides when you need to force page breaks every X number of lines. These red numbers help you count how many lines tall a page is inside your text file. Remember, blank lines matter when counting lines!

NOTE: Use the SETUP... dialog at the top of the window to turn these line numbers on or off.


File Open - Directory Listbox
Windows will show you every available subdirectory in the disk drive and subdirectory which is currently selected. If you are having trouble here, it's most likely that you can't find a subdirectory which makes sense.

To cure that problem:

 1 - double-click the left mouse button on the small "C:\" word at the top of the list. That will force Windows to look in the "root" or "main" directory of drive C. That is the only place where all of your Major subdirectories can be found.

 2 - next, you will see a list of your major subdirectories, which will start to make more sense. As a clue -- most intelligent software companies will name the subdirectory for their programs with the same name as the program itself. It's a fairly new concept to some companies, but it's becoming more popular.

 3 - then, look through the list of subdirectories to try to find the most likely one which your file may be saved into, then double click on the subdirectory name when you have found a likely candidate.

 4 - lastly, if your file was not in that subdirectory, go back to step 1 of this little pop up.


File Open - Drives
This little thing is called a listbox. To get the listbox to open up, press on the little arrow to the right. Every disk drive connected to your system will appear, and you can pick which disk drive to search from the list of disk drives shown.


  Common Questions

The Screen takes too long to redraw

How to Turn Off Screen Preview

Obtaining Line Drawing Characters

I can't find my file.

My file does not contain embedded page breaks.

Print is smearing on back sides.

HP4 printing problem

Printing is too slow


Headers and Footers
  • Options - Header and Footer

The header and footer may be disabled by selecting None, or by erasing all text in the associated edit box.

Header and Footer lines may be Left, Center or Right justified.

Changing your Header and Footer Fonts:

Use the [image] buttons to set your header and footer font or pointsize.

Importing Filename & File information to Header Line:

You can have TOPS create your header line automatically from your text file by checking the different boxes shown in the drawing above. If ANY of the boxes are checked, the filename will be imported automatically into the header line. As you can see, TOPS can also import the complete Pathname, File Size, File Date and Time if you check the appropriate check boxes in this header dialog.


Misc Setups
   Options - Misc Setups

Line Styles:

Don't alter (clip) long lines: unusually wide lines will be kept as is. This will sometimes make your print a lot smaller than you would like. It is sometimes wise to clip long lines at somewhere near 80 characters.

Clip long lines at: to clip or truncate long lines, type a number into the edit box, then be sure that the corresponding button is active. The number you enter here will relate with the left margin trimming from the Text Margins dialog. Example: if you have Left Margins set to "ignore", then the "ignored" count of left spaces in the file will not be included in the number you type here.

Tabs:

Tab characters in your file will be expanded out to the number of blanks which you have checked here.

Page Break Handling:

Use Embedded: TOPS will automatically figure out this setting for you each time you open a new file. You can override TOPS by checking this box, but if your file really doesn't have page breaks, TOPS will try to squeeze your entire file into the first panel on the first sheet, resulting in the tiniest font you have ever seen!

Simulated: If your file doesn't contain embedded page breaks, you will need to set this edit field equal to the number of lines you wish to appear inside each panel of your printed output. An average letter sized document will contain 60 to 66 lines per page, but this number is strictly up to you. TOPS cannot automatically decide the best number for you.

Sheet and Page Numbering:

Page Numbering: refers to the artificial numbers which TOPS will place above every panel in your job. TOPS will always start with the number "1" unless you edit the "starting with page" field with a different number. If you type in a negative number, TOPS will not number the first (x) number of pages equal to the positive amount in this field. You have the option to turn this feature on or off.

Sheet Numbering: refers to the artificial numbers which TOPS places only at the upper left-most panel on each sheet of paper. Example: "SHEET 1  PAGE 1". TOPS will always start with the number "1" unless you edit the "starting with sheet" field with a different number. You have the option to turn this feature on or off.

Ignore all Blank Lines:

By turning this feature on, TOPS will completely ignore all blank lines in your file. Normally, to get the largest font possible, you should turn this setting on.

Show Example on Startup:

If you don't want TOPS to automatically show the example file each time you start TOPS, turn this item off. Once you understand how this program works, you will no longer need to see the example file each time you run TOPS.

Show Logo on Startup

The Logo is the small window which appears for a few seconds just prior to the TOPS main window appearing. This same logo screen can be seen at any time by selecting About, then About again from the TOPS main menu.

Setup Auto Save:

TOPS (by default) will always write a file named "TOPS.OVL" into the same directory where TOPS is installed to on your disk drive. If, for some reason, you choose not to save your setups each time you quit the program, then turn this automatic feature off.


Page Layout
   Options - Page Layout

Choose your Print Style

Flat Styles:

Definition: Flat means that you do not intend to fold the printed sheets of paper which come out of your printer into a booklet.

Print or Fax from 1 to 256 pages per sheet in any combination up to 16 rows and 16 columns.

Booklet:

Print in standard booklet form, where 4 pages will be printed to each sheet of paper.

 Note: Printing more than 16 pages per sheet requires an output device of 1200-2450 dpi.


Font Selection
   Options - Font

TOPS will let you choose any Windows True-Type font you wish.

Below are samples of some of the fonts which come with Windows:

Arial

Times New Roman

Courier New

 Note: When spacing is critical -- use a Fixed Pitch font.

Courier New is the FIXED PITCH font which comes with Windows.

If you ever have trouble with the way your horizontal spacing looks

in TOPS, this font should repair the problem!

(notice how all of the characters in this paragraph line up!)

 Note: DOS OEM Line Drawing characters:

Some older DOS text files make use of the DOS Line-Drawing character set. There is a truetype font called "linedraw.ttf" which works perfectly for these files. It is the same as Courier New, but the upper characters contain the line drawing characters instead of the ANSI european characters. This font is available from CompuServe or AOL. It is also available for free downloading from our BBS.

Filename: linedraw.ttf, ETS Support BBS - (801) 265-0919 - (801) 265-2496.


Sheet Margins
   Options - Sheet Margins

You can set the blank space around the edges of your printed sheets of paper.

Minimum =.25 inches --  Maximum = 2.00 inches in each edit field.

Please enter your margins in inches. The program does not support metric or pixel entry fields, since this dialog is rather less used.

The edit fields in the dialog boxes will only accept numbers and periods.

HINT: Sometimes setting the margins to a lower amount than you are normally used to will result in a more readable font. When printing reduced, you have to pay more attention to the things which will give you the largest font possible!

FAX HINT: If you are planning to FAX your document from TOPS, set all of the margins to .25 (1/4 inch), since this will yield a better looking received fax.

 Note: Laser printers do not have the ability to print closer than one quarter of an inch from the edge of a sheet of paper. That is why .25 inches is the lowest number allowed here.

 Note: Some Ink Jet and Bubble Jet printers cannot print in the bottom 3/4 inch of a sheet of paper. These users may have to set their bottom margins to .750 inches.


Q - can't find my file.
I can't find my file:

This is a very common problem for you people who are new to computers.

These questions may spark your memory...

 1 - Have you created a file?

 2 - Do you know what name you gave it?

 3 - Do you know what disk drive it is on?

 4 - Do you know which directory it was placed in?

 5 - Do you know which subdirectory (if any) it was placed in?

I cannot help you answer these questions... but you can look

in the Help topic "File - Open" to find out how to go look for

your file!


Text Margins
  Options - Text Margins

Purpose: To get the largest (most readable) font, you need to eliminate as many blank lines and spaces from your text file as possible. TOPS automatically ignores as many blank lines and spaces as possible, and gives you the option to override the built-in margin eliminators.

Text Margins: Defined here as the blank spaces (whitespace) surrounding the printable text in each page of your text file.

Left Margin Elimination

Ignore Blank Characters on Left: TOPS will scan the entire file, looking for the smallest count of blank characters before any blackspace characters are found on a line. These "blank left margin" characters should be thrown away, because doing so yields the largest possible font. The default is "Ignore" blank characters on the left.

Keep Left Margins: You can force TOPS to keep blank characters on the left, he will not mind. You may need to do this sometimes if your font is too wide, and you need to squish it in horizontally.

Top Margin Elimination

Ignore Blank Lines on Top: TOPS will scan the entire file, looking for the smallest count of blank lines before any printable lines are found in a file. These "blank lines on top" should be thrown away, because doing so yields the largest possible font. This choice is on by default.

Keep Top Margins: You can force TOPS to keep blank lines on top. You may need to do this if your font is too tall. This could help make the font shorter.

Ignore Top (n) Lines: You can force TOPS to ignore the first (count) lines on each page, regardless of their contents. This is useful for eliminating headers, page numbers, etc.

Right Margin Elimination

Ignore Blank Characters on Right: Normally, text files don't have any spaces after the words at the end of a line, but I have seen some programs commit this... Normally, leave this set to "Ignore".

Keep Right Margins: Again, you can keep the blanks at the end of a line. Exception: If Clip Long Lines is set in the Misc Setups menu, that setting will override this one.

Bottom Margin Elimination

Ignore Blank Lines on Bottom: TOPS scans the entire file, and finds out how many blank lines are always at the bottom of each page. He then ignores those lines, by default. This helps yield the largest possible font.

Keep Bottom Margins: You can force TOPS to use all blank lines at the bottom of each page. This would be useful if you ever need to make the font shorter.

Ignore Bottom (n) lines: You can force TOPS to always ignore the last (count) lines on each page. This is useful for clipping off footers, page numbers, or whatever you don't want.


Border Styles
   Options - Border Styles

Borders: Defined as the black rectangle drawn around reduced pages on the sheet of paper. You will notice that this dialog contains little pictures of each border style to demonstrate the desired output.

Shadows: Defined as the Thick, Dark lines drawn on the Right and Bottoms of each Border. The Shadows are intended to make your output look more attractive, and give a 3-D look.

HINT: Click the mouse on the little check box below each picture.

Clicking the mouse on the little pictures will not change your selection.


Recall / Save Setups
  Options - Recall / Save Setups

Recall a Setup:

Loads one of the 20 setups into memory, all defaults will change to this new setup.

Save Current Setup:

Causes TOPS to write his setup file (TOPS.OVL) to disk immediately.

Copy Current Setup:

Makes a duplicate copy of your current settings into another setup.

Rename Current Setup:

Allows you to enter a personalized text string which will help you remember what this setup is used for.

Reset Current Setup to Default:

Resets the current setup to the factory default settings. These are the same settings which were in effect when you ran TOPS for the very first time.

HINT: If you use TOPS to FAX  from time to time, you might want to create a special setup called "Fax Setup" (or something more clever) that has all of the Sheet Margins set to .25 inches. (looks great when faxing, but sort of weird on paper printers).

TECHNICAL INFORMATION:

TOPS stores his setups in an overlay file named TOPS.OVL every time you exit the program. When you run TOPS for the very first time, he looks for the file TOPS.OVL in the directory where TOPS is installed. If he does not find the .OVL file, he will create a fresh default overlay file. The file is in binary format, and contains a header followed by 20 binary images of the TOPS setups. Do not attempt to edit this file. If this file becomes corrupted somehow, TOPS could behave very badly, and you may have to delete this file to force TOPS to behave properly again.


Change Window Looks
   Options - Change Window Looks

Background Color: The color that TOPS uses to paint

the client area of his main window.

Hint: Blue is beautiful.

Background Shade: Solid or Blended.

Hint: Blended is both fun and beautiful.

Dialog Styles: There are currently four

dialog styles to choose from.

Custom #2 is default.

#0	#1	#2	#3


blackspace
blackspace: any character, which when printed, that produces at least 1 black dot on a piece of paper. The line you are reading right now contains blackspace.

Note: blank lines, space characters and carriage returns produce no "blackspace" whatsoever.


Customer Support
If you need to call TOPS Customer Support:

1 - Please be running TOPS when you call.

2 - Load the file which is giving you trouble into TOPS.

3 - Please have a specific question prepared.

4 - Faxing a problem sample before calling helps a lot!

(A Cover Page is not necessary when Faxing)

ETS Customer Support	(801) 265-2490	8am-3pm MST

FAX	(801) 265-8921

 Support Hours are 8am to 3pm Mountain Standard Time.


Other Products
ETS is usually busy developing new software programs.

The programs listed below were designed over the period from 1992-1995.

Please call Toll Free 800-387-7003 for more information on any of our products.

For DOS:

Court Reporter Pro - Transcript Condensing	$99.95

Court Reporter Index - Transcript Indexing	$99.95

Laser Printer Envelope - Envelope Addressing	$29.95

SKIP - Label Printing/Addressing	$10.00

CASEY - Calendars the Easy Way	$10.00

For WINDOWS:

ProTEXT - Transcript Condensing	$249.95

ProDEX - Transcript Indexing	$149.95

TOPS - Text Output Paper Saver	$  39.95

ArTEL - Artistic Envelopes and Labels	 .. future


Page Breaks

page breaks: technically defined as the ascii character 12, a page break character is placed on a line by itself after the very last line on each page in a document. The page break is the single most important formatting character in a document, because it communicates to computers that "this page has ended, start a new page now". TOPS relies heavily on page breaks to know where the pages in your document start and stop.

Example: Page Breaks look like this in your ascii text file...

 Note: page breaks are sometimes called "form feeds".


Phone Numbers
Toll Free ORDERS	8am - 6pm 800-387-7003

Outside USA	8am - 6pm 801-265-2497

SUPPORT	8am - 3pm 801-265-2490

(Please Note: TOPS does not have toll free support)

FAX	801-265-8921

BBS	801-265-0919 	Hi Speed modems

801-265-2496	Hi Speed modems

Our BBS (Bulletin Board) is FREE to all callers, and contains

the latest Free and Registered versions of all ETS software.

If you want to know if there is a newer version of this program,

call the BBS (via modem) any time, and look in the File areas

for the latest version, then Download the program if you wish!


  What TOPS is all about

TOPS is a specialized ascii text file printing program.

While just about any program can print text files full size, TOPS can print or fax up to 256 pages on one sheet of paper, giving a tremendous advantage in paper saving! TOPS was designed to read your ascii text file, then print your file to paper or fax.

 Note: You will normally need a high resolution print device to print much beyond 16 per sheet, such as a Linotronic or other rather expensive photo printer or photo plotter.

 Note: TOPS will work well with any properly formatted ascii text file. TOPS cannot print files which are not in ascii text format.


using TOPS to print a document
Before printing your document using TOPS, you must have first created your document using another program, and saved your document as an ascii-text file.

 Note: TOPS does not create or edit documents, it's only purpose is to print the documents you have created.


 About your File

This window displays information about:

a - The first six pages in your file.

b - The last two pages in your file.

This information can be used to see if the pages in your ascii text file pages are evenly paginated.

TOPS will normally produce a better output if all of the pages contain approximately the same number of lines.


Printing your File
  File - Print

  Print to FILE

  Number of Copies

  Collated Copies

  Print Range

  Change Sides

  HP II and III Laser Compatible Fast Printing


Printer Setup
    File - Printer Setup

Use this common Windows Dialog to choose the print device that you will be printing on. This menu is called a Common Windows Dialog because it is common to most all Windows programs. You may already be familiar with this dialog because most Windows programs use this very same dialog for selecting printers.


File Open
  File - Open

Finding your file can be the most difficult task of all to new users.

All Windows programs use a method similar to this for finding files on disk...

How to use this particular HELP Topic.

  1 - Move the mouse over the items in the picture below.

  2 - If a little "Hand" cursor appears, press the Left Mouse button

       to get specific help with that particular item.


Print to FILE
Print to File: from the File - Print dialog, checking this box forces the Windows Print Manager to send the document to a binary file on disk, rather than to your print device. You may choose any filename you wish for the newly created file, but you should normally give these files an extension of .BIN (meaning: binary). The binary file created could later be copied directly to the print device from DOS. Example: C:\COPY MYJOB.BIN LPT1:[enter]. This file cannot be copied to a fax driver, only to normal printers. The file must have also been created using the driver for the intended destination printer.


Number of Copies
Number of Copies: accessible from the File - Print dialog, allows you to select how many copies you want to print. Some print devices (such as faxes and dot-matrix printers) do not support multiple copies. Laser Printers normally support multiple copies.


Collated Copies
Collated Copies: When printing more than 1 copy of a document, this option will put all of the pages of each complete document in the proper order. This option will usually take a lot longer to print, since the computer has to download each sheet image data for each copy.


Print Range
Print Range: Accessible from the File - Print dialog, allows you to print any range of sheets throughout the document.

Example:


Printing Both Sides
   Print - One or Both Sides

One Side Only:

Used when you intend to print on only one side of your paper. Remember that a lot of print devices can only print on one side, such as Fax drivers and dot-matrix printers.

Both Sides:

Print Front Sides and Stop:

TOPS will print all of the front sides of your 2-sided job, then stop. You will then be required to wait for the Print Manager to finish sending the job to your printer, and place the paper back into the paper tray in your printer. After you have done this, you will need to select this dialog again, but this time: print all of the Back Sides.

Print Back Sides and Stop:

This is usually the 2nd step after printing all of the front sides of your job. After following the steps above, TOPS will ask you if you want to print from sheet 1 or the last sheet in your job. You will have to be the judge here, and notice whether the back side of the first sheet printed during the first pass will be the first sheet printed again, or the last sheet printed previously will be the first sheet printed on the second pass. The computer cannot decide this automatically, it's up to you!

Duplexing Printer:

Duplexing printers have the ability to print on both sides of a sheet of paper. They are usually much more expensive, and print both sides beautifully. If you have a duplexing printer, and want to print both sides, select this option.

Disclaimer: Both Sided printing is not recommended for non-duplexing (simplex) laser printers. If you choose to print on both sides, you will do it at your own risk. While many people who live in dry climates can get away with it, people in the southeastern USA can rarely print their back sides without smudging. There is no sure fix for this, humidity can really ruin the back sides of your print job! The only thing you can try is to switch to a paper which has a higher cotton content.


Address
Our Mailing Address:

ETS Inc.

1115 East Brigadoon Court

Salt Lake City, UT  84117-4969


Q - File has no Page Breaks
My File has no embedded Page Breaks.

This can be a real problem for the following reasons:

 1 - Without Page Breaks, the computer must guess where pages start and stop, and computers are not very good guessers.

 2 - TOPS can simulate Page Breaks every (n) lines, but needs your help to determine what number to type for (n).

Solution:

 You can use a program called "Write" which came with Windows to add Page Breaks to documents. I didn't say it was easy, I said you can. Write is located in "Accessories", and it's logo has a picture of a pen and an "A" in it. If you load your text file into Write, select "No Conversion". To create a Page Break in Write, position the cursor to where you want a break, then press "Shift + Enter", and a row of dots will appear (Writes' way of saying "Page Break" here). If you use Write, do NOT be tempted to even think of changing the font. Repeat: do not change any fonts in your document. Ascii Text files do not have fonts built in to them, you will RUIN your file. You can edit all you want, and Save your file, but don't change any fonts.


Q - Print smearing on back side
The Printer is smearing when printing on the back sides:

We hear this all the time: The front sides look perfect, but there are gray smudges on the back sides!

Possible Solutions:

 1 - A duplex printer will not smear the backs as badly.

 2 - Use a paper with a higher cotton content.

 3 - If you are using Copy Bond paper, switch to laser printer paper.

 4 - Put your paper in the microwave on high for 2 minutes before printing side 1.

 5 - Keep your paper supply away from any humidity.

disclaimer: ETS Inc. does not recommend printing on both sides unless you are using a duplexing (more expensive) printer. Programs cannot send a command like "Smear Paper" to a printer. It is NOT the programs' fault. If you live in a dry climate, you can get away with both sides printing on simplex printers. If you live in the South (Fla, Ga, Ms, Tx, to name a few), good luck. The extra humidity will some days make it absolutely impossible to get good looking back sides. The longer the paper cools before printing side 2, the worse the problem becomes.


 Turn Paper Over

Background Info: You have (most likely) just finished printing all of the front sides of your document.

Your Goal: To put all of your printed sheets back into the printer tray to prepare to print all of the back sides.

How to Do It:

Step 1: Put your printed sheets of paper back into the paper tray of your printer. Make sure to place the stack so that blank sides will be the next to receive the ink. Header always goes toward the printer, footer side always goes away from the printer.

Step 2: Before putting the paper tray back in the printer, look at the sheet on top. Is this the back side of Sheet 1, or the back side of the Final Sheet?

Step 3: The next dialog will ask you for the information you remembered from Step 2 (above).

TOPS can print Side 2 normal (Sheet 1 backs get printed first) or reversed (Back of Last Sheet gets printed first) order.

See Also: Printing Both Sides

 Note: It is ridiculous to use this feature on Dot-Matrix and Fax print devices. Please don't call our customer support with complaints that your Dot-Matrix printer prints poorly when printing the back sides.

 Disclaimer: Both Sided printing is not recommended for non-duplexing (simplex) laser printers. If you choose to print on both sides, you will do it at your own risk. While many people who live in dry climates can get away with it, people in the southeastern USA can rarely print their back sides without smudging. There is no sure fix for this, humidity can really ruin the back sides of your print job! The only thing you can try is to switch to a paper which has a higher cotton content.


HP4_Old_Driver_Warning
HP4 Old Driver Warning

The old versions of the LaserJet 4 printer driver will cause my fonts to print too wide. The words will not fit inside the panels when printing. The Screen Preview will look fine, but the Hard Copy will look terrible.

If you own an HP Laser Jet 4 (any style) you must use the HP Driver Version 31.V1.50 or newer.

The older versions of this HP Driver do not allow this program to calculate font widths properly.

To find out which version you have now:

1 - Go to Printer Setup

2 - Select your HP4 Printer, then select the Options button.

3 - Select the About button.

To obtain the new driver from CompuServe:

Go to the HPPER forum, look under the HP4 section

To obtain the new driver from HP, contact:

Hewlett-Packard Driver Distribution Center

Voice: (303) 339-7009  Monday thru Saturday 24hrs

Fax: (303) 330-7655

To obtain the new driver from the HP BBS download service:

Modem: (208) 344-1691

 Note: These HP services are free.


Twenty Setups

TOPS has the ability to save and recall up to twenty setups. You have the ability to customize setups for a particular application, then save that setup under a unique name.

See Also: Recall / Save Setups


Setup Name
Options - Recall/Save Setup - Setup Name

You may type in a description for this Setup.

The following examples may inspire you:

Example: "Bills FAX setup"

Example: "Johns Favorite 4 column"

Example: "Bubble-Jet setup"

Example: "My normal setup"

Example: "HP4MV 128 pages"


 Ordering TOPS

TOPS can be purchased for $39.95.

Regular Shipping and Handling is FREE.

Outside USA - add $5.00

FedEX Shipping - add $10.00.

You are entitled to an immediate Unlock after you place your order!

(If you send a check, you must wait until we receive the check...)

All Orders are Shipped the Same Day Received.

Note: TOPS does not come with a printed manual (at this time: March 1995). Should a manual be printed for TOPS in the future, it will be sent to you at no charge. The manual would be a printed version of the HELP Topics.

Note: Remember, You can FAX this order form directly by selecting your FAXModem as the print device from Windows! Our FAX Number is: (801) 265-8921.

See Also: Copyright Notice


 Copyright Notice

TOPS comes in two flavors:

The Demo copy you can give to others:

The version which prints the TOPS logo at the bottom of each sheet is called a Shareware copy. This is for evaluation only, and may be freely distributed to any person or electronic media with no restrictions whatsoever.

The Purchased copy you cannot give to others:

The version which has been purchased from ETS Inc. (does not print the logo at the bottom of each sheet) is called a Registered copy. This version carries a strict restriction.

1 - Only YOU can use it. You can install it on YOUR own personal computers.

2 - You cannot allow others to copy or "borrow a copy" of it.

 It is a federal offense to copy software that is protected under the copyright laws (17 USC 106). Penalty for this offense is a fine up to $250,000 and imprisonment for not more than five years depending on the severity of the violation (18 USC 2319). To identify and help in prosecuting violations, the Software Publishers Association has established a toll-free number (1-800-399-PIR8) to report copyright violations.


 Booklet

Use the Booklet layout to create little booklets. Booklets should be printed on both sides of the paper, assembled, folded and stapled down the middle.

Orientation:

Portrait - Produces a Tall and Narrow Booklet.

Landscape - Produces a Normal Sized Booklet.

Note: If you are not sure which orientation to use -- choose Landscape; which is the normal orientation for booklets.

 Note: This setting overrides any orientation setting in your Printer Setup menu.


Slow Screen Painting
Slow Screen Painting:

If you want to make the screen re-paint faster:

1 - Select: File, then Print Preview from the main menu.

2 - Select Approximate Image.

TOPS has 2 Screen Painting modes:

Approximate: Your Screen image will be harder to read, but will repaint much faster.

Exact - When Zoomed in all the way, your screen image will be an exact copy of your printer image. This takes longer to draw, because it takes about four times as much calculating to draw this image.

See Also: Print Preview


Turning Off Screen Preview
Turning Off Screen Preview:

Method 1: Click the Left Mouse Button on the minus sign in the upper left corner of the Zoom Tool Window.

Method 2: Press ESCape on your keyboard.

Turning off the screen preview will allow you to make changes to your setups without having to wait for the screen to redraw each time.

To Turn the Screen Preview back ON:

Select File, then Print Preview from the main menu.

 Note: The Print Preview will always be re-created after any new file is opened (from the File - Open menu).


Obtaining Line Drawing Characters

If your ascii text file contains the DOS-style Line Drawing characters instead of the European character set, you will need to obtain a TrueType font which contains these characters. You can search for these fonts on Compuserve or AOL. Keywords may be Line Draw or Symbol Font.

One such font is available FREE on the ETS Customer Support BBS:

ETS BBS (801)265-0919 -or- (801)265-2496

The Filename is: LINEDRAW.TTF


Printing is too slow

Method 1:

For HP II and III Compatible Laser Printers Only:

1 - Select the File - Print dialog from the Main Menu.

2 - Select [image] from the dialog.

Method 2:

To Change your Print Speed in Windows:

1 - Go to Main in Program Manager.

2 - Run Print Manager (see example below).

3 - Select Options - High Priority.

Method 3:

There are many programs on the market which will make Windows print faster. These programs are called Print Accelerators. You should be able to purchase one of these programs at your local computer store for under $50.


Fast Printing to HP Compatibles
 Faster Printing

Fast Printing to HP II and III Compatible Laser Printers

Applies to: all HP II and III compatible laser printers, such as HP, Panasonic, IBM (Lexmark), Okidata, Brother, Texas Instruments, etc.

For HP II and III Compatible Laser Printers Only:

1 - Select the File - Print dialog from the Main Menu.

2 - Select [image] from the dialog.

This program has the ability to send "smart" line drawing commands to your currently installed Windows Laser Printer driver, which bypass the Windows internal GDI Rasterizer. All HP II and HP III compatible laser printers have the ability to accept line drawing commands directly from Windows. By using these special commands, Windows will only have to send 10% (one tenth) as much print data to the printer -- resulting in a vast print speed improvement -- (about ten times faster!).

If your printer is an HP II or III compatible laser printer, you should turn this option on. If you leave this option enabled for non-laser printer drivers, don't worry -- this program will automatically test your current Windows driver to see if it supports fast printing, then adjust accordingly.

 Note: Windows prints all textual items to the printer very rapidly. It is only the vertical and horizontal lines in the borders which cause slow printing. The fast printing option causes the program to use your laser printers ability to draw black lines, as opposed to Windows raster drawing commands that send lines as bitmapped images.

 Note: This option dramatically increases the speed at which the borders are drawn to your laser printer. If, you discover that this option causes no borders to be printed to your printer, it means that your printer driver does not support this option. If the borders are not being printed, then you will have to turn this option off.

 Note: This option will only have a minimal speed improvement for HP 4 or newer laser printers. These drivers use a similar technique to speed up line drawing. You will only improve print speed by about 10%.

 Note: This option has no meaning when running under Windows 95.