Printing the Euro symbol in OfficePower

OfficePower’s character set does not contain a euro symbol. However, using the facilities provided by OfficePower’s Character Definition Files, it is possible to print the euro symbol in place of another character in the set. This article describes how to print the euro symbol in place of the generic currency symbol, ¤ .

The basic technique is to replace the current entry for the ¤ symbol (octal value 244) in each of the relevant Character Definition files with a new entry which will draw the euro character instead. To print a euro symbol, the user enters a ¤ symbol into their document or record - using the key sequences CombCh,X,O or CombCh,X,0. (CombCh is F11, and the X and O characters have to be in UPPER case). Note that the symbol will be displayed on all terminals or emulators as ¤ - it is only when printed that it will appear as a euro symbol.

This technique does not rely on any updating of the printers or their internal fonts. The downloadable file accompanying this article contains a range of character definition entries for use with the HPLASER and POSTSCRIPT printer families. The entries for HPLASER can also be used with DESKJET family printers, and probably with other printer families compatible with HP printers, though this has not been tested by Teamware Group.

A system administrator can update an OfficePower system to print the euro symbol by following the procedures below, which should be read in conjunction with Chapters 27 and 28 of the OfficePower Administrator's Guide.

It is recommended you first copy any character definition files to be amended so that you can easily revert to the originals if required.

Procedure 1 - installing the euro character definitions

1. Download the CPIO file containing the new character definitions
2. Create a (temporary) folder under opadmin called europrint
3. Copy the CPIO file into the opadmin/europrint folder, naming it eurocpio
4. At a UNIX command prompt, unpack the CPIO file using the command:
   cpio -iI eurocpio
5. Verify that the europrint folder now contains the following files:

Procedure 2 - updating the HPLASER character definitions

1. Using OfficePower’s Update/Create Character Definition File function in the Printers category (printers.upd-char), select the printer family HPLASER and the character definition file standard-P
2. Locate the record for character 244 - note that the Output String for this record will currently be \272 - and delete this record
3. Press the COPY IN* softkey and copy in the new character definition from the datafile opadmin/europrint/HPstand-P
4. Exit, saving changes.
5. Repeat steps 1 to 4 for further character definition files for the HPLASER family, copying in new character definitions as shown in the table below. (Note that, in the case of the two "ecma94" character definition files, there will not be an existing entry for character 244 to delete.)
6. Using OfficePower’s Update/Create Fonts function in the Printers category ( printers.upd-font), examine each record for a landscape font (those with a capital L at the end of the name) for the HPLASER printer family. If any landscape fonts are using the ecma-P character definition file, amend the field to ecma-L. (Earlier versions of OfficePower were issued with this field incorrectly set for CGTimes and Univers landscape fonts. Previously, this error had no effect, but failing to correct it now will result in the euro character being rotated through 90 degrees in landscape fonts.)

Procedure 3 - updating the POSTSCRIPT character definitions

1. At a UNIX command prompt, move the file ccipreface.ps from the opadmin/europrint folder to the $spooldir/datafiles directory: e.g
   mv /oppublic/opadmin/europrint~fl/ccipreface.ps /opvar/spool/lpd/datafiles/ccipreface.ps
2. Using OfficePower’s Update/Create Character Definition File function in the Printers category (printers.upd-char), select the printer family POSTSCRIPT and the character definition file standard-P
3. Press the COPY IN* softkey and copy in the new character definition from the datafile opadmin/europrint/POSTSCRIPT
4. Exit, saving changes.
5. Repeat steps 2 to 4 for the character definition file standard-L, again copying in the contents of the datafile opadmin/europrint/POSTSCRIPT.

If you wish to add euro support to the DESKJET or other printer families, repeat Procedure 2 above for these families.

After completing the above procedures, you can delete the files in the opadmin/europrint folder and then remove this folder, if you wish.

If you wish to add euro support on a more selective basis, instead of always printing the euro symbol in place of the ¤ symbol on all printers, you can extend this technique. For example, copy the existing character definition tables (with amended names), and add the euro character definition to the copies, rather than amending the originals. Then create new font records (again with distinctive names) to use the amended character definition tables, and add these new fonts to the appropriate font sets using the printer.upd-fset function. Users can now print the ¤ symbol using the original fonts, and the euro using the new fonts. Further information on managing printer fonts can be found in chapters 23 to 28 of the OfficePower Administrator's Guide.

• Create a temporary directory on your hard disk
• Download euro.exe to the temporary directory
• Run euro.exe to unpack the CPIO file eurocpio and the document euro.doc

Click here to download euro.exe

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