Glossary
Installation Planning Guide 15
offset printing A widely-used method of commercial and corporate printing,
where ink is picked up by a metal or paper plate, passed to an
offset drum, and then passed to the paper.
online Devices under the direct control of a central processing unit, e .g.,
a printing system in interactive communication with a mainframe.
Refer to offline.
operating system Basic host- controlling program that governs the operations of a
computer, such as job entry, input/output, and data
management. The operating system is always running when the
computer is active. Unlike other types of programs, it does not
run to an end point and stop.
option A portion of the command line that modifies the command.
orientation 1. In reference to image area, orientation describes whether the
printed lines are parallel to the long edge of the paper or the
short edge of the paper.
2. Choice of printing portrait (vertically) or land scape
(horizontally).
page orientation Direction in which data is printed on a report. Refer to landscape
page orientation and portrait page orientation.
pagination Process of separating text into pages.
pathname An identifier for the position of a file or directory within the file
system.
PC Personal Computer. Family of computers that most commonly
run a version of DOS.
Page Description
Language (PDL) Page description language used to describe the printing of jobs
to a laser printing system. PDL describes the input (type, format,
characteristics), performs the processing functions (logical
processing), and describes the output (type, format, font
selection, accounting options) of a print job. Examples ar e
PostScript or PCL.
PDF Portable Document Format. A document format for distributing
documents for viewing and printing on a wide variety of
platforms. Often used with Adobe Reader or Adobe Acroba t.
pel Equivalent of dots per inch.
peripheral Device used with a computer or workstation, usually for input or
output. Printers, modems, and the cartridge tape drives are
examples of peripherals.
physical page Sheet of paper on which printing is done.