28 May
2009
28 May
'09
11:30 a.m.
While reading :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
- John
28 May
28 May
2:09 p.m.
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a
typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Not sure exactly, but:
Epson dot matrix printers used to advertise "logic seeking" and
"bi-directional printing". They reversed the lines internally, but an
older printer with no buffer might expect to be fed lines alternating
forward and reverse, so it could print them in proper order when the
head alternated forward and reverse on successive lines.
De
4:48 p.m.
At 05:09 PM 5/28/2009 -0400, you wrote:
In approximately 1980, I read the command set manual for the Diablo 630
(620?) daisy-wheel printer. I noted with interest the command to cause it
to print right-to-left. Hmm, I thought, if it CAN do that, then it SHOULD
do that. So I wrote a driver for VMS for it. I had a little help on the
driver complexities. Darned if analyzing line lengths and figuring out
whether to seek to the left margin or swing out to the right and print
backward wasn't hellacious.
-T
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I found "Sometimes computer printers with a
typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Not sure exactly, but:
Epson dot matrix printers used to advertise "logic seeking" and
"bi-directional printing". They reversed the lines internally, but an
older printer with no buffer might expect to be fed lines alternating
forward and reverse, so it could print them in proper order when the
head alternated forward and reverse on successive lines. 
2:26 p.m.
On 28 May 2009 at 13:30, John Foust wrote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Just about any of the old daisywheels or dot matrix printers. George
Comstock (of Diablo) first acquainted me with the word
"boustrophedonic"--"plowing like an ox" many years ago.
--Chuck
2:41 p.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 28 May 2009 at 13:30, John Foust wrote:
I've seen it happen on daisywheels, but I don't even understand how it
would be possible to happen on a dot-matrix printer. Can you describe
what the output looks like?
Peace... Sridhar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Just about any of the old daisywheels or dot matrix printers. George
Comstock (of Diablo) first acquainted me with the word
"boustrophedonic"--"plowing like an ox" many years ago.
3:04 p.m.
On 28 May 2009 at 17:41, Sridhar Ayengar wrote:
I've seen it happen on daisywheels, but I
don't even understand how it
would be possible to happen on a dot-matrix printer. Can you describe
what the output looks like?
Maybe I should shoot a video of one operating. Basically, the head
moves left-to-right when printing the first line and buffers up the
second line. Discarding leading and trailing spaces, the processor
that controls the printer decides if it would be faster to print the
next line right-to-left or left-to-right, based on the position of
where the printhead came to rest when the previous line was printed.
Multipass NLQ dot-matrix printers were always bi-directional ( print
a bunch of dots in one pass and then print on the same line but
offset by a tiny horizontal amount).
The first printer that I ever owned was a Diablo Hitype I with the
OEM 12-bit interface connected to a Processor Tech S100 parallel I/O
card. It was about three monts before I figured out that I could
save a lot of time by printing bidirectionally instead of printing
Teletype-style.
Chuck
5:55 p.m.
At 04:26 PM 5/28/2009, Chuck Guzis wrote:
On 28 May 2009 at 13:30, John Foust wrote:
OK, I'll bite. What would be set wrongly to make it do this?
I'm not talking about a printer that can print on the return to
to the left... The Wikipedia article makes it sound like the
text prints "backwards" on every other line.
- John
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Just about any of the old daisywheels or dot matrix printers. George
Comstock (of Diablo) first acquainted me with the word
"boustrophedonic"--"plowing like an ox" many years ago. 
6:12 p.m.
John Foust wrote:
At 04:26 PM 5/28/2009, Chuck Guzis wrote:
I suspect because daisywheel printers had such terms in their technical
vocabulary that is why they are so rarely seen today :-)
I also had a lot of trouble with the daisy wheel other such moving head
printers having problems with platen positioning and running the head
into the platten, hence damaging the paper due to the fact one could
loosen the platen for positioning.
Once the norm was just tractor wheel feed, that pretty much became a
thing of the past.
Jim
On 28 May 2009 at 13:30, John Foust wrote:
OK, I'll bite. What would be set wrongly to make it do this?
I'm not talking about a printer that can print on the return to
to the left... The Wikipedia article makes it sound like the
text prints "backwards" on every other line.
- John
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Just about any of the old daisywheels or dot matrix printers. George
Comstock (of Diablo) first acquainted me with the word
"boustrophedonic"--"plowing like an ox" many years ago.
6:21 p.m.
On 28 May 2009 at 19:55, John Foust wrote:
I'm not talking about a printer that can print on
the return to
to the left... The Wikipedia article makes it sound like the
text prints "backwards" on every other line.
Perhaps, but I don't think that's what was intended. As cool a word
as "boustrophodonic" is, I think "bidirectional" is more accurate,
implying nothing more than a change in direction.
I think George wanted to convey the idea of the printhead moving back
and forth like an ox plowing, without reference to the directionality
of the text being printed itself.
On the other hand, I suppose one could print English and Arabic in an
interlinear fashion, but changing typewheels would drive you nuts. :)
--Chuck
8:59 p.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
Perhaps, but I don't think that's what was
intended. As cool a word
as "boustrophodonic" is, I think "bidirectional" is more accurate,
implying nothing more than a change in direction.
My interpretation of the claim was that under certain conditions
(firmware bug? misconfiguration?),
it would get out of sync and actual print text in the reverse character
sequence of what was intended. I've never seen this happen, but it's
easy to imagine it being the result of a firmware bug.
Eric
29 May
29 May
4:49 a.m.
On the other hand, I suppose one could print English
and Arabic in an
interlinear fashion, but changing typewheels would drive you nuts. :)
Gulf Data sold Vector Graphic systems with bilingual English/Arabic
Memorite word processing in the Middle East. The common printer was the
Qume Sprint 3 daisywheel. This setup could print bilingually on the
same line, but I'm sure changing the wheels would have driven you nuts
if you did lots of that.
De
10:26 a.m.
While reading :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon
I found "Sometimes computer printers with a typewriter-like
moving type head print boustrophedon if set up wrongly."
Which old printers might've done that?
Hmmm.. Many dot matrix printers (impact and injet) print bidirectionally,
but I've never come across one (no matter how old) that didn't buffer the
data intenrally, so the host sent the characters in left-to-right order
for all line,s and the printer put them on the paper in the appropriate way.
I can imaging a firmware problem in the printer could cause it to print
some lines backwards (but wouldn't it also print the chracters left-right
reversed, which is not strictly boustrophedon?), but that's a fault I've
never seen.
-tony
4:40 p.m.
Tony Duell wrote:
I can imaging a firmware problem in the printer could
cause it to print
some lines backwards (but wouldn't it also print the chracters left-right
reversed, which is not strictly boustrophedon?),
Depends on where in the firmware
the bug is.
And of course for other printer technologies (e.g. daisy wheel), it's
generally not possible to reverse the individual characters.
but that's a fault I've never seen.
Me either.
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