World: r3wp

'end-page might be buggy in your version.

Does text flow from one page to another?

Nope, that's too high-level, it's not a feature of Draw dialect. 
The printer scheme provides a cross-platform low-level layer to build 
such higher-level frameworks.

So, how are you doing it ? multiple pages and text flow?

Making text flow from one page to another is a job for a word-processor 
like MSWord or LaTeX. The printer scheme aims to be general purpose, 
so it can be used to print anything (not only output from word-processors).

Text can only flow inside boxes fully contained inside a page. This 
is achieved by extending Draw dialect with a new primitive : 'text-box.

What I am doing now is printing the text to a virtual draw page, 
and then when it reaches the bottom of the text box, it then flows 
to the next text box.

if the next text box is above the current text box, it assumes a 
page break and so starts a new page.

So, the text boxes are contained within the one page.

and if I run out of text boxes, it just keeps reusing the last text 
box ... for all subsequent pages

Could you send me your Draw source code ? (privately or by email, 
if it's too long)

Sure ..

What I tried to do was create a print template that the user can 
define.

My printing then uses the print template dialect to print page after 
page.

The underlying GDI API I've used does a lot more than needed, I should 
restrict its behaviour.

I see, that's the kind of usage that I was thinking about too.

pagesize A4
font Times-BoldItalic 30
linewidth 1
at 190x750 My-Name
color (black)
font Times-Roman 12
newpath at 75x725 line1
at 75x715 line2
at 75x705 line3
at 445x715 "Ph: "
at 465x715 ph
at 445x705 "Fx: " 
at 465x705 fx
at 438x680 "Date:"  font Times-Bold at 465x680 consult-date
font Times-Roman 11
newpath at 75x740 line 530x740
newpath at 75x700 line 530x700
at 75x680 Provider-Template

at 75x600 "Dear " 
at 100x600 Provider
flow-translate 0x0
flowbox 75x150 540x590 float 20
flow-translate 0x0
flowbox 75x150 540x720
gonzo 
flow consult gonzo
flow-translate 0x0
flowbox 75x150 540x720 float 10
flow-translate 0x0
flowbox 75x72 540x720 float 50
showpage

This is the "dialect" I am using to generate a multi-page letter. 
 Words like "consult-date" "provider" "My-name" are processed by 
a pre-processor to substitute the correct variables.

Looks like rebolized PostScript

flowbox 75x150 540x590 float 20  


means to put a text box that accepts text that flows into another 
box, but to start the text inside the box 20 points below any text 
above it.

yes, to make it easier to convert to postscript  and to draw.

the same dialect gets converted to draw to allow a preview.

So, you have a draw converter for this dialect ?

yes.

but it handles rotations and translations poorly

you should try to pipe the draw output to the printer scheme

gonzo is a postscript utility to do micro justification and other 
goodies

is gonzo open sourced ?

yes ...

has to be ... can't hide postscript source!

ok, so it's 100% PS. I wrote a few helping functions in PS too.

For eps, I just put a yellow box in the print preview ....

as no idea what it will look like

ie. I allow the template language to include an eps file

Ok, sent ... it's got lots of stuff specific to my emr app

which you can strip out .. the preprocessing stuff.

and apologies for the poor formatting ....

Thanks for the food for thought, I think that I could reuse several 
routines from gonzo. But PS is just a low-level layer for my printer 
dialect, doing too sophisticated things at PS level is not an option 
for me. All the calculation and fancy things (like good justification) 
have to be done in Draw dialect, so that WYSIWYG can be achieved.

that's an admirable aim ... just beyond my skill set

I have multipage preview working ... some time ... I have a block 
of draw blocks and I am supposed to switch between them to page thru 
the different pages.

ie. not always working!

Is it an issue with View/Draw or a bug in your code ?

my code of course :(

I've uploaded the 35 gnu ttf so that you can use postscript fonts 
for draw http://rebol.wik.is/Protocols/Printer

When printing, the user can often choose to have extra info printed 
with: who ordered the print, date and time, etc. What's the english 
name for this part of the print? The danish word for it translate 
to "receipt", but I feel, there's another english word.

do you metadata ?

Nah, not really. It's been printed typically on a separate page after 
the actual print.

legend
 maybe?

Or that is more used for text under an image in a book?

yes, it is