Re: Importing PostScript files
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg16642] Re: Importing PostScript files
- From: "P.J. Hinton" <paulh>
- Date: Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:53:58 -0500
- Organization: "Wolfram Research, Inc."
- References: <7cof18$1q0@smc.vnet.net>
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
On 17 Mar 1999, Daniel AMIGUET wrote: > How to import in Mathematica an external PostScript file, produced by > Adobe Illustrator 8 for example, and use it as an usual graphics in a > notebook? Chances are you won't be able to do this. The front end's PostScript interpreter only understands a subset PostScript page description language. Many of the operators it understands are acutally higher order macros that are mapped to lower level PostScript operatiors. To get the front end to render your PostScript successfully, you would need to write a text processing application which would translate your PostScript file into this subset language. This is a non-trivial problem, but if you're curious or industrious, you can take a look at the psfix shell script that appears on the Mathematica CD under SystemFiles|Graphics|SystemResources That script contains numerous comments that explain what the different operators mean. You can think of it as a Rosetta Stone between abbreviated Mathematica PostScript and real PostScript. There is one exception to all of the comments that I listed above. The NeXT front end used NeXT's DisplayPostScript feature to render PostScript, so in that case, you should be able to import EPS and view it successfully. -- P.J. Hinton Mathematica Programming Group paulh at wolfram.com Wolfram Research, Inc. http://www.wolfram.com/~paulh/ Disclaimer: Opinions expressed herein are those of the author alone.