International Business Machines Corporation

Jesus C Lopez

David E Finlay

Stephen Dale Hanna

Ruben Dominguez, Jr

David C Stevenson

Donald W Zegafuse, Jr, Deceased

Thomas S Mereness

A character generator with multidirectional scan and variable line and character (or symbol) size capability is disclosed. Universality is implemented by producing a serial binary stream which can be used to print or display in any of eight combinations of scan direction and progression, that is, for scan direction left to right, or vice versa, progressing up or down, or scan direction top or bottom or vice versa, progressing left or right. In formatting the serial binary stream, a font is accessed (for basic symbol definition), which selectively provides for orthogonal scan of the symbol definitions. Variable line size is implemented by terminating a symbol row (or line) based on a predetermined size criteria regardless of the comparable font dimension and 'filling' up to the line size to the extent the corresponding font dimension is less than the predetermined size criteria. Variable character (or symbol) size is implemented by independently multiplying the effect of a symbol definition by selected (integral) factors, in orthogonal directions. The general architecture includes a font table (for symbol definition), an address/escape (A/E) table, defining symbol size for comparison with line size parameters, a character position escape (CPE) table to define a leading character or symbol on each line and a page buffer (PB) memory defining the characters (symbols) in the document and their relationship with other characters (symbols). Access to the CPE table allows access to the PB, from there to the A/E table and from there to the font allows extraction of selected and appropriate portions of the symbol definition to make up the binary system.

Multidirectional scan and print capability

The invention provides a printer with a capability of printing in any one of a plurality of rotations. Component image data is stored in a library. The component image data is subdivided into data sets or quads. The size of a quad is selected so that it can be readily rotated with simple hardware. As the data sets are written to a buffer, they are rotated, and the locations in the buffer at which the different data sets are written depends on the selected rotation, to provide for data rotation 'on the fly'.

Method and apparatus for improved printing in a selected orientation

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Longmont, CO, United States of America

Jesus C Lopez