mptool - a Gtk+ window-based front-end to the mp POSTSCRIPT pretty printer program.

The mptool program has virtually the same command line options as the mp program. See those manual pages for more details.

The additional mptool options are:

[ -tooltips ]

The mp program is used to pretty print mail, news articles or ordinary text files. There are now lots of command line options to mp which can be used to setup various options to change the way the text is output. These are not always easy to remember. The mptool program is provided as a simpler means of setting these options and thereby making it easier to print your files in the desired format.

It is also possible to select text in another Gtk+ application, and drag and drop that text over the mptool open window, and it will be automatically printed out using the current settings.

The mptool program has virtually the same command line options as the mp program. See those manual pages for more details. The additional mptool options are:

-tooltips

Enable Gtk+ help tooltips. By default, tooltips will be disabled.

On startup, mptool look for various X resources which by default are stored in $HOME/.mpdefaults. Note these resource names will be prepended with mptool. Virtually all of these X resources are described in the mp manual pages. The additional mptool resources are:

Resource: tooltips

Values:

True, False (False)

Description

If set to true Gtk+ help tooltips are enabled.

mptool operates via a set of graphical items both in the main window and the various option sheets. Tooltip help on the various options can be enabled (or disabled if already enabled), via the Help keyboard key. Commonly used operations are easily accessable via options in the main window; the remainder are on the option sheets. Each option equates to an mp command line option. This section gives the match up between these graphical options and the equivalent mp command line option. Refer to the mp manuals pages for more details on each option.

Filenames:

The file(s) to be printed.

Input type:

Nothing, "-news", "-postscript" or "-text", depending upon the setting.

Output type:

Nothing, "-landscape" or an Organiser type (see below).

Organiser:

"-filofax", "-franklin", "-proplan", "-timeman", "-tsintl" or "-tspartner" depending upon the organiser type selected.

Paper Size:

Nothing, "-a4" or "-us".

Subject:

Nothing or "-subject <subject>".

Copies:

"-copies #".

Number of Sides:

Nothing or "-duplex".

Clicking on the Print button causes mptool to execute an mp job with the various command line settings. Clicking on the Reset button will reset all the options to their default values.

Note that the Filename: field can contain multiple filenames. These should be separated by spaces. If any of the filenames contain a space character, then this filename needs to be quoted.

There are various option property windows. The Header options window contains the following options:

Print all headers:

"-allhdrs".

Headers to Print:

"-addhdr <header>" or "-remhdr <header>" depending upon whether the header is a new one added by the user, or a default one that was removed from the initial list.

The Input options window contains the following options:

Prologue Name:

nothing or "-prologue <name>".

Mail folder

Nothing or "-folder".

Mail digest

Nothing or "-digest".

Elm mail file:

nothing or "-elm".

Use From header:

nothing or "-from".

Use Content-Length: field:

nothing or "-content".

Use file last modification time:

nothing or "-modtime".

The Output options window contains the following options:

Printer Name:

"-printer" or "-printer <name> depending upon whether a printer name was given.

Line Length:

"-linelength #".

Page Length:

"-pagelength #".

Output to BSD printer system:

"-bsdprint".

The Printing options window contains the following options:

Columns per Page:

"-columns #".

Spaces per Tab Character:

"-tab #".

Margins:

"-top #", "-left #", "-bottom #" and "-right #".

Print header page

Nothing or "-banner".

Wrap words onto next line of output:

nothing or "-wrap".

Flip banner headings:

nothing or "-flip".

Force new page:

nothing or "-forcepage".

Number each line of output:

nothing or "-number".

Adjust reverse page for duplex printing

nothing or "-tumble".

The User Name options window contains the following options:

Alias Name:

"-alias name".

Characters in User Name:

"-chars #".

Words in User Name:

"-words #".

These options will only be applyed if you click on the Apply button on the appropriate options sheet. Clicking on the Reset button on that property sheet, resets those property sheet values back to their default values. Clicking on the Save as Defaults option in the Options menu, causes all the current option sheet settings to be the defaults the next time mptool is started.

The default output printer is determined by looking at the. PRINTER environment variable for BSD systems or the LPDEST environment variable for System V systems.

An alternative file containing the mptool X resources can be given with the MPDEFAULTS environment variable.

$HOME/.mpdefaults

X resource initialisation file.

BINDIR/mptool

executable

mp(1), lp(1), lpr(1)

Rich Burridge. MAIL: Rich.Burridge@Sun.Com