Star Micronics NP-IO manual Download Characters DOT Graphics

CHAPTER 6

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CHARACTERS

AND DOT GRAPHICS

Subjects covered in Chapter 6 include-

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. Designing and printing your own characters

•User-designed graphics

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Using the procedures outlined so far, all of the printer’s standard functions can be utilized. There are two additional user-defined functions available: designing and printing your own characters, and designing and printing your .own dot graphics.

These two functions can be used to design and print any sym- bol, or any graphic shape. This allows you to make your own special symbols, or print a company logo. Some understanding of dot matrix technology will be useful.

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DOT MATRIX PRINTING

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Dot matrix printers are named because each character is form- ed from a group of dots. The print head comprises nine wires or pins stacked vertically. For any standard character, up to seven of the pins are used at one time; for capital letters, the top seven are used, for standard height lower-case characters, the center five pins, and for “descending” characters (such as “p” or “g”), the bottom seven pins are used. The print head moves across the paper and at any instant prints a vertical series of dots; look- ing at Figure 6-1 will reveal that the letter “p” consists of five vertical columns of dots.

Any pin is fired by only one number, and any group of pins is