Star Micronics NX-15 user manual Specialfeatures Of The Printer, Chapter, Readinga hex dump

CHAPTER 6

SPECIALFEATURES OF

THE PRINTER

Subjectscoveredin Chapter6 inckde-

●Printer’s bell

●Master reset

●Uni-directionalprinting

●Internationalcharactersets

●PrintingBIG characters

●The optionalsheetfeeder

●Macro instruction

●Readinga hex dump

In the previous chapters we have learned about several groups of control codes. In this chapter we will look at more con- trol codes. These codes don’t fit neatly into any of the groupings that we have looked at so far, but they add a lot of useful features to your printer.

■Now hear this

You may have heard the printer’s bell if you have ever run out of paper. And you may have wondered why it’s called a bell when it beepsinstead of ringing! It’s a long story that goes back to the early days of computers, when teletype machines were used for computer terminals. These mechanical marvels were equipped with a bell that could be heard for blocks. This bell was used to signal the operator that something needed atten- tion. The code that the computer sent to the teletype machine to ring the bell was, reasonably enough, called a bell code. The name bell codeis still with us, even if the bell has changed to a beeper, and a lot of people still call the beeper a bell, even if it doesn’t sound like one.

The code to sound the “bell” is CHR$(7), which is ASCII code

7 or (BEL). Any time your printer receives this code it will sound the bell for a quarter of a second. This can be used to re-