Subject: OPI Server ready

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2001 18:17:19 +0100

Hello,

some two years ago I announced that we will develop an OPI server which
then will be offered under the GPL.

Now it's ready. And it's an Open Project.

If someone is interested in, she/he can read something about it on

http://opi3.ebios.de

Yours,
Volker Birk
-- 
*** ebios Informationssysteme, Germany      ***   vb@kangu:~ $ cd /pub/
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---

From: "Daniel E. Lautenschleger" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2001 11:38:15 -0600 (CST)

What is OPI?

-Dan

-- 

Daniel E. Lautenschleger
University of Wisconsin
R.M. Bock Laboratories
Network Administrator and Computer Support
[email-masked]

---

From: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2001 13:43:32 -0500

Good! Does it include utilities to make fpo images?

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 08:13:23 +0100

> What is OPI?

Read this page?

VB.

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 08:14:21 +0100

> Good! Does it include utilities to make fpo images?

What are fpo images?

VB.

---

From: Walt Reed <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2001 23:51:15 -0800

>On Mon, Feb 05, 2001 at 11:38:15AM -0600, Daniel E. Lautenschleger wrote:

obstructing potential integrators, maybe?

-w

---

From: "Bruce A. Burdick, Jr." <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2001 02:06:28 -0600

If I recall correctly, in the publishing industry an OPI server is one that
swaps high resolution images for low resolution images (often called "FPO"s
for "For Placement Only"). I guess the connection to netatalk is that Macs
have been big in publishing and a cheap Linux box with netatalk and a good
open source OPI server would make for an interesting bargain. I don't
remember what OPI stands for (Open Press Interface?).

-B...

> From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
> Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 08:14:21 +0100
> To: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
> Cc: "Volker Birk" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>
> Subject: Re: OPI Server ready
> Resent-From: [email-masked]
> Resent-Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 02:19:07 -0500 (EST)
>

---

From: Carsten Neumann <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 20:24:16 +0100

> >On Mon, Feb 05, 2001 at 11:38:15AM -0600, Daniel E. Lautenschleger wrote:

What page?

> obstructing potential integrators, maybe?

Obscene Pornographic Intercourse? ;-)

No:
Open Prepress Interface!

You have to dig a little harder to find it.
Also http://opi3.ebios.de gives no hint.

I found these docs:
http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/PDFS/TN/5660.OPI_2.0.pdf
http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/PDFS/TN/OPI_13.pdf

Regards

	Carsten

---

From: Chip Mefford <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2001 14:52:50 -0500

> Obscene Pornographic Intercourse? ;-)

No no no,

Obtuse Pencilnecked Interlocutor

---

From: "Bruce A. Burdick, Jr." <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2001 14:16:30 -0600

> From: Carsten Neumann <[email-masked]>
> Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 20:24:16 +0100
> 

[...]

> http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/PDFS/TN/OPI_13.pdf

Here's a quote from the second PDF:

"The Open Prepress Interface (OPI) is a collection of PostScript-language
comment conventions that allows a page-layout program to use low or medium
resolution TIFF images for layout and proofing, and have a prepress system
or OPI server automatically substitute a high resolution TIFF or other image
when the final film plates are generated. Both desktop prepress software and
high-end prepress systems can use OPI comments to minimize network traffic
and image storage requirements."

-B...

---

From: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 15:43:55 -0500

> > Good! Does it include utilities to make fpo images?

Sorry for not explaining. "fpo" stands for "for position only" and on
traditional opi systems it is a lower resolution version of the original
image. The fpo image can be used for placement on screen and is
sometimes able to be printed at the lower resolution. The opi server
removes the fpo and substitutes the full resolution image.

For those interested, here are some docs on adobe's site:

http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/pdfs/tn/5660.OPI_2.0.pdf

http://partners.adobe.com/asn/developer/pdfs/tn/OPI_13.pdf

Frank Morton
[email-masked]

---

From: Alex Alegado <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 08 Feb 2001 20:47:39 -0800

OPI is **THE** Holy Grail the print industry is looking for. The trade mags
mention Linux as a curiosity and of the few sites that use Linux, the stumbling
block to full deployment is the lack of a good OPI solution. Unless the site was
using it solely for file- and non-OPI print services, there's always the OPI
caveat mentioned in the articles. SIGH.

The leading solutions are either NT-based (ScenicSoft's "Color Central" or
IPTech's "CanOPI") or commercial Unix-based (Xinet's "FullPress" or Helios'
"EtherShare").

In principle, all it needs to be is a filter for a printer queue. The filter
would grep the PostScript stream and every time it sees an OPI "Comment" it
grabs the filename listed in the comment and substitutes the file for the
comment. Naturally, all kinds of intelligence needs to be built in to the filter
for validating the OPI comment and dealing with the potential for super-hairy
filenames which are, unfortunately, common on Macintosh volumes.

CanOPI from the list above does the file substitution on the fly while most of
the others (I'm not sure about FullPress) write a new (larger) file as the input
job is processed. CanOPI's method is slick since it minimizes diskspace
requirements on the OPI server and the read/write penalty.

On 2/6/01 at 2:06 AM, Bruce A. Burdick, Jr. <[email-masked]> wrote some
or all of the following...

--
==========================================================================
 Alex Alegado, [email-masked], 626.524.0624 Cel w/VMail 
   Prepress Supervisor, California Plasticard 
     213.742.9852 Voice, 213.742.0086 FAX, http://www.cpicardgroup.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
 the.ThoughtShop.net -- Low-cost web-hosting and design...
   Apache-based Miva, CGI, PHP, MySQL support
     [email-masked], http://the.ThoughtShop.net
==========================================================================

---

From: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 20:57:48 -0500

Anyone using the OPI Server by "Volker Birk" <[email-masked]> ?

Also, Volker Birk, can you give us an update on what  you know
about people using it, continuing development, etc.

Frank Morton
[email-masked]

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 08:14:20 +0200

> about people using it, continuing development, etc.

I don't know anything about users but the ones we have here as our
clients.

Further developement is garanteed - we also do a commercial edition,
like sendmail, with nice point-and-click interface. So even if nobody
else will help we will develop.

Now we are doing a Netatalk port to HP UX (Benjamin's speech: HP SUX ;-)

Benni is porting. The AFP over IP already runs, some problems with the
ressource forks left until now. And going on.

VB.
-- 
*** ebios Informationssysteme, Germany      ***  kangu:~ $ cd /pub/
*** Gut-Betha-Platz 1, 88339 Bad Waldsee    ***  kangu:/pub $ more beer
*** Phone +49-7524-93421 Fax +49-7524-93423 ***  Aaahhhh! That was good!
*** mailto:[email-masked]                      ***  kangu:/pub $ _

---

From: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 25 Nov 2001 21:54:45 -0500

> Volker Birk" <[email-masked]> wrote:
> Sent: Monday, February 05, 2001 12:17 PM
> Subject: OPI Server ready

Is anyone using this? Is work continuing on this or did it die?

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 08:39:28 +0100

> Is anyone using this? Is work continuing on this or did it die?

Yes, it's in productional use.

No, it will definitly NOT die.

VB.

---

From: gmac63 <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 06:29:25 -0500

> No, it will definitly NOT die.

Has anyone seen Xinet FullPress OPI solution. Its interesting, but has a few 
"gotchas". The Xinet solution has solved a few problems associated with OPI 
and might be of help to the OPI project. 

One of which is parsing images and storing them in an .HSAncillary file (or 
was it the .HSResource file?!?) Anyhow, TIFFs are TIFFs and EPSs are EPSs, 
etc. This came in handy when updating files from various programs such as 
Quark and PageMaker (Ughh). 

The FullPress solution (for those who don't know) accepts high res files (and 
any other files for that matter), parses them and stores the preview/OPI 
comments in a resource file (noted above). That resource file is published 
out as "<volume name> FPO" in AppleTalk. Oh yes, we have to assume we are 
publishing for Macs (netatalk and all ;), though an OPI solution that is 
cross platform would be a fantastic idea!

This "FPO" volume contains just the resource information as far as I can 
tell, and the OPI comments. The page file (Quark, PM, Illustratort, FreeHand, 
CorelDraw) links its high res images to that FPO volume. And since a Mac is 
generally "dumb" about high res vs. low res in this case, the files uipdate 
without incident. 

The OPI solution also contains an OPI server -- that which parses and 
replaces the low for high res. Once printed to the OPI server, the images are 
replaced as per the opi comments and sent to the appropriate spool/printer.

I only wish I had an .HSAncillary or .HSResource file to play with...

The only big problem I saw with FullPress is that, as opposed to netatalk, 
all resource fork info was stored in one file. Hence a great number of type1 
printer fonts would cause a very large .HSResource file. Trust me, I've done 
that....

Netatalk fortunately stores the resource in separate files, as I can remember.

Anyhow, I would love to see an OPI (re)placement for Linux other than Helios. 
Let me knwo if I can help.

-Wes Yates

---

From: "Frank Morton" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 07:30:29 -0500

> > Referring to the OPI Server at http://opi3.ebios.de
> > Is anyone using this?
> 

Is there documentation on setup anywhere for things
such as what an opi3.cfg file contains? How to create
FPOs? How to integrate with something like netatalk?

I have asked this same question a few times before
and the only response always relates to a commercial
opi package, so I guess people are not using it.

If your OPI Server works, it is of great value to many
people on this list, even if they don't know it. But, some
help getting us started will probably be required for
more people to use it.

Frank
[email-masked]

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 14:45:33 +0100

On Mon, Nov 26, 2001 at 07:30:29AM -0500, Frank Morton wrote:
> such as what an opi3.cfg file contains?

There is not much documentation until now - sorry.
We'll be better in the future - could someone help, please?

The settings for the config file are:

output=opi13|opi20|opimixed
        Version of OPI comments in the output file

linesep=cr|lf|crlf|lfcr
        line separation in the output file

replace=auto|manual
        if manual, ask user with wich files the pictures are to be
        replaced

log=<hostpath>
        path for log file opi3 writes to

data=hex|bin
        flag wether opi3 should output pictures in binary or as text

case=on|off
        flag wether opi3 should be case sensitive in file names

hires=<hostpath>
        path, where opi3 searches for the high res pictures (in host
        format)

lores=<clientpath>
        path where low res pictures were inserted from

> How to create
> FPOs?

What do you mean with "FPO"?

The low res pictures are automatically created by the scripts which you
can find on http://opi3.ebios.de also.

The scripts create the directory structure and for every picture in the
high res directory which is a TIFF file they create a low res picture in
the low res directory path at the same place.

> How to integrate with something like netatalk?

Opi3 just reads an input file and outputs an output file. So you could
create some named pipes to use it as an lpr filter. Have a look at the
sample scripts also, there is a solution for that.

Unfortunately it is only possible to use TIFF pictures with the existing
scripts (the reason is easy: the people who use it have such pictures).
And there is only less documentation until now.

> opi package, so I guess people are not using it.

Oh? I never received such a message from you, I'm sorry.
The commercial OPI package is not ready until now, so this information
is not correct. Where did you get the response from?

It is right, that (like with sendmail) we're planning to offer a
commercial package with Installer, GUI and so on. The opi3 software
itself will remain GPL. I think, if someone uses GPLed software, she/he
should be able to install and script little things for herself/himself.
If someone says: "I only want to press SETUP and then it has to work and
I want a phone number to call if something does not work and I want a
GUI to deal with everything", for these people we will offer the
commercial version.

The server software of the commercial release will be exactly the same
you can find on http://opi3.ebios.de, precompiled and additionally the
source code (necessary for a GPLed software).

Only the SETUP, the GUI and the hotline will be commercial.

> help getting us started will probably be required for

That's the truth, of course. And netatalk was the reason for us to do
opi3 and to offer it under GPL. But: we only have less time to work on it
and we hope that probably someone will join in to improve the scripts
and documentation.

I could offer other things, too. We're porting netatalk to HP UX. The
afpd works already with Apple Share IP. The DDP kernel work is not
ready. If someone is interested, I will post more information here.

Unfortunately our amount of time to do such things is very
small, so I hope that someone else will be interested in porting
netatalk to HP UX also. We're working on that furthermore.

VB.

---

From: Thomas Kaiser <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 22:17:48 +0100

> What do you mean with "FPO"?

That's Xinet slang for lowres images: FPO --> 'for placement only'

> the low res directory path at the same place.

So you do it almost the same way as Xinet does. But they store the lowres
image inside the same file they store the highres' resource fork. The
'lowres volume' you can mount on the mac just does some magic to let you
believe it's a separate volume. In fact, it's just another view on the same
files. Nice in some situations: If you delete, rename or move a highres
image, the lowres will do the same (btw: almost all this you can do with
Helios too, if you're familiar enough with it ;-)

> sample scripts also, there is a solution for that.

That means you support the full set of OPI comments? 1.3 and 2.0 too?

> scripts (the reason is easy: the people who use it have such pictures).

Hmm, using EPS images and omitting them while printing (forcing the layout
application to create OPI comments) will work, too? So you won't need
automatically generated lowres images at all?

> And there is only less documentation until now.

That's true ;-)

As a very satisfied of a commercial OPI server (not Xinet ;-), I wonder if
you have any plans regarding

- postscript font management
- honoring the output device's ps-level while printing EPS (OPI replacement)
- color management (icc)
- native pdf support

Regards,

Thomas

---

From: Volker Birk <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 23:40:00 +0100

On Mon, Nov 26, 2001 at 10:17:48PM +0100, Thomas Kaiser wrote:
> Nice in some situations: If you delete, rename or move a highres
> image, the lowres will do the same

... and so is it with our scripts...

> That means you support the full set of OPI comments? 1.3 and 2.0 too?

Yes.

> application to create OPI comments) will work, too?

Yes. opi3 will handle them correctly. The problem is, the scripts for
building the low res images are working on TIFF files only until now.

> So you won't need

You could also do that. But then your layout software must handle this
correctly.

> - postscript font management

Seems like you're using Helios. I think, we'll have no font management.
That is, because we will use the font management of the client
computers. The users I know are not able to handle with server font
management correctly and only have problems with it. So why not using
the fonts of the client machine?

> - honoring the output device's ps-level while printing EPS (OPI replacement)

We're not changing the PS level of the input file. Only replacement is
done. Of course, we could enter EPS 2.0 comments if there is PS Level 3.
But why? Nearly no output device at all uses the comments, we just put
them in for being in standard.

> - color management (icc)

That is an idea, of course, to do color management in the Software. But
better than doing it in opi3 would be a color management server itself.

> - native pdf support

Why not? I think, we'll support it.

VB.