[tex-k] dvips: Landscape papers handled in an idotic way

[Juhapekka Tolvanen]

Package: tetex-bin
Version: 2.0.2-14

info page of dvips says:

`-t PAPERTYPE'
     To rotate a document whose paper type is not the
     default, you can use the `-t' option twice, once for the paper
     type, and once for `landscape'.

That is complete bullshit. All I get is an error like this:

dvips: both landscape and papersize specified; ignoring landscape

If I watch it with gv or print it, text is not rotated so that it would
fit to my A4-sheet. It is cropped.

After some struggling I finally found a way to do it right:

dvips -z -Ppdf -Pwww -Pcmz -Pamz -Poutline -Pcm-lgc -Phfbright $CMSUPER
-G0 -j0 -f -D 1200 -Z -T 297mm,210mm -o ${BASENAME}.ps ${BASENAME}.dvi

"-T 297mm,210mm"! How intuitive and easy! - NOT!

Please, come from the stone age: Rest of the universe know, that the proper
way to express landscape-oriented A4-paper is "A4R" or "a4r". Have you
idiots seen for example copier machines? Their paper trays have text "A4"
and "A4R" printed on them. And how about for example a program called
xdvi:

xdvi -paper a4r ovikyltit.dvi

It is so much simpler. And now go and make it possible to use options
like these:

-t a5r
-t a4r
-t a3r
etc.

It just can not be too hard to create options like those. Even maintainers
of xdvi could do it, so hopefully maintainers of dvips can do it, too.


-- 
Juhapekka "naula" Tolvanen * http colon slash slash iki dot fi slash juhtolv
"kohtalona perinnön on kirjastona roihuta kun lukutaidottomat säikkyy
ensipakkasta ja tuki kanssaihmisten on hyöty täysin ilmainen. vaan mitenpä
käy lempeyslainan palautuksessa?"                                        CMX