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EscapeE Changelog

What's new in EscapeE 10.61E

Feb 11, 2022
  • Features:
  • There is now a feature for including XML metadata in TIFFs and reading it back. This intended for use with the Tesseract OCR code to create searchable PDFs from bitmapped files. Field definitions can be used to create XML for each page - the data will be similar to the data that would be exported to XML. This data is stored as a private tag, currently tag number 65223, in each TIFF page. There are two new options in the configuration and TIFF export dialogues to output either just the field names, width, height and coordinates where found but can also include any extracted data:
  • Include XML [ ] fields [ ] data
  • The command line options are /TIFF 1D to include the data or /TIFF 1X just to include the XML fields.
  • When reading back such a file the metadata is displayed as XML in the Source panel of the console window and can be exported to XML by choosing the Meta data option in the "Fields to be output" group. It can also be output as the log file when exporting the TIFF file to some other format - choose Meta data in the log file options.
  • Truetype fonts are now drawn using glyph numbers rather than Unicode codes. This avoids problems with unwanted character substitution in Windows 10.
  • 10.61B: The highest tray number of 20 now applies to PostScript as well as PCL.
  • 10.61D: It is now possible to export metadata from a TIFF using the options /SAVE M /FIELDS ''
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.61C: The new /TIFF 1X option did not work in conjuction with the /X option.
  • 10.61D: A bad plugin configuration string could cause an access protection fault.
  • 10.61D: A modification in version 10.61C to flag substitute fonts better caused problems for some plugins.
  • 10.61E: Problem in outputting some types of images that have alpha transparency (SPR1509).

New in EscapeE 10.61D (Sep 11, 2021)

  • Features:
  • There is now a feature for including XML metadata in TIFFs and reading it back. This intended for use with the Tesseract OCR code to create searchable PDFs from bitmapped files. Field definitions can be used to create XML for each page - the data will be similar to the data that would be exported to XML. This data is stored as a private tag, currently tag number 65223, in each TIFF page. There are two new options in the configuration and TIFF export dialogues to output either just the field names, width, height and coordinates where found but can also include any extracted data:
  • Include XML [ ] fields [ ] data
  • The command line options are /TIFF 1D to include the data or /TIFF 1X just to include the XML fields.
  • When reading back such a file the metadata is displayed as XML in the Source panel of the console window and can be exported to XML by choosing the Meta data option in the "Fields to be output" group. It can also be output as the log file when exporting the TIFF file to some other format - choose Meta data in the log file options.
  • Truetype fonts are now drawn using glyph numbers rather than Unicode codes. This avoids problems with unwanted character substitution in Windows 10.
  • 10.61B: The highest tray number of 20 now applies to PostScript as well as PCL.
  • 10.61D: It is now possible to export metadata from a TIFF using the options /SAVE M /FIELDS ''
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.61C: The new /TIFF 1X option did not work in conjuction with the /X option.
  • 10.61D: A bad plugin configuration string could cause an access protection fault.
  • 10.61D: A modification in version 10.61C to flag substitute fonts better caused problems for some plugins.
  • 10.61E: Problem in outputting some types of images that have alpha transparency (SPR1509).

New in EscapeE 10.60B (Aug 21, 2021)

  • Features:
  • There is now a case-blind option on the Fields/Searching menu that will cause the tag to be matched regardless of the case. Currently this only applies to only for letters a-z and A-Z, not for accented letters or non-latin alphabets.
  • There is an option in IDF export "Para gap/line height". This allows specification of the gap between lines that will count as delimiting a paragraph, as a percentage of the text line height.
  • Improved handling of text spacing in PDFs produced by the Tesseract OCR plugin.
  • 10.60B: IDF files generated by EscapeE now contain a <INFO tag that allows them to be edited by the IDF wizard.
  • 10.60B: The highest configurable PCL tray number is now 20 rather than 9.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Unwanted luminance correction for CMYK JPEG images could give the wrong colours.
  • The /ERROROK ALL option did not suppress all logged errors.
  • 10.60A: Problem when using a CSV control file in conjunction with fields that call a new fields file.
  • 10.60B: There was a spurious error message when reading 600 dpi resolution TIFFs.
  • 10.60B: Incorrect output file names were generated when the output folder name started with a dot.

New in EscapeE 10.59C (Jun 10, 2021)

  • Features:
  • Added a File menu item to "Buy EscapeE".
  • Simplified the dialogue shown when EscaepE is run unregistered and added and option to buy it.
  • Better action when a user-defined pattern supplies too few pattern bytes.
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.59A: It was possible to move the cursor to the left of the page margin (SPR1496).
  • 10.59A: The option to ombine text strings when exporting to PDF could result in the error message "textWord +++" (SPR1498).

New in EscapeE 10.58C (Apr 28, 2021)

  • Features:
  • 10.58B: The RTINSTAR import module can now handle more Epson POS commands.
  • 10.58B: Files starting with escape equals (hex 1B 3B) are recognised as Epson POS format and passed to the RTINSTAR DLL for processing.
  • 10.58C: There is now an option to add page numbers when creating IDF booklets using the File/New menu. The positioning of the page numbers is taken from the specification in the Configuration/ Layout dialogue.
  • 10.58C: Better choice of the viewed area when zooming in to a selected area.
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.58B: Problem with caching images when having a rotated and non-rotated version at different sizes (SPR1480).
  • 10.58B: When reading 4-bit TIFF images that had no palette, the one that was constructed was too grey.
  • 10.58C: PNG predictors in the LZW context did not work properly in PDF import (SPR1485).
  • 10.58C: Recursive use of IDF files did not always work properly.

New in EscapeE 10.58 (Mar 26, 2021)

  • Features:
  • In the fields dialogue the contents of normal fields are shown (as previously) with a white background. Composite field values are shown with a light green background and values within fields that have search tags (not shown in earlier versions) have a grey background.
  • Better visual appearance of editable text areas created by fields.
  • The RTFORMIN module has a DOTS option to recognise dotted lines as fillable fields as well as enclosed boxes.
  • More helpful message if an explicit input format is specified but the input file is not in that format.
  • Bug fixes:
  • RTPDFIN did not cope with all types of coordinate transformation (SPR1478).
  • When extracting text from a field, although multiple spaces are converted to single ones unless left or right alignment is specified in the field's advanced properties, this was not done when searching for a tag. This has now been corrected, and for backward compatibility, existing tags will have multiple spaces replaced with single spaces unless one of the alignment flags is set.
  • When exporting PDFs containing scaled images the resulting file size was larger because the images were scaled up before export (SPR1476).
  • The configuration option to log sheet numbers was sometimes lost when saving other options.
  • An unhelpful error message was given if a problem was detected before the console log was created.
  • The F1 key called the old Windows Help system not the new one.
  • The option to show unmatched character codes did not work for scaleable fonts.
  • The character recognition dialogue did not update the database for certain fonts (SPR1479).

New in EscapeE 10.57 (Mar 9, 2021)

  • Features:
  • PCL and Postscript files of sizes greater than 2 Mbytes can now be created. PDF files of thia size can now be read.
  • Better choice of the area to view after zooming in or out.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some gray-scale conversions did not work properly.
  • The ADDTEXT plugin did not cope with high order codes when using the original font for the new text.

New in EscapeE 10.56 (Mar 9, 2021)

  • Features:
  • The convention for LPR printers is to start with a banner page if the user's name is specified in the control file. EscapeE has previously always supplied one: either as specified on the /LPRU option or if blank or unspecified then the name of the owner of the computer. There is now a checkbox on the TCP/IP configuration page "Print banner page" and if no checked the LPRU parameter is set to * to avoid a banner page when outputting via LPR. This effect can also be achieved by specifying /LPRU * on the command line.
  • There is a new menu option: File/New/IDF booklet. This provides a simple way to make a booklet from the current document or a range of its pages.
  • 10.56B: There is a new option /TEMPDIR xxx which specifies the folder for temporary fonts. The specified folder must exist and if the full path is not given it will be evaluated relative to the folder in which EscapeE is started, unlike the output file specification, which is relative to the folder of the input file.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Exporting a document using Opentype fonts to PCL format did not work properly as PCL does not support them. They are now converted to bitmapped fonts.
  • Problem with CSV file input if the last record did not end with carriage return or line feed.
  • The View button on the IDF pane of the console window did not always work well.
  • 10.56A: Problems if relying on preserved temporary fonts when a font had been updated by adding characters.
  • 10.56C: The mechanism for selecting retained temporary fonts did not work properly for fonts with no OS/2 tag.
  • 10.56D: After drawing a user-defined line pattern the pattern could persist for subsequent lines.
  • 10.56E: PCL files > 2 Gbytes could not be read (SPR1272).

New in EscapeE 10.55 (Jan 18, 2021)

  • Improvements to image caching (SPR1464).
  • The default cache size has been increased to 100 Mbytes but this is not retrospective and some jobs e.g. that in SPR1464 may need more.
  • Improvements to Ubered export. Added a percentage scale factor for the font size which can be appended to the IDFOPTS parameter:
  • IDFOPTS 3,97

New in EscapeE 10.54 (Jan 4, 2021)

  • Features:
  • More complete implementation of dashed lines for formats such as Postscript and PDFs (SPR1463).
  • IDF now takes advantage of the better dashed lines for its custom lines. For single lines there can now be a negative first parameter sapecifying an offset into the pattern e.g.
  • <GROUP LEFT = "900" TOP = "200" LINESTYLE="CUSTOM,-50,100,200">
  • <M X = "0" Y= "0"/><P X = "1000" Y= "0"/>
  • </GROUP>
  • This draws a line with dashes 100 dots, spaces 200 dots, beginning half-way though a dash.
  • When registering EscapeE the appropriate product is chosen according to the user's selection (SPR1420).
  • Files that start straight in with @PJL enter language xxx are now sent to the appropriate import module.
  • Better diagnostics for certain HP-GL errors.
  • Invalid values of the fsType flags in the Truetype OS/2 record are now ignored.
  • Bug fixes:
  • In IDF the combination of BLANKLINES="NO" and ALIGN="BOTTOM" or ALIGN="RIGHT" did not work properly.
  • Spurious "page x not found" message from IDF reading a CSV file with REPEAT="YES".
  • When reading a CSV file in IDF the field values were not cleared at end of file.
  • When exporting to 1-bit monochrome the preference for retaining JPEG images is now ignored as that is an inappropriate format.

New in EscapeE 10.52 (Dec 12, 2020)

  • The word indexing feature in composite fields has been extended so that a negative index measures from the end, similar to the way column indexing works: {field1[1]} is the first word of field1 {field1[-1]} is the last word of field1 and {field1[-2]} the previous word etc.
  • There are two more hot-keys: Ctrl-V views the control file if any and Ctrl+Shift-I opens the configuration dialogue for editing the input options.
  • There is now an option /SAVEDEFS c where c (not case sensitive) is:
  • Don't save the field definitions on closing the file
  • On closing the file ask if field definitionsare to be saved
  • (or anything else) always save the field definitions on closing the file (the default).
  • There is nothing in the user interface that saves this parameter, so it has to be in the [PCLVIEW] section of rt.ini or on the command line.
  • Better diagnostics for mismatched font selection sequences.

New in EscapeE 10.50 (Oct 27, 2020)

  • Features:
  • Import from PDF of certain types of image is speeded up significantly.
  • If images are being ignored when reading a PDF then they are skipped by the import module, thus improving performance.
  • Improved Lineprinter font with extra Greek characters (SPR1453).
  • Added the special composite field _FirstPageInSet which gives the page number of the first page in the current set, and is updated when a field defines the start or end of a set.
  • A set is assumed to start at the next front page following the end of a set, or when explicitly specified by a field.
  • 10.50A: Added the option for a field's action to occur on the next sheet.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Opentype fonts generated from imported PDFs did not always work properly (SPR1452).

New in EscapeE 10.49a (Oct 2, 2020)

  • Problems with PDF overlays with alpha channel (SPR1447 & SPR1448).
  • Setting the custom paper size in the Configuration/Printer dialogue did not take immediate effect.
  • Rangecheck error reading Postcript file (SPR1444).
  • Unless the option /USESPACES Y is used, EscapeE skips leading spaces in PCL text strings for fonts with a non-printing space character but because of a bug this did not apply to downloaded bitmap fonts. Fixing this mitigates the bug in Acrobat which intersperses spaces in extracted text when overprinting is used (SPR1442).
  • The image options button in the Direct print dialogue was mis-aligned.

New in EscapeE 10.49 (Sep 2, 2020)

  • Bug fixes:
  • Potential problem with blank pages in Postscript output inserted for duplex pagination. Copyright notice in the splash screen changed to 2020.

New in EscapeE 10.48b (Sep 2, 2020)

  • Bug fixes:
  • Intermittent problems with some Truetype fonts.
  • Showing the selected font in red did not work if combined with showing fields (SPR1423).
  • 10.48A: Problem when converting to an imagemask (SPR1437).
  • 10.48B: Problem when showing fonts in use (SPR1441).
  • 10.48B: The Duplex override panel was not hidden when switching to a format where is was not relevant.
  • 10.48C: The duplex override options 'Duplex -> short' and 'Duplex -> long' wrongly set the mode on all pages rather than just the duplex pages.
  • 10.48C: Duplex/simplex was not working reliably for Postscript export.

New in EscapeE 10.47 (Jul 13, 2020)

  • Features:
  • Support for an unlimited number of CMYK colours (SPR1419).
  • Support for complex colour blends including tensor blends in PDF import (SPR1419).
  • Support for CMYK colour with transparency in PDF export.
  • Bug fixes:
  • EscapeE sometimes failed to see that a page should be imaged to obtain a correct result when exporting

New in EscapeE 10.46D (Jul 6, 2020)

  • Features:
  • In the Configuration.Text dialogue, below the option "Assign character codes using the TTLIB database" there is now an option "Manually review pages with unconverted codes" which is enabled once the other option is selected. The new option allows one to find if any character codes have not been assigned because the characters were not in the database. Page through the file by clicking on the forward arrow in the toolbar or for PCL or Postscript just click on the "Last page" button, and when a page is encountered that has unconverted code the Character conversion dialogue is invoked to allow them to be assigned the correct code.
  • 10.46B: Implemented the commands esc &f<num>J set custom paper width in 1/720" and esc &f<num>I set custom paper height in 1/720".
  • Bug fixes:
  • Exporting to PDF or Postscript could give the spurious error message "No path open..." where there were two paths, one starting where the other ended.
  • The "Next unknown" did not save any previous code definition.
  • When exporting a PDF as a graphic with hidden text, the text did not use the converted codes even if the "Use converted codes when exporting" text option was selected.
  • 10.46C: Problems loading a control file into a window.
  • 10.46C: The custom paper width and height commands did not apply immediately if custom paper was already selected.

New in EscapeE 10.45 (Jun 22, 2020)

  • Better alignment of characters when exporting long lines of text (SPR1413).
  • Choosing the PDF option "Use JPEG for images if was a JPEG" now disables the other criteria (SPR1416).

New in EscapeE 10.44G (Jun 4, 2020)

  • Features:
  • Import modules can now have extra options of the form option=value. For import modules that support these options there is a More... button in the configuration/input options dialogue. These options are stored by setting symbols such as PDFINoption=value in the ini file.
  • 10.44C: Improved caching of Postscript files used by import DLLs.
  • Bug fixes:
  • If viewing all fields with their names then calling the fields dialogue caused to names to vanish.
  • 10.44B: Problems with IDF tray selection in some cases.

New in EscapeE 10.42 (Jan 23, 2020)

  • Features:
  • The PDF Security options have been made easier to understand and there are <None> options in the certificates lists to cancel a previously selected certificate.
  • The option to ignore a downloaded font now applies to PDF and other formats, not just PCL.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The selected PDF Signing Certificate profile was not preserved on restarting EscapeE.
  • Truetype fonts where more than one character maps to s single glyph were not handled properly (SPR1398).

New in EscapeE 10.41 (Dec 5, 2019)

  • Features:
  • There is now an option /RTINI to define the name and path of the licence file.
  • Tray numbers can now be assigned to Windows user-defined trays.
  • Changes to the Nq interface to work with NQ2.
  • bug fixes:
  • If a PCL file requested an undefined pattern there was no error message and white was used (SPR1297).

New in EscapeE 10.40A (Sep 13, 2019)

  • There is now a command-line option /WINDOW HIDE which runs minimised and avoids the program appearing in the taskbar.
  • Better layout of the export and print dialogues.
  • 10.40A: When exporting to FDL the default image type generated is PNG not RIF.
  • 10.40A: There are two extra options when defining tags: "Graphic of this width" and "Graphic of this height". These are useful in selecting vertical or horizontal lines of variable length.

New in EscapeE 10.39A (Aug 29, 2019)

  • 10.34A: Another modal dialogue removed when running unattended (SPR1383).
  • 10.34A: The Find Text feature did not always work properly (SPR1387).
  • 10.34A: Minor fixes and enhancements to the mechanism for adding to an IDF document.

New in EscapeE 10.39 (Aug 1, 2019)

  • Features:
  • I/O errors no longer bring up modal dialogues, which fail if run as a service (SPR1383).
  • Raster Op 184 which does an XOR with the pattern is simplified if the pattern is black, so that there is no need to image the page when exporting to PDF (SPR1384).
  • EEFONTS can now export a specific font from the TTLIB.TTK database (SPR1376).
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problem with PCL XL import if too many points in a path (SPR1378).
  • Problem with importing PDFs with obfuscated character codes. Removed fix for SPR1372.

New in EscapeE 10.38 (Jul 12, 2019)

  • There is now an option to request that the page orientation be changed to whatever best suits the orientation of the text on that page. This can be specified in the Configuration/Printer dialogue as Orientation Auto, which is in addition to the default Portrait/Landscape options (SPR1377). To request this on the command line specify an A as well as (or instead of) the P or L in the /ORIENT option.
  • There are some improvements making it easier to set up several tagged fields. After right-clicking and choosing one of the tag sub-menu options, that option is put at the top of the right-click menu.
  • The Fields dialogue has been changed so that if the OK button is highlighted then pressing the Enter key is equivalent to clicking on the button.
  • The right-click character mapping feature now asks the user to supply a font name so that the converted codes can be identified in the database as belonging to a particular font. The conversion dialogue shows the font number under the heading "TTlib".
  • The Font properties dialogue now shows the number of character codes recognised for that font.
  • Improved EEfonts program:
  • Added two options: "Show database details" and "Show bitmapped fonts".
  • The Load menu offers to load a different database or to load the default one.
  • Added "save font character data" as a right-click option on the TT database font pane to save data for the selected font as a separate file. If no font selected then it offers to save font zero, the one created by mapping characters in EscapeE.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The Postscript trays list could show the wrong paper name initially.
  • 10.38A: IDF import did not support XML entities encoding code points above FFFF.

New in EscapeE 10.36D (Jun 28, 2019)

  • Added an email option to the registration screen.

New in EscapeE 10.36 (May 23, 2019)

  • Features:
  • Postscript pattern support for rotated views (SPR1362).
  • Bug fixes:
  • EscapeE could sometimes use a slightly smaller point size than requested (SPR1367).
  • 10.36A: Rounding problems with certain patterns cause inconsistent alignment.

New in EscapeE 10.35 (Mar 25, 2019)

  • Features:
  • major release of the Postscript import module (RTPSIN.DLL version 700) including some Level 3 extensions:
  • Type 0 font support extended to include FMapType 9 (CMAP mode - level 3).
  • Introducing CID font support for TrueType fonts (level 3). (SPR1063, SPR1328)
  • Adding level 3 style incremental updating for TrueType fonts. (SPR1328)
  • Improvements to resource management operators, including new CIDFont resource types and the CIDInit procset.
  • Added support for the little-used "token" operator. (SPR1354)
  • Added support for the little-used level 2 user path mechanism. (SPR1356)
  • Supporting the "cshow" operator in the context of Type 0 fonts and especially when CID fonts are involved. (SPR1328)
  • When constructing documents using the IDF wizard it is now possible to drag and drop a set of files on the the window for processing.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Output filenames using special fields such as PJLs did not get evaluated in the case of some export formats such as PDF.
  • The default spacing for PCL downloaded Truetype fonts for not always correct.

New in EscapeE 10.34C (Feb 28, 2019)

  • Improvements to the dragging of items added by a plugin (SPR1349).

New in EscapeE 10.34B (Feb 28, 2019)

  • Improvements to the position of any new items add to IDF files using the right-click options.
  • There is now an Overlays item on the View menu which shows any overlays defined in IDF or PDFs similarly to the way macros are shown for PCL files.
  • Improvements to the Lyra font family used for HP's Univers (SPR1350 & SPR1352).

New in EscapeE 10.34A (Feb 8, 2019)

  • (SPR1348)It is now possible to set up EscapeE so that it asks the user which job he wants to run when it is called. There is a buttom marked 'Job types' at the bottom of the Configuration/General tab and clicking on this brings up a dialogue where the analyst can choose to offer his users a choice of jobs i.e. ini files from all the .ini files in a particular folder or by reading their paths from a list of files (.lof or .job). In the latter case the file name (which must be in quotes if it contains spaces) can be followed by a comment which is displayed to the user following the file name. If the comment starts with an asterisk then the file name is not shown, just the remainder of the comment. Once this has been set up and saved (the symbol for it is JOBS) the user is asked to choose the type of job from the list when he calls EscapeE (unless an ini file is specified on the calling line). To choose a different job just click on Options/Choose job configuration to invoke the dialogue where the job can be selected. The File/Open dialogue offers Job configurations as a file type to be opened.
  • The configuration dialogue has an Edit option to edit the list, and if the list is saved it will
  • Be given an initial identifier:
  • :ESCAPEE JOBS
  • So that if opened in EscapeE is will be recognised as a list of jobs and treated accordingly.
  • In IDF a named group specifying CACHE="YES" will create an overlay which can be invoked by an <INCLUDE> tag specifying GROUPNAME="name_of_group". This tag can now specify a scale and rotation and either it or the group can specify a transparency value in percent using ALPHA="xx" where xx is a real number up to 100.00.
  • In an IDF expression the clip region can now be referred to e.g. CLIPY="CLIP.TOP + 100"
  • Saving the configuration now saves the default fields file path in the FIELDDEF symnbol unless it has been rendered inoperative by checking 'Always use these definitions' which then uses the 'FIELDS' symbol.
  • When loading a new fields file when the existing fiellds have been changed the user is asked if they are to be saved.
  • The default width of a Kyocera code128 barcode has been increased to match that of the printers.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Kyocera barcodes did not work properly.
  • When making a shortcut for the default font selection sequence it was not always put in brackets.
  • The Apply button in the Fields/File dialogue did not work unless the file name had been edited.

New in EscapeE 10.33B (Jan 18, 2019)

  • AES encryption was still not working (SPR1340).
  • Problem with Postscript type 1 font with wrongly named characters (SPR1069 & SPR1305).
  • Character spacing wrong (SPR1270).
  • Problems with parsing default font name in a SELECT option read from an OPTIONS file if it contained spaces (SPR1342).
  • Problem when reading PDFs using fonts with no Unicodes.

New in EscapeE 10.33 (Dec 26, 2018)

  • Features:
  • Improvements to the mechanism for saving downloaded Truetype files to the library.
  • The 'No output' option offers logging options when exporting and does not produce output.
  • Bug fixes:
  • If the AES encryption mode was saved then it applied subsequently even if no password was given (SPR1340).

New in EscapeE 10.32 (Dec 4, 2018)

  • If the output file name includes field names in curly brackets then the name is initially evaluated when creating the file and if some of the fields were not yet defined they are evaluated when renaming the file at the end (SPR1334). Note that the fields must be 'found' at one or other of these points to be evaluated properly.
  • Canon blocked format now supports PCL-XL (SPR1317).
  • The default image resolution and resolution over-ride now apply to images added by plugins as well as to those read from the data stream.
  • bug fixes:
  • PCL-XL followed by PCL-5 did not work properly.
  • Canon blocked format could fail when reading a second file.
  • When performing character recognition on a scaleable font, any chracters with no outlines were converted to spaces. Now they remain with their original character code unless the glyph number is 3.

New in EscapeE 10.31E (Nov 16, 2018)

  • Features:
  • When edge-to-edge mode is selected in the Printer configuration the cursor is allowed left of the margin.
  • Better handling of the resizing of fields overlapped by images added by plugins.

New in EscapeE 10.31D (Nov 16, 2018)

  • Bug fixes:
  • Problems introduced in 10.31C.
  • Improvements to handling of Canon blocked format (SPR1317).

New in EscapeE 10.31C (Nov 2, 2018)

  • font definitions in PDF overlays.

New in EscapeE 10.31A (Oct 16, 2018)

  • Features:
  • Drawing with alpha transparency is now supported for PDF import (SPR1312).
  • There is a new operator (mod or remainder) for use in expressions within composite fields. For example 2 gives 1 for odd-numbered pages.
  • Bug fixes:
  • IDF files with no IDF tag could cause problems.
  • Improved handling of source editing for IDF input.
  • 10.31A: EETMP Truetype files could be left open when reading Postscript file that add characters to a font (SPR1313).

New in EscapeE 10.30 (Aug 7, 2018)

  • Features:
  • The AddText plugin can now add multiple lines and the vertical spacing can be specified in the configuration.
  • Bug fixes:
  • In PCL XL when starting a new page in duplex the default was a back page not next page.
  • Some IDF syntax errors were not reported.

New in EscapeE 10.29 (Aug 7, 2018)

  • Features:
  • The Postscript cshow operator is now supported by the import module (SPR1286).
  • The AFP import module now uses EscapeE's IMAGECACHE size specification to determine its maximum cache size.
  • Canon blocked format as used by Canon MF8500 printers is now supported, controlled by the CANON feature code (SPR1292).
  • PDF export now includes Unicode conversion table when necessary.
  • 10.29C: Cached images are now retained for successive files invoked by a CSV control file.
  • bug fixes:
  • Text alignment when reading a PDF was incorrect(SPR1290).
  • Error 183 from the ICC configure button (SPR1293).
  • Font problem when reading past page 100 (SPR1294).
  • 10.29A: The message "Default paper type xx assumed' was shown befor the main form was in view.
  • 10.29B: Certain types of complex pattern in PDFs were not supported (SPR1295).
  • 10.29B: TrueType font output did not print on all printers (SPR1296).
  • 10.29C: The {_setpage} special field (giving the page number within the current set) returned one less than the correct answer.
  • 10.29C: Certain composite fields did not display their value correctly when viewed in the fields dialogue.

New in EscapeE 10.28 (May 1, 2018)

  • Features:
  • There are two new special fields to allow calculation of the number of pages or sheets in a set:
  • _numSetPages
  • number of pages in the current set.
  • _numSetSheets
  • number of sheets in the current set.
  • These numbers rely on there being one or more fields which mark the start of a set. On encountering one of these special fields EscapeE searches forward until it finds a field indicating end of set.

New in EscapeE 10.27A (Apr 13, 2018)

  • A subset of the Kyocera BARC, barcode, command is now supported. The following types of barcode are currently implem,eted: Code128, UPC E, EAN8, EAN13, BC39, Postnet. Currently the only options implemented are those specifying the units, height and whether or not to draw text under the barcode. This requires that the the barcode plugin is installed (though only the PPBC.D32 DLL and fonts are actually used) and that the user is licensed for the BARCODES feature.
  • There is now a special field {_Media} that give the media type of the current page.
  • The AddText plugin now has the option to draw the text with an opaque white background.
  • The following plugins are now included in the delivery: AddImage, AddFile, AddText, MoveText, Barcode, BC39Reader, Evaluate, QRCodeReader and Script.

New in EscapeE 10.26B (Mar 20, 2018)

  • Features:
  • The simplex/duplex specification can be overridden when printing as it can be when exporting.
  • Bug fixes:
  • When editing a field name in the Field dialogue the backspace key did not work (SPR1269).
  • Clicking on a field in thge table view did not always highlight it (SPR1269).

New in EscapeE 10.26A (Mar 20, 2018)

  • Features:
  • The Find Text dialogue now has an option to restore the previous position if the search fails.
  • Added a right-click Find option to the IDF source windows.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problems with font subsetting when the original font had no character names (SPR1263).
  • Problems with a left-over search dialogue in the source/log window.
  • Memory consumption when fonts are repeatedly defined when reading PDFs (SPR1257).

New in EscapeE 10.26 (Mar 5, 2018)

  • Features:
  • The option to ignore downloaded fonts that have the same header as one already loaded now applies to import formats other than PCL e.g. PDF.
  • There is a new special field symbol {_TempDir} whose value is the Windows temporary folder, terminated by backslash.
  • If a Windows font is loaded and found to have the wrong weight or italic style then a descriptive message is given.
  • IDF syntax errors now have their line number shown in the error message.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Exporting to AFP format using CCITT4 compression could cause problems.
  • In the case of a corrupt input file it was possible to get into a situation whereby EscapeE would not exit.

New in EscapeE 10.25A (Feb 13, 2018)

  • Features:
  • 10.25A: Added a STATUS command for the pipe interface used by EEVIEW.
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.25A: Unicode conversion table could be truncated.

New in EscapeE 10.25 (Feb 13, 2018)

  • Features:
  • When a downloaded Truetype font contains characters recognised as coming from an installed font the The Font Properties dialogue now shows "Recognised as font ...".
  • Can read CCITT3 Fax TIFFs even when the byte-aligned EOLs mode is wrongly specified (SPR1254).
  • Bug fixes:
  • The PCL-XL import module was not good at handling the case where the file was truncated.
  • The ADDfile plugin ignored the specified page number for TIFF files.
  • Font embedding failed for TrueType fonts installed in EscapeE but not in Windows (SPR1249).

New in EscapeE 10.22G (Dec 23, 2017)

  • Features:
  • Major improvements to memory management for PDF import (SPR1183).
  • Better handling of CFF fonts with no Postscript names for the characters in the post section (SPR1232).
  • Conversion to complex colour spaces to CMYK colour when appropriate (SPR1232).
  • 10.22A: Better font substitution dialogue. The PDF name can be typed explicitly.
  • Bug fixes:
  • When exporting custom paper to PCL the export module inserts PJL commands which act as system resets and therefore delete the temporary fonts - the fonts are now designated as permanent (SPR1227).
  • Problem with white rectangle only appearing when output to PDF (SPR1232).
  • The font name to be matched was not always displayed in the substitutes list (SPR1233).
  • The old font substitutes list was restored on exit from the font substutes dialogue so the file had to be loaded again to get the new substitutions (SPR1233).
  • It was not possible to use the font substitution mechanism to change the font used for PDF export without changing the screen font (SPR1233).
  • Character recognition using the database failed if a font had characters added to it after its first use (SPR1234).
  • 10.22A: In the font substitutes list if the style to be matched was zero it was shown as blank but now shows as Upright.
  • 10.22B: "Bad Inline image termination" form PDF import (SPR1223).
  • 10.22B: Inconsistencies in the font substitution mechanism (SPR1233).
  • 10.22B: Missing AFP font caused problems (SPR1236).
  • 10.22B: Tray commands not added to PS output (SPR1238).
  • 10.22C: RTPDFIN crash when opening a PDF generated by Microsoft PDF writer (SPR1240).
  • 10.22C: Incorrect palette when reading an IDF file containing an 8-bit JPEG image.
  • 10.22C: After sweeping out an area and right-clicking "Zoom in" the selected area was not centred properly in the window.
  • 10.22D: Does not write to WIN.INI.
  • 10.22D: Better format for the About box.
  • 10.22E: Problems in exporting Postscript files when fonts were updated by adding characters (SPR1202).
  • 10.22E: Removed spurious message "Unknown option SHORTCUT=" and "Plugins are disabled" when newly installed.
  • 10.22E: The option to run a program did not always work if joining a list of files together (SPR1244).
  • 10.22E: If the automatic symbol set recognition failed the text could appear wrong if exported.

New in EscapeE 10.21C Beta (Oct 27, 2017)

  • Better caching of Postscript images, resulting in smaller output files (SPR 1225).

New in EscapeE 10.21A Beta (Oct 14, 2017)

  • When exporting to JPEG formatn EscapeE no longer uses the RTOJPEG export DLL to do the export so can now apply the same options as for PDF JPEGs. The JPEG export has an Options button which shows an appropriate JPEG options page.

New in EscapeE 10.21 Beta (Oct 10, 2017)

  • Improvements to DICOM export:
  • Blank pages will be ignored if the "Ignore blank pages" option in the Printer configuration is selected.
  • Parsing of dates has been upgraded to accept dates such as Jan/1/2001 and convert them to DICOM format.
  • The print preview page now shows the appropriate pair of pages when printing as a booklet.
  • If the file name is omitted when specifying the location of the character recognition database in the Options/Library folders dialogue then it defaults to TTlib.rtk
  • When switching between alphabetical list and tree view in the Fields dialogue the path to the current field is shown expanded.
  • Bug fixes:
  • If an IDF group specified both BOUNDS and X or Y the result was incorrect.

New in EscapeE 10.20D Beta (Oct 6, 2017)

  • In some cases temporary fonts were not deleted at the end of a job (SPR1214).

New in EscapeE 10.20C Beta (Oct 3, 2017)

  • The IDF Wizard has an option on the More menu to delete delete music parts.
  • In IDF the overlaying of specific pages of a file containing HP-GL could use the wrong frame size.
  • Low precision when displaying colours e.g. right-click Text details.
  • Logging to CSV format required at least one user-defined field, not just filename, page or sheet.
  • There was a 6-character limit on the length of the /LOG and /SAVE options.
  • The Configuration dialogue did not save two of the new logging options properly.

New in EscapeE 10.20B Beta (Oct 3, 2017)

  • There ius now a getFontName call which allows an import module to obtain the name of the font actually being used.

New in EscapeE 10.20A Beta (Sep 28, 2017)

  • The Postscript import module failed to close one of its threads when going backwards in the file.
  • Booklet printing of badly centred pages could result in poor alignment of the output pages.
  • Under some circumstances when creating a PDF with embeded Truetype fonts fonts were converted to bitmaps and the message "Nil font" was given.
  • There were problems when running multiple copies of EscapeE processing Postscript files using type 42 fonts (SPR1213).

New in EscapeE 10.18D (Jul 21, 2017)

  • The Minimum space width in Configuration/Text options under Text extraction is now used when finding tags (SPR1200).
  • The default minimum space size for text extraction has been increased from 30% to 70%.

New in EscapeE 10.18B/9 Beta (Jul 11, 2017)

  • New features:
  • When exporting images to IDF or HTML5 (UberEd) format any that were originally JPEG-compressed will be saved as JPEGs.
  • If the option to ignore white areas is selected then totally white images are ignored as well as white rectangles and filled paths.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Downloaded scaleable fonts are now registered as private which improves the performance of jobs using large number of fonts.
  • The Direct Print dialogue contained some irrelevant items.

New in EscapeE 10.18A/9 Beta (Jul 10, 2017)

  • Problem with IDF files reading a CSV before the first page.
  • Options for import modules not always honoured.
  • Options specified on the command line in a /INPUT parameter were not shown in the Configure dialogue.

New in EscapeE 10.18/9 Beta (Jun 30, 2017)

  • Features:
  • The "Duplex override" drop-down list for exporting now has more options. The options with their corresponding parameter in the /OUTPLEX option are:
  • N Simplex All pages are single-sided.
  • L All -> Long edge All pages are double-sided with flipping on the long edge.
  • S All -> Short edge All pages are double-sided with flipping on the long edge.
  • DL Duplex -> long edge Simplex pages have a blank back, duplex ones flip on long edge.
  • DS Duplex -> short edge Simplex pages have a blank back, duplex ones flip on short edge.
  • U Unspecified Do not specify a plex in PDF output.
  • - no option Use the duplex specification from the source file.
  • The default if the parameter is blank or omitted is that the specification is taken from the original file.
  • If the cursor is over a field then pressing the Ins key or right-clicking on "Add text" will use the ADDTEXT pluging to add the text within that field.
  • The ADDTEXT plugin configuration dialogue has a checkbox "Single line" which is set by default for any field whose height is insufficient for two line in the selected font size. If this checkbox is set then pressing enter is equivalent to clicking on OK rather than creating a second line of text. This makes it easy to fill in a series of fields such as a post code or account number which are specified in small 1-character fields.
  • Bug fixes:
  • AFP files using characters that did not occur the font could cause problems (SPR1196).
  • The ADDTEXT plugin configuration dialogue could sometimes append a spurious character to the text

New in EscapeE 10.17A/9 Beta (Jun 13, 2017)

  • The IDF wizard now displays its version number in the initial dialogue.
  • 10.17A: The PDF import module now honours the duplex/simplex specification introduced in level 8 PDFs.
  • 10.17A: Given the possibility of OCR on image files, the export of TIF file to text is now allowed.
  • Inconsistency in the IDF wizard between trimmed and untrimmed images in splitting files.
  • 10.17A: The BC128Reader plugin now sets the flag to inform EscapeE that its field has been updated (SPR 1189).
  • 10.17A: The IDF Wizard could give the error "Cannot focus a disabled or invisible window" under some circumstances.

New in EscapeE 10.17 (Jun 6, 2017)

  • The composite field wizard has been enhanced to support counters of fixed length with leading zeros. For those not familiar with composite fields, this wizard is invoked by clicking on the More button in the Fields dialogue after creating a composite field. By clicking on "If field found" after choosing a existing field one can set up a composite field that counts the number of time that field is found or not found. Checking the checkbox next to the digit 0 makes the counter into an n-digit zero-filled counter.
  • If an existing composite field is selected before clicking on More then, provided that it was defined using the wizard, the appropriate settings are shown in the wizard to reflect its interpretation.
  • Certain types of faulty TrueType Font Collection file can now be read.
  • If a duplex override is in force it is shown in maroon when exporting, as a warning.
  • The IDF wizard trimming and field defining now has a feature whereby the arrow keys adjust the field size. If the shift key is held when the arrow key is pressed then the field is reduced on the appropriate side, left for left arrow, top for up arrow etc. until a change of colour is encountered. This allows a white border to be removed easily, repeating if necessary to skip any spurious black marks. Holding the control key reverses the direction, and if no shift or control is held then the effect is just to ensure the appropriate part of the field is on view. The default criterion for considering a row or column to be white is that it contains 3 or fewer black pixels. This threshold can be changed using the up/down button in the box headed "Blank area".
  • Bug fixes:
  • The IDF feature whereby ORIENT='?' chooses the page orientation depending on the first file loaded on that page now works properly.
  • Better handling of IDF expressions that have to be deferred befor evaluation.
  • Totally blank pages were ignored when moving backwards through a PCL file after going two pages beyond the blank one.

New in EscapeE 10.16C/9 Beta (May 16, 2017)

  • The View feature in the IDF source window did not work for large files.
  • Conditional groups in IDF documents executed sub-groups even if the condition failed.

New in EscapeE 10.16B/9 Beta (May 12, 2017)

  • 10.16B: Corrections to the IDF Mail Merge Wizard.
  • 10.16B: Corrections to the Ctrl-drag feature for IDF documents.

New in EscapeE 10.15E (May 8, 2017)

  • 10.15E: Improved editing of IDF source files. The View button in the Source window can be used to show the effects of any editing without having to save the file.
  • 10.15E: Uses HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE as the Registry key to find RT.INI if not in WIN.INI or HKEY_CURRENT_USER.

New in EscapeE 10.15 (Apr 13, 2017)

  • Features:
  • There can be multiple IDF files under construction: the ‘New IDF file’ option adds a new tab to the Properties window and creates a vestigial file in it. If there is a currently selected area then that is put in as a clip region.
  • Menu items that add IDF elements do so to the current IDF file. This is the one shown in the current IDF tab or the one most recently shown.
  • Items on display in an IDF file can be moved by using Ctrl-Click and dragging. The items that will be moved are shown in red. N.B. this feature is still not fully developed, so use with care.
  • View/Show source for IDF source files now offers a choice of ‘Original IDF’, which is just the existing file, or ‘Modified IDF’ which is regenerated in canonical form by the RTIDFIN DLL incorporating any modification made using Ctrl-Click.
  • If there are any IDF files under construction then an IDF button is shown on the toolbar. Clicking this button shows the current IDF file window.
  • the old Control File window is now only used for LOF files or remembered file lists.
  • A number of menu captions relating to control files and viewing have been changed to make them easier to understand.
  • The IDF import DLL is now part of the standard delivery.
  • 10.15A: There is now a 'Find' button on the IDF tabs of the Properties window.
  • 10.15C: Added the Ctrl-S click in the main window to view the source file.
  • 10.15C: When viewing IDFfiles groups can be moved by dragging whilst holding down the Control key.
  • 10.15C: In the IDF source window added the following shortcutm keys:
  • Ctrl-Enter or Ctrl-J to select statement for the current page'
  • Ctrl-pgDn or Ctrl-N to move to next page and select its statement.
  • Ctl-G to call the "Go to page" dialogue and select the appropriate IDF statements for the page.
  • Ctl-X to call the IDF creation wizard.
  • 10.15C: The EscapeE Find and Goto dialogue now has a check box which causes the window to close after the search. This is checked by default after an initial Goto.
  • 10.15C: The IDF wizard supports clip regions with and without padding attop and bottom.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some of the plugin configuration files were omitted from the delivery.
  • When exporting IDF files which use the BASEFILE feature the PDF export module can now handle more complex cases involving recombining the resource data (SPR1175).
  • 10.15A: Toolbar overlap when not maximised.
  • 10.15A: Sharing conflict when trying to save a modified IDF.
  • 10.15A: The IDF button panel disappeared when closing one of multiple IDF output files.
  • 10.15A: There was no cursor in the IDF source window;
  • 10.15A: Some boxes in the fields dialogue overlapped with captions such as 'Width', 'Height' etc.
  • 10.15A: The Zoom in right-click menu item did not always appear.
  • 10.15A: There is a 'Remember' button in the fields dialogue to as EscapeE to remember the settings of 'Show fields', 'If found' and 'Show names'.
  • 10.15B: Print captureFiles greater than 32k did not work properly.
  • 10.15C: Saving the IDF source did not reload the file.
  • 10.15C: The IDF cursor y position was wrong after a group with padding at the bottom.
  • 10.15D: AFP medium maps referenced in the data part of a Begin Page (BPG) record are now honoured (SPR1180).
  • 10.15D: Multiple overlays specified within an AFP medium map are now honoured instead of just the first one (SPR1180).
  • 10.15D: Multiple objects within an AFP page segment are now honoured instead of just the first one (SPR1180).

New in EscapeE 10.14 (Apr 13, 2017)

  • Features:
  • There is a new Right-click option "Tagged Text" which combines the actions of the "New Tag" and "Add text" options. It sets up a text tag from the text that was clicked on and uses the AddText plugin to position new text to the right of the tag.
  • When defining a new tag the search area is now extended to encompass the tag and if the user has extended the tag that extra area is included.
  • If the user right-clicks on a Checkbox field the there is the option to check or uncheck it as appropriate.
  • Bug fixes:
  • In PDFs where the transparency setting means that no marks will appear on the page then any path drawing is skipped (SPR 1178).
  • Wrong font selection under certain circumstance (SPR 1176).

New in EscapeE 10.13 (Feb 19, 2017)

  • Features:
  • ICC colour profiles are now supported for Postscrip export.
  • The "View control file" menu item will now view whichever is appropriate of the IDF file being viewed or the control file being constructed.
  • Bug fixes:
  • If too many patterns or CMYK colours are used then a warning is given.

New in EscapeE 10.12 (Feb 19, 2017)

  • Features:
  • Simple bitmapped Canon print files can now be imported (SPR 1151).
  • Fields can now search for text in a particular symbol set.
  • Better implementation of fixed pitch fonts with non-standard heights.
  • 10.12A: If a plugin attempts to modify a PDF document that is marked as not editable then the corresponding field is disabled and a warning given.
  • Bug fixes:
  • PCL export did not support inline images.
  • IDF pages containing only Beziers and polylines did not work properly.
  • 10.12A: Wrongly formatted fonts list if very long selection sequence.
  • 10.12A: Fixes to Canon import.
  • 10.12A: Plugins could cause duplicate pages when running in interactive mode (SPR1166).
  • 10.12A: The option to ignore fonts if duplicated did not work when reading PDFs (SPR1166).
  • 10.12A: Path filled with white did not always view correctly (SPR1167).

New in EscapeE 10.11 (Feb 19, 2017)

  • Features:
  • Support for encrypted files produced by the RedTitan Print Monitor.
  • 10.11B: Added Print Monitor support for PCL-XL and other formats.
  • 10.11E: The "page length x lines" option on the printer tab now applies to Epson files as well as PCL ones.
  • 10.11E: Specifying /MACRO n on the command line now sets the "Permanent Macro" flag in the PCL options. This means that by specifying a subsequent /PCL option it is possible to use a batch file to create a PCL macro from a non-PCL file (SPR1165).
  • Bug fixes:
  • 10.11C: In edge-to-edge mode the default HP-GL clip region still cropped at the left of the printable area (SPR1160).
  • 10.11D: PCL-XL import did not allow extreme scaling of character size but now does, as long as the resulting pointsize is reasonable (SPR1164).
  • 10.11D: If calling the configuration dialogue from the Export dialogue, any changes to the macro number were ignored (SPR 1165). The macro number is now copied back to the box in the Export dialogue, which becomes visible if macro export is chosen.
  • 10.11D: An attempt to do "Save page as macro" when the source file contains macro now fails with a message saying to export to PCL and define the macro number in the PCL options.
  • 10.11E: HP-GL character fill mode 3 where the pen is used to trace the outline of a character did not work very well, especially when exporting to PDF (SPR 1162).

New in EscapeE 10.10C/9 (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Feature:
  • Bigger buffer for reading and PCL files, giving improved perfomance
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problem when exporting downloaded fonts as bitmaps if the space character was also the error character
  • Excessive memory usage where an image was used a few times and then not used again (SPR1148)

New in EscapeE 10.10B (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Bug fixes:
  • The euro character did not have the correct width in the default fonts used for creating PDFs (SPR1146).
  • Window too small for one of the dialogues that was changed in version 10.10A
  • Plugins could be run a second time when viewing a previously viewed page

New in EscapeE 10.10A (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Feature:
  • Improved dialogues for certain questions and error reports
  • Bug fixes:
  • The vertical scroll bar position could be wrong in some text windows
  • 10.10A: Problems with two-up and booklet printing to the Windows print driver

New in EscapeE 10.10 (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Features:
  • Better handling of control files and their associated menus.
  • Better handling of two-up printing
  • Improved help for the following plugins: MoveText, AddImage, AddFile & BarCode. Choose Download, EscapeE Web Install then Plugins to download from www.PCLVIEWER.COM
  • Better able to read files intended for the Fujitsu FTP-641MCL504 thermal printer (SPR1142)
  • Bug fixes:
  • Epson 400 file gives 'Bad row number: 0' (SPR 1133)
  • Setting up a plugin when no fields were defined caused an access protection fault.
  • Problems when exporting lists of files (SPR1134)
  • Border settings were ignored when exporting an image of just the printed area (SPR1143)
  • PDF import uses less memory and the memory management speed is improved (SPR 1138)
  • The option to disable the auto-popup of the right-click menu did not work properly.

New in EscapeE 10.09H (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Bug fixed:
  • Exiting from EscapeE after scrolling the fonts window could give Scrollbar property out of range.

New in EscapeE 10.09G (Oct 28, 2016)

  • Features:
  • Improved Character recognition dialogue with help button
  • There is an "Autopopup" option on the main window's right-click menu. If this option is checked (the default state) then selecting an area causes this menu to be shown. If not checked then a right-click is needed to see the menu
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problems with character code recognition for fonts with many characters.
  • Changing between duplex and simplex did not always set the print position to the default top of page value (SPR 1126).
  • When a complex page had to be converted to an image there was a problem with very large outline fonts (SPR1125).

New in EscapeE 10.09F (Aug 12, 2016)

  • There is now a Close item in the File menu of the control file window (clicking the close box simply hides the window as before).

New in EscapeE 10.09E (Aug 12, 2016)

  • Scrollbars in the Font details and Control file windows now reflect the proportion of the data on display.

New in EscapeE 10.07D/9 (Apr 8, 2016)

  • There is now a JPEG options button on the Configuration/Graphics tab which takes you to the same dialogue as is reached from clicking on More... in the PDF export options. N.B. the JPEG options are only relevant for PDF and Postscript export.
  • There is a check-box in the JPEG options which asks to use JPEG compression if (and only if) the image was orginally sourced from a JPEG. This will apply to JPEG images read from .JPG files, IDF documents or images compressed using DCT compression in PDFs and can result in significant reductions in the size of such files when exported to PDF or Postscript. To specify this on the command-line append ,JP to the JPEGOPTS parameter.
  • If you right-click on an image in EscapeE and ask for graphic details it says '... JPEG graphic ..." if it was read from a JPEG.
  • The AFP import mechanism has been enhanced to perform substitute fonts for any that are not included in the datastream. The user can provide a file called afpsubstitutefonts.txt in the same directory as the RT.INI file with the following syntax:
  • CodedFontName, Substitute Truetype name, size in 1/100 point
  • This can be optionally followed by ,B for bold, I for Italic, and comments
  • can be added, introduced by a semicolon.
  • Bug Fixes:
  • Problem with character recognition if glyph 3 which Windows requires to be the space character is actually printable (SPR1090).
  • Postscript files starting with PJL commands but not %! were not read (SPR1101).
  • The serif style was ignored when substituting for unknown fonts in PDFs.

New in EscapeE 10.04C/9 (Feb 17, 2016)

  • Features:
  • The STAR POS printer input format is now more fully (though still not fully) implemented (SPR1073).
  • If an Epson file is printed in upside down mode then EscapeE rotates the view accordingly (SPR1064).
  • The fonts list and the Font Properties dialogue show the slant angle for any skewed fonts.
  • Better parsing of LOF control files.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some handle problems involving using a plugin to overlay a PCL file when the fields file also invoked a header file.
  • The Field Found indication was not always set in the fields dialogue when showing fields on the last page of a file (SPR1071).
  • Problems with reloading a page of a file which started with a Configure Raster command.
  • When installing Truetype fonts the compressed style was not always recognised (SPR1072).
  • The /TO option did not work properly if wildcarded in conjunction with a list of input files.
  • The IDF REPEAT mechanism did not work well for multiple files.
  • Multi-page Star files did not always work properly.
  • Fields not always extracted properly in rotated text.
  • Star printer font handling and end-of-file handling were not right.
  • The TIFF CCITT group 3 Fax compression mode used the user's options for byte-alignment, EOL codes and single-strip mode. To avoid problems with poor faxing software these options are now all set when group 3 Fax compression is selected but can be changed if required (SPR1080).
  • Further fix for text extraction for pages with text rotated clockwise (SPR1077).
  • Installing Truetype fonts from a file could result in zero widths in the RESIDENT.FIF file (SPR1081).
  • Memory loss using the ROCR OCR plugin (SPR1079).

New in EscapeE 10.03D/1.0.0.0 (Feb 9, 2016)

  • FEATURES:
  • There is now an Options menu for the IDF control file window. The options are:
  • Full-width select:
  • This expands any clipped areas to the full page width when adding them to the document. It is useful if re-paginating a document by moving items between pages.
  • Relative paths:
  • If this is checked then and file paths that are the same as that of the IDF file are omitted. In order for this to make this work the user is prompted for a file name when creating the IDF document, rather than when saving it.
  • Keep coordinates:
  • This encloses each clipped region in a group such that is it positioned as it was in the original document. This option has been moved from the File menu.
  • Adding an IDF element when the cursor in the IDF control file window is below the last page element will create a new page.
  • Complex elements such as paths can now be moved by plugins.
  • 10.03A: the /LPRL option is now a synonym for /LPRU to define the user field used by NQ.
  • 10.03B: Better handling of Truetype fonts with incorrect max stack size in the maxp record or wrong Windows ascent & descent values in the OS/2 record (SPR1065 & SPR1066).
  • 10.03D: The STAR input format is now recognised (though not fully implemented).
  • BUG FIXES:
  • A null fields file could be created when copying items to the clipboard in IDF format.
  • 10.03A: It was sometimes necessary to click on the main window twice to get focus (SPR 1052).
  • 10.03A: Sparse fonts containing certain character codes did not work properly under Windows 10 (SPR 1058).
  • 10.03A: Line-drawing could go wrong in IDF scripts calling for rotated files.
  • 10.03C: Font spacing incorrect in when reading certain Postscript files which redefined the fonts (SPR 1068).
  • 10.03C: It was not possible to select an area with a negative x or y coordinate.
  • 10.03C: The appropriate PJL commands are output when exporting to PCL or Postscript in edge-to-edge mode (unless the "Do not use PJL commands" is checked in the options).
  • 10.03C: If the main file is on the nul device then no attempt is made to reload it.
  • 10.03D: Problems in extracting Unicode text from merged fonts (SPR 1069).
  • 10.03D: Monochrome IM images in AFP input did not work correctly if the images width was not a multiple of 8 (SPR 1070).

New in EscapeE 10.02E/ 1.0.0.0 (Dec 18, 2015)

  • Correction of faulty truetype fonts in pdfs where the OS/2 usWinAscent was too small.
  • Workaround for bug in Windows 10 concerning TrueType fonts with too few characters.

New in EscapeE 10.02C/ 1.0.0.0 (Dec 18, 2015)

  • Some types of file no longer have to be converted wholely to images when exporting to PDFs.

New in EscapeE 10.02B/ 1.0.0.0 (Nov 27, 2015)

  • Features:
  • There is now an UberEd export format which generates HTML5 format suitable to reading with the RedTitan UberEd program for subsequent editing and document creation purposes. The command line option is /UBERED
  • The UberEd, IDF and RTF export formats now have a configuration dialogue. There are two modes of operation: using fiuelds to define which areas are to be included, or simply exporting the whole page. The dialogue has the following options:
  • Use existing fields:
  • Use the existing field definitions for describing the areas to export.
  • Define fields automatically
  • Define fields encompassing the various items on the page. An attempt is made to recognise right-justified, filled or centred text and to set the field type accordingly. Graphics are marked as of type Graphic but areas can be swept out without specifying a type, in which case anything in the are will be rendered as a graphic for export.
  • Use same fields on each page
  • Any automatically-defined fields are set up so they only apply to the current page.
  • Show Fields form
  • The fields definition form is shown for each page so that corrections can be made to any of the fields before exporting that page.
  • Delete Existing Fields
  • All existing fields can be deleted by clicking on this button. Confirmation is required before this action is carried out.
  • Show lines
  • Include lines and paths in the output.
  • Show graphics
  • Include graphics in the output.
  • Use same options for each page
  • Do not show this dialogue for subsequent pages.
  • X difference to be vertically aligned
  • The maximum difference in 1/600" pixels between x coordinates for two items to be considered to be vertically aligned when deciding the text alignment mode.
  • Flowed text
  • Line breaks will not be preserved.
  • The right-click option to copy text in IDF format is now "Copy as IDF/UberED" and puts an HTML version of the selected area on the clipboard in UberEd format as well as text in IDF format as previously.
  • Support for radial blends in PDFs.
  • Support for colour-key transparency in PDFs (SPR 1049).
  • Any hexadecimal characters in the text string in the font details dialogue are now shown in red to aid legibility.
  • 10.02C: Some types of file no longer have to be converted wholely to images when exporting to PDFs.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Memory could be used up when importing PDF files using colour space management (SPR 1049).
  • Problem with an unusual Flate predictor usage for non-image data (SPR 1050).
  • Body text in EscapeE Fields files was not fully supported.
  • Carriage returns and line feeds were ignored if right at the start of a PCL file when there were no PJL command preceding them (SPR 1057).
  • Problems could occur when re-opening a PCL/XL file after switching to another program.
  • 10.02B: Problems with repeatedly defined fonts in PDFs (SPR 1062).
  • 10.02C: PDF with form-filling gave 'Bad File Format' (SPR1050).
  • 10.02C: Possible loop if there was no access to the RT.INI file.

New in EscapeE 10.01 / 1.0.0.0 (Nov 20, 2015)

  • Features:
  • There is now the option to select text on the basis of whether or not the baseline of the string falls within the field. Previously the text was selected if any part of the character cell (not just the black area) fell within the field. This is still the default mode of operation but in the Text options there is now a check bock "Criterion is text baseline rather than text extent when selecting"
  • EscapeE now logs the date and time and details of any errors encountered on its RT.INI file in a file called escapee.log in the Windows temp folder (normally C:\Users\\AppData\Local\Temp).
  • Bug fixes:
  • If a PDF substitute font name has a style specified e.g. Arial,Bold then the exported font name became Arial,Bold,Bold.
  • When reading PCL-XL the POPGS command did not restore the saved clipPath (SPR 1046).
  • Problems in exporting IDF or Rich Text when no fields are defined.
  • If there was an error in the IDF file then the Edit and View Control File options were disabled.
  • Overly flexible command-line parsing could result in misleading error messages for syntax errors (SPR 1048).

New in EscapeE 9.52/ 1.0.0.0 (Oct 22, 2015)

  • FEATURES:
  • AFP input can now use ICC colour profiles when converting from CMYK to RGB. If an AFP mask is used in conjunction with a CMYK image then the default ICC setting will be unconditionally used to render the image as an RGBA image in order to apply the mask and maintain accurate output colours.
  • There are two new command-line options to alter the format of CSV output records (SPR 1040):
  • CSVSEPARATOR:
  • specifies a separator other than the default comma. /CSVSEPARATOR T can be used to specify tab as the separator.
  • CSVQUOTE:
  • specifies a quote other than the default double quote. To specify single quote use /CSVQUOTE "'" and to specify that the data is not to be in quotes /CSVQUOTE N can be used.
  • Improved handling of multiply-defined PC-XL fonts (SPR 1041).
  • Greater tolerance for errors in PDFs such as repeated minus signs (SPR 1037).
  • Better support for Postscript type 0 fonts and some support for the undocumented type 4 format (SPR 1026).
  • The Properties/Source page now has a search feature which can be invoked using the the right-click menu or (if the window has focus) the F3 key.
  • Bug fixes:
  • There were problems in reading files larger than 2 gigabytes if they contained downloaded Truetype fonts (SPR 1041).
  • It was not possible to list the source of just a single page of a PCL XL file.
  • IDF format did not support CMYK colour.
  • When converting line-art files with few colours to image formats the result was sometimes produced in monochrome.
  • Various fixes to the IDF wizard:
  • Poor diagnostics if the user specified an illegal numbers e.g. binding margin 1z.
  • Better handling of images with no resolution specified.
  • Items such as the Bar numbers check box and binding margin are hidden if not relevant.
  • Page number X and Y offsets and binding margin did not work properly if specified in inches.
  • The "Others" menu has a "Re-paginate" option to remove new page commands.
  • Added text could have extra characted appended to it.

New in EscapeE 9.51 (Jul 21, 2015)

  • Better printing dialogue as regards tray selection. It is possible to override the original tray selection by choosing for the trays oif the currently selected Windows printer. The spin button is a way of setting up the HPTRAYS symbol which gives a list of tray numbers corresponding to trays 1 to n in the original print file. In the Text configuration options there is now a checkbox "Use converted codes when exporting" which uses the character codes as translated by the character conversion database when exporting. This means the text in a PDF or PCL file exported in this way is searchable (SPR 1023). Note that there is the danger that if some characters are not recognised then the displayed result will be wrong. Currently for PDFs this does not work well when including TrueType fonts in the output. There is preliminary code for interpreting XML-encoded HP-GL comments. 9.51C: Assign unique names to fields created from PJL commands by appending a number to any that are duplicated. 9.51C: Permit plus signs in output file names if no Bates page numbering in use. 9.51C: More general recognition of when a filled area can be replaced by a solid rectangle. 9.51E: Improved handling of cases of multiple updating of a font file when reading Postscript. 9.51F: Added paper sizes SRA4, SRA3, RA4 and RA3. 9.51G: The arithmetic minus (hex 2212) is now converted to hyphen (2D) when converting Unicode to single-byte characters (SPR 1036).
  • Bug fixes:
  • The feature for ignoring downloaded fonts if substituted did not work for bitmapped fonts.
  • The PDFTRAYMODE value was not being saved if changed in the configuration dialogue (SPR 1022).
  • In the image configuration under "Smoothing for output to/Monochrome images" 4-bit gray-scale or 8-bit gray-scale is selected the image came out black & white even if "Force monochrome" was not specified (SPR 1024).
  • Memory protect fault in certain cases of export to image format at non-standard resolution (SPR 1020).
  • Changing the "Assign character codes using the TTLIB database" option did not take immediate effect.
  • The cancel reply in response to a question about scaling the page during printing did not work.
  • Problem in using a standard Adobe font for a bitmap font.
  • Text in the status bar sometimes did not refresh properly, leading to overprinting.
  • Setting Custom paper size in centimetres did not work properly.
  • There was a 1 in 4094 chance of failing properly to terminate LZW compression, ued in some Postscript exports.

New in EscapeE 9.50 (Mar 31, 2015)

  • Features:
  • Outline fonts now supported in AFP import.
  • AFP Barcodes now support additional information for certain barcodes (e.g. rectangular option in Data Matrix) and now recognise the no translation option. Unusual AFP defined orientations for barcodes now have limited support.
  • Improved Help documentation of command-line options.
  • HP-GL CF command is now more fully implmented.
  • Bug fixes:
  • When viewing the export options the tab now says "Options" rather than "General".
  • Alpha channel images did not work when converting to monochrome.
  • Specifying the PDF font in a font substitution file failed for newly installed Truetype fonts.

New in EscapeE 9.49 (Feb 3, 2015)

  • Outline fonts now supported in AFP import.
  • AFP Barcodes now support additional information for certain barcodes (e.g. rectangular option in Data Matrix) and now recognise the no translation option. Unusual AFP defined orientations for barcodes now have limited support.

New in EscapeE 9.48 (Jan 30, 2015)

  • Features:
  • Initial support for touch-screen gestures.
  • Improved compresion for certain imagest in PDF export.
  • Improved music part creation in the IDF wizard.
  • Better diagnostics for problems when exporting comments.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Wrong file extension used when fields forced new log and new output files at the same time.

New in EscapeE 9.47 (Dec 5, 2014)

  • Features:
  • There is an option in the PCL configuration whereby a prefix string can be specified such that any PJL comment, PJL JOB and PJL JOBATTR items creat fields with a name beginning with the prefix. For example setting a prefix of PJL_ would mean that a PJL command @PJL COMMENT NAME=David Fletcher would result in a field PJL_NAME with value David Fletcher. When parsing such PJL commands the name is split from the value at the first occurrence of the PJL separator. If no separator is given then separators colon, equals and space are looked for in that order. The command-line equivalents of these options are PJLPREFIX and PJLSEPARATOR. If a PJL prefix is given and 'Export PJL comments' is specified then when exporting to PDF, Postscript or PCL instead of just copying any PJL comments they are reconstructed from any fields with the appropriate prefix. This means it is possible to construct them based on the data in the file.
  • The HP GL AC (Anchor Corner) command is now implemented and user-defined shading patterns implemented better.
  • When printing and scaling to fit the paper there is now an option to crop the output to the specified paper size.
  • The following keystrokes are now aavailable to display field when viewing the main
  • window (not the fields dialogue):
  • Alt + down arrow – select next field
  • Alt + up arrow – select previous field
  • Alt + left arrow – select parent field Alt + right arrow – select first child field
  • Bug fixes:
  • When reading graphics any pixels that are completely transparent black are converted into transparent white to avoid problems in Adobe Acrobat TM.
  • Character recognition did not work for bitmapped fonts with character codes above hex FF.

New in EscapeE 9.46 (Oct 24, 2014)

  • Features:
  • When using the Windows Print feature there is now a preview panel showing the final appearance.
  • On the General tab of the Configuration dialogue in the 'ignore' section for download fonts there is now a check box 'if same header'. If this box is checked then any downloaded font which has the same ID and an identical header to a previously loaded font will be ignored. This can be used to avoid multiple copies of a font being included in the output. The corresponding ignore option is U (unique) e.g. /IGNORE U
  • Bug fixes:
  • Using a field to force a front side did not always work for PCL input.
  • Problems with including Truetype fonts in exorted PDFS.
  • Closing the console window in the IDF wizard could cause problems.
  • Problem with exporting non-standard palette images using JPEG compression.

New in EscapeE 9.45 (Aug 25, 2014)

  • Features:
  • EscapeE can now read files intended for the Epson 6200 and related printers.
  • The EscapeE help is now available in German if German language is selected. Because there are a few obscure topics not yet translated, and because the German version may not be as up-to-date as the English one, there is a "Help in English" option in the Help menu to call the English version.
  • Previously if an IDF file cited a filename in the tag it implied that the specified PDF file was to be used as a basis for a modified PDF but it transpires that for some types of PDF this is not currently possible. Therefore there is now a BASEFILE attribute for the tag which explicitly requests this feature, leaving the FILENAME attribute available for cases where the same file happens to be used by several pages but any exported PDF is created from scratch.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some RedTitan error messages were reported as if they were Windows errors e.g. unexpected end of file was reported as "Cannot create another system semaphore".
  • Minor bug fixes to the document creation wizard.
  • If a user-defined input format was used then its DLL name did not appear in the list of available input formats.
  • There were problems if the errorlog file ever reach a size of 2 Gigabytes, so now after it gets to 10 Megabytes the existing file is renamed with extension ~log (any such previous file being erased) and a new file is started.

New in EscapeE 9.44 (Jun 13, 2014)

  • Features:
  • When exporting to PDF it is now possible to include Solimar finishing instructions such as tray selection. In the PDF export options click Advanced then More and choose whether to look up the tray number in the list of Postscript trays, PCL trays, trays appropriate to input format or simply use the original tray number.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problem with "Type3 font resln varies".

New in EscapeE 9.43 (May 3, 2014)

  • Features:
  • Improved font properties dialogue, distinguishing the case where a font was unavailable by putting its name in square barackets.
  • Improved font substitute file dialogue. For PCL fonts the default is now that the "Match name" box is not checked. If the default substitute file is changed the it is put into current use unless an it has been over-ruled by a /SUBST option.
  • If an import module outputs messages to the log window then the yellow exclamation mark icon is displayed. The error list now includes "Warning messages" and clicking on it displays the log window.
  • When defining a text tag then if an area has been selected beforehand the tag string is set to the text within that area.
  • The AFP import module can handle the situation where Presentation Text input data elements span records.
  • If colour is set to white in AFP GOCA processing then it is treated as opaque.
  • Better error messages if there is a problem with colour in AFP GOCA
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some items were wrongly scaled when exporting to 8-bit monochrome images.
  • Problem with PDF import in the case of a named Type1 font that is not included in the PDF, and where no encoding is supplied.
  • Custom line patterns in IDF were not cancelled at the end of the group containing them.
  • Text drawn as filled and outlined paths in AFP input is handled better.

New in EscapeE 9.42 (Apr 28, 2014)

  • Features:
  • In the Format group in the Configuration dialogue there is now a drop-down list of 23 input formats as well as the list of export formats. These correspond to the formats that can be specified in the /INPUT option.
  • Import DLLs can have a list of options given as a string following the import format e.g. /INPUT PCC,ROW to specify row mode.
  • The PCC import module can now handle files where the row (line number) on the page is given as a 3-digit decimal number in columns 1-3 of each line. This mode is specified by the ROW option (see above).
  • It is now possible to have IDF tags with their own name space eg. . These will be ignored by RTIDFIN.
  • The HP-GL CF command in outline mode is now implemented.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The bullet character in RTF input was not rendered properly on export.
  • There was a problem in linking from the EscapeE help to other help files such as that for EEFONTS in some situations. There is now a RedTitan HH.EXE that sets the current folder before calling the standard HH.EXE.
  • The setting of the checkbox "Space width = cell width" was not saved.
  • If the hotkeys were used to move fields up or down in the tree view then the fact that the had been changed was not noted so they would not be saved unless other changes were made.
  • Problem with some types of filled pattern in PDFs.
  • The option to log page number was sometimes wrongly disabled in the export dialogue.
  • White text in bitmapped fonts was not visible at low viewing scales.

New in EscapeE 9.41 (Mar 21, 2014)

  • Features:
  • The default font can be any of the installed Windows fonts, not just a few predefined ones. The arrow next to the font selection string of the Printer tab in the configuration dialogue now shows a full font list and has an option to select Bold if wanted. The syntax of the /SELECT command has been enhanced to allow a font name instead of a typeface e.g.
  • /SELECT "^(19U^(s0p11.8h11.73vsb'Lucida Console'"
  • The RTPCCIN import module can now handle files which use the format where columns 1-3 are a line number, and column 4 is a number of lines to skip before printing. This is the default for files with extensions other than .pcc which are treated as having lineprinter-style printer control codes where 1 = skip to channel 1, 2 = skip to channel 2 etc. + = overprint.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problem selecting Windows fonts referenced in PDFs.
  • Confusing dialogue when saving a font substitute file.
  • Symbol set Auto was wrongly selected when choosing "RedTitan DDF (Preprinter) as the input source type.
  • Incrementally downloaded fonts in Postscript did not always work properly.
  • Substituted fonts were not always recorded as such.

New in EscapeE 9.40 (Feb 18, 2014)

  • It is now possible to export just the selected pages of each of a list of files and for instance export the first page of each file in the list.
  • It is now possible to select an area of a page in EscapeE and using Alt-Click to drag it on to the IDF document creation wizard so that it is added to the list of file segments being assembled. This is particularly useful when generating a document in close-packed mode.
  • Bug fixes:
  • When doing printing from EscapeE using the Windows driver the page was sometimes unnecessarily scaled down in size.

New in EscapeE 9.39 (Feb 11, 2014)

  • Features:
  • Better handling of unknown fonts in PDFs.
  • User=defined line types in PDFs are implemented.
  • AFP images compressed using CCITT4 with spurious EOL codes and redundant white runs can now be handled.
  • There is now an option to scale an image by a percentage. The command line syntax is /RESIZE x,y where x and y are in pixels by default. If the parameters are followed by " they give a size in inches, if followed by % they specify a percentage change, otherwise if they contain a decimal point the size is in centimeters. In the percentage case the second figure may be omitted e.g. /RESIZE 90% will make the image 90% of normal size.
  • Postscript files preceded by Epson EJL commands are now recognised.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problems with generating bitmapped fonts from Opentype fonts when exporting.
  • Line thicknes could be wrong when drawing Bezier curves in imported AFP files.
  • The /JOIN option inhibited the reading of library fonts.
  • CMY images could lose pixels at the right-hand edge.
  • Correction to fix in 9.39B for CMY images.
  • Problem with reading embedded Opentype fonts in PCL files.
  • Occasional "Invalid file handle" message when re-opening a PCL file containing macros after switching to another program.
  • In IDF files there was a problem when rotationg large images through angles not a multiple of 90 degrees.
  • Some red warning messages shown in the status bar were not very clear.

New in EscapeE 9.38 (Nov 9, 2013)

  • Features:
  • When exporting AFP files the page can be scaled using the image scaling mechanism.
  • If printing a two-page file as a booklet the pages are printed side-by-side in simplex rather than on opposite sides of the paper.
  • Enhancements to the IDF mechanism to allow stacking of elements by specifying X="X" or Y="Y" to use the current cursor position left by text or the bottom right hand corner of the previous group.
  • The PDF import module is more forgiving of Truetype fonts whose Poastscipt character names are incorrect.
  • Bug fixes:
  • One atom was consumed for each run of EscapeE, thus gradually consuming memory.
  • Problem with shifting shared path elements used in IDF documents.
  • Obscure problem in PDF reading, giving "Object stream not found".

New in EscapeE 9.37 (Sep 18, 2013)

  • Features:
  • More general patterns in PDF import can be handled.
  • Alpha channel transparency coded to avoid bug in Windows.
  • Alpha channel transparency now propagated into exported PDFs rather than imaging the whole page.
  • Check box to select A3 paper when booklet printing.
  • Bug fixes:
  • When trimming exported images to the printable area of the page, the right and bottom bounds were too generous.
  • If a /TO command line option was used to define the output file name then the {_oname} special field only reflected this after the first page.
  • Some pages were unnecessarily converted to images when exporting to PDF.
  • TLE records in AFP export did not work well for multiple tags referring to page groups consisting of multiple pages.
  • When doing booklet printing the right-hand page was printed too close to the edge of the paper.

New in EscapeE 9.36 (Jun 26, 2013)

  • Features:
  • The Fields dialogue has been improved by adding an extra "Action" tab which contains the actions that were previously on the "Advanced" tab. In order to see the PDF and XML tabs it will be necessary to click on the scrolling arrows at the top of the dialogue. There are two extra mutually exclusinve check boxes: "Force front side" and "Force back side" which select the appropriate side of the paper, which is useful when changing trays for example.
  • When modifying an existing composite field using the "More" button an attempt is made to parse the existing syntax (or the selected part of it) and fill in the dialogue appropriately. This is likely to succeed only if the field has been set up using the standard syntax such as generated by the dialogue.
  • Improved handling of transparency when reading PDFs and exporting the result.
  • When saving the downloaded fonts into a separate file they are all marked as permanent.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The value of some composite fields could persist even if the "Persistent fields" option on the Fields/File tab was not selected.
  • Very long lines of text in AFP input were truncated.
  • In PCL3 GUI input, alternating uncompressed data with compressed led to pixels being replicated.

New in EscapeE 9.35 (Apr 19, 2013)

  • Features:
  • AFP import now supports more of the advanced drawing features:
  • drawing arcs specified in AFP GOCA (the graphics drawing) input.
  • masked images
  • tile support in AFP IOCA (images)
  • Support for additional sequences and combinations of AFP input records.
  • Tray number now displayed on page for AFP input.
  • Better support for patterns and user-defined lines.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Some fields retained their values even when their parent field was not found.

New in EscapeE 9.34 (Apr 9, 2013)

  • Features:
  • Generalised PDF shading now implemented.
  • Improved field recognition in IDF export. Supperscripted text is included as part of the current line rather than being a new paragraph.
  • In the fields dialogue when clicking on a field in the tree view there is now a right-click option to combine it with the field below.
  • After clicking on a field in the tree view, pressing the Delete key will delete it. other hot-keys are:
  • Ctrl-C
  • combine with field below.
  • Ctrl-D
  • move the field down in the tree
  • Ctrl-N
  • create a new sub-field
  • Ctrl-U
  • move the field up in the tree
  • The IDF wizard can now edit Rich Text items.
  • There is an option use the top of the character cell as the reference point rather than the baseline when doing text extraction. This means that superscripted text is treated as part of the same line rather than being on a separate one. This mode is requested by checking "Align using top of cell" on the Text configuration page or specifying V as one of the /TEXT parameters
  • Zenographics format as used by the HP1020 etc. can now be read. It requires extra DLLs and and EXE that can be downloaded separately from the RedTitan web site.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The message warning that a licence is about to expire is no longer shown if EscapeE is in continuous operation.
  • Alignment problem if PCL-XL input with certain partially loaded fonts.
  • Problems in interpreting options when creating documents in the IDF wizard
  • Problems could occur in IDF export if the automatically-generated fields were edited before continuing with the export.
  • Various problems concerning editing of lists of files and in interpreting them.
  • In IDF documents font names such as "Times New Roman Bold" were not recognised as being a bold version of Times New Roman.

New in EscapeE 9.33C (Mar 5, 2013)

  • In the case when control code characters had to be rendered as graphics the alignment was not always correct with regard to characters redered using the font.
  • Problem with PDFs using Flate compression for part of the PDF only.

New in EscapeE 9.33 (Mar 2, 2013)

  • Features:
  • There is now the option to export to Postscript as an image with hidden text.
  • Bug fixes:
  • The odd/even path filling method was not supported in PCL XL or Postscript export.
  • The Action box in the field dialogue was misleadingly checked even if the field was not enabled for the current page.

New in EscapeE 9.32 (Mar 2, 2013)

  • Features:
  • Digital signing and encrypition of PDFs using security certificates is now implemented. There is a Security option button on the PDF options page which brings up a panel offering the following:
  • "Manage certificates" which runs the EECERTS programs to perform functions such as viewing certificates and creating lists of certificates for signing documents.
  • A list certificate profiles suitable for digital signing.
  • A list of recipients whose public keys are available for enryption.
  • The PCLSLEEK printer language, similary to PCL3GUI, is now recognised and differing x and y resolutions are now supported..
  • Adding opaque images (as opposed to text) by plugin is now implemented
  • Bug fixes:
  • Saving the current page as a macro did not always work as well as it should.
  • Minor problem with some PCL images using compression mode 9.
  • Images scaled up as 8-bit gray scale could show striations.
  • Invalid shading patterns are now treated as white
  • Changing a field size with window scrolling could cause red lines to remain until a delayed refresh.
  • 09.32A: alternate fill method was not fully supported in reading PCLXL.
  • 09.32A: deleting text which was the target of a field search did not always work correctly.

New in EscapeE 9.31 (Feb 13, 2013)

  • Features:
  • When clicking to select a particular element of the page e.g. for creating a tagged field, a list of possible elements is presented to the user if there is more than one at that position on the page.
  • The PDF configuration now has a separate button which invokes a Security panel with options relating to encryption. The two existing options, "save encrypted password in the PDF" and the encryption key length have been moved to this panel.
  • If the format is changed when exporting then a "Save format" button appears. Clicking on this button saves the new format as the default without saving any other parameters that might have changed in the current session. To save them just use the Save button in the Options/Configuration.
  • There is a new option for the /DRAW command-line option: Q which requests EscapeE to perform non-orthogonal image rotation directly rather than using the Windows coordinate transformation, which cannot handle large scaling factors.
  • Improvements to the patterned drawing when reading PDFs.
  • More tolerance of CCITT compressed lines which replicate too long a run from the previosu line.
  • Provides for RS2 to determine the parent of a field.
  • Support default font specified with AFP input.
  • If the DPI is specified within an AFP JPEG image or within the input image parameters of an IOCA image then this is honoured.
  • In AFP the Code Page Control record of a font is now read and if a space character is explicitly specified then this is forced.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Alignment issues when reading images from PDFs using JBIG2 compression.
  • Problems of text direction with obscure coordinate transformatons in PDFs.
  • Possible memory leak when reading rotated graphics.

New in EscapeE 9.30 (Feb 13, 2013)

  • Features:
  • EscapeE can now be run and controlled from an external program such as EEVIEW. It musit be called with the /PIPE command specifying a named pipe which will be used for communication . The following commands can be sent to EscapeE on the pipe:
  • ALPHA a
  • Set the alphablend transparency value to a (1-255).
  • CLOSE
  • close the current file
  • FIND s
  • find the specified string
  • MENU x
  • N= do not show the toolbar and menus. Y = default case, where they are shown.
  • OPEN f
  • open file f
  • PAGE p
  • go to page p
  • TIPS n
  • if n is odd then show the console window on enountering erros, if even the do not show it.
  • WINDOW s,l,t,w,h
  • Specifies state of window on startup
  • 0=Normal, 1=Minimized, 2=Maximized
  • Left offset in pixels
  • Top offset in pixels
  • Window width in pixels
  • Window height in pixels.
  • exit from EscapeE
  • The returned result is 'OK' if successful or 'BUSY' if EscapeE is not idle when the command arrives. There are a few commands which take effect immediately rather then when EscapeE is idle:
  • !PAGE
  • returns the number of the page currently on view, 0 if none.
  • abort
  • !ZOOM n
  • change the zoom factor (parameters as for the ZOOM command-line option).
  • There is a new special field {_RTID} which returns the RedTitan PC ID.
  • It is possible to have different units for specifying field dimensions in a .ee file. Preceed a dimension with UNITS="u" where u is one of
  • inches
  • Centimetres
  • Decipoints (1/720")
  • DOTS
  • 1/300"
  • DOT600
  • 1/600"
  • The highest error number specifiable on the /ERROROK option is now 209.
  • There is a /MENU N option to avoid showing the toolbar and menus.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Graphical tags might not be found unless fields were saved in units of 1/600".
  • Field details were not always refreshed after reconfiguring a plugin.
  • XML tag names were not saved in the fields file.
  • In the case of fields which could occur multiple times, the subfield contents were not always shown in the fields dialogue.

New in EscapeE 9.29 (Feb 13, 2013)

  • Features:
  • There is a new option to specify which errors should cause an
  • abort (syntax similar to /ERROROK):
  • /ABORT a,b,c...
  • /ABORT ALL
  • Use this option to abort on specified errors, where a, b, c etc. are return codes
  • that are to be treated as unacceptable and cause EscapeE to terminate processing the
  • current file. E.g.
  • /ABORT–134..-126,-140
  • aborts on encountering error code -140 and all the codes in the range (denoted by ..) -134 up to -126 inclusive. In the special case of /ABORT ALL, all errors not ignored by the /ERROROK specification will cause an abort. The valid range of error numbers is from -439 to 199. The action on aborting a file is determined by the value of the new /ABORTACTION option whose parameter which can be a combination of
  • to erase the faulty input file (the default is to rename it if there has been an error)
  • to abort timed processing and exit (the default is to ignore the file and carry on).
  • 9.29A Shows horizontal compression/expansion factors in the fonts list.
  • The option /ABORTLOG is equivalent to /NQLOG in that it specified the name of a folder into which aborted output files and error logs are placed. The input file’s disposition depends on the value of the /ERASE option:
  • /ERASE OK
  • the input files are erased if successfully processed.
  • /ERASE
  • (no parameters) erases the input files
  • /ERASE N
  • (or /ERASE not specified) renames the input files as *.bak
  • The /RENAME option can be used to rename the input file after processing, or move it to another folder if not erased as specified by /ERASE
  • The Export as a macro option now allows the macro number to be specified.
  • 9.29E: Better diagnostics if an image file added by a plugin is not found.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problem with Epson R200 images using adaptive compression.
  • Page numbers were always included in XML output regardless of the option settings.
  • 9.29B: Possible crash if too many cached images on PDF export.
  • 9.29C: If a downloaded bitmap font was selected using the wrong width then characters were spaced according to that width.
  • 9.29D: Possible crash when converting outline fonts to bitmaps for PCL export.
  • 9.29D: Excessive font caching when converting outline fonts to bitmaps for PCL export.
  • 9.29E: Configuring a plugin from the Fields dialogue did not refresh the view of the page.
  • 9.29E: HMI no longer reset when changing orientation.
  • 9.29E: Problem reading CCITT compressed images from PDFs when stream size unknown.

New in EscapeE 9.28 (Feb 13, 2013)

  • Features:
  • AFP input now assigns Unicode values based on character names if they are standard ones.
  • 09.28A: The image cache size can now be changed in the Configuration/Images dialogue.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Problems with multiple copies when doing booklet printing.
  • A PostScript output file compressed with FLATE compression could not exceed 2 Gbytes in size.
  • Rare problem relating to EOF markers and buffer size when uncompressing certain Postscript files.
  • Problems with unwanted clipping in PCL export.
  • Problem with blank rows in some types of adaptive compression.
  • 09.28A: Temporary file names could be re-used which could cause problems if Windows was slow to release the fonts.
  • 09.28A: Temporary files used in IDF documents could persist after the run was over.
  • 09.28B: Problems with fixed pitch fonts with non-standard aspect ratio.

New in EscapeE 9.27 (Feb 13, 2013)

  • Features:
  • Support for use of EscapeE as a more general viewer.
  • More helpful comments in the "Fonts in use" list.
  • 09.27C: Support for new text parsing methods 2 and 1008.
  • 09.27D: Improved font substitutes display.
  • 09.27F: When the requested typeface not found, the typeface number is used to choose between serif/sans-serif fonts.
  • 09.27J: Better handing of user-defined lines e.g. arbitrarily dashed ones.
  • Bug fixes:
  • Misalignment of column headings and data in the "Font substitutes" listing.
  • Problems in using Windows fonts with "-" in their names.
  • When logging at end of file, all composite fields were evaluated even when parent field not found.
  • 09.27B: Possible incorrect positioning when exporting to 300 dpi PDFs and combining text strings together.
  • 09.27E: PDFs containing certain CCITT4-compressed images were rendered in inverse black/white.
  • 09.27E: Could not forward-reference a field when constructing an output file name.
  • 09.27F: Pages offset unnecessarily when printing.
  • 09.27G: TIFF or PNG images were not always trimmed to remove white space, thus causing printed output to be offset unnecessarily.
  • 09.27G: Media specifications were not passed on if PCL output was in page image mode.
  • 09.27G: Character codes above hex FF were omitted when including bitmap fonts created from library outline fonts.
  • 09.27G: Outlined polygon.s were sometimes incorrectly closed.
  • 09.27J: Problem if exporting rotated text to PCL in Text and Graphic mode.
  • 09.27J: Viewed area not cropped if whole page width view selected.
  • 09.27J: Scrollbar height not allowed for correctly when calculating a viewing scale.