Sorry I couldn't make the call. I prefer Portland (c), with clear
separation of elements. Adding a units suffix is fine but should have been
preceded by the underscore separator. Prefixes such as na, jis, iso are
indeed name space "classes". I think many people are just comfortable
referring to and thinking of the name space as part and parcel with the
name. Also, in Portland, we jumped into defining new "classes" which made
some people nervous, I think.
Anyway you look at it... it's a weird.. "concocted" syntax so I guess it
hardly matters. I can live with it.
The XML structure is the real, useful goal in my opinion.
----------------------------------------------
Harry Lewis
IBM Printing Systems
----------------------------------------------
"Hastings, Tom N" <hastings@cp10.es.xerox.com>
Sent by: owner-ipp@pwg.org
05/02/2001 05:30 PM
To: "ipp (E-mail)" <ipp@pwg.org>
cc: "Mark VanderWiele (E-mail)" <markv@us.ibm.com>
Subject: IPP> Minutes of telecon to decide on PWG Media Size syntax, Wed, May 2
Minutes of telecon to decide on PWG Media Size syntax, Wed, May 2
Attendees: Mark VanderWiele (IBM), Ron Bergman (Hitachi Koki Imaging
Solutions), Melinda Grant (HP), Ira McDonald (High North), Bob Herriot
(Xerox), Bill Wagner (NetSilicon), Carl-Uno Manros (Xerox), and Tom
Hastings
(Xerox)
We also had rankings of the media size alternatives from: Don Wright
(Lexmark).
1. Summary
We covered three issues:
A. The syntax for the Media Size Self Describing Names
We unanimously agreed to method a (iso-a4_210x297mm, na-letter_8.5x11in),
since it does help the simple client with a simple fallback presentation
to
the user for unrecognized names and can still be easily parsed and
processed
by new client software.
B. Merging the Media Finish Names into Media Type Names (decision at
Portland)
We did reaffirm that adding the 'photographic-xxx' type names, where 'xxx'
is glossy, high-gloss, semi-gloss, satin, and matte, is ok.
C. Adding some commonly used Media Type Names, such as bond and recycled
We agreed to add stationery-bond and stationery-recycled to go along with
stationery-inkjet.
We also agreed that a future project should attempt to produce a way to
collect all of the media attributes, including MediaType, MediaSize,
MediaColor, and others, like weight and imagable area (which is
printer-dependent), into a single collection, perhaps using XML. So we
did
not want to add things to the Media Type which are kept separate in
current
systems.
We also agreed that we wanted to complete this standard in the next week
or
two, ready for final voting. Ron will publish the next version over the
weekend and we will probably have one more version a week after that to be
voted on. Because of the unanimity of the Media Size syntax decision, we
feel that this decision will stick and that the standard can move forward.
2. Details of the syntax for the Media Size Self Describing Names
We considered the following 5 alternatives as published in the meeting
announcement. No one had any additional alternative to add.
a. original UPnP/HTML way (but with _ field separator): iso-a4_210x297mm,
na-letter_8.5x11in
b. Maui (D03-D07) way: iso-a4.2100-2970, na-letter.8500-11000
c. Portland decision: iso_a4_210-297, na_letter_8.5-11
d. All 1000ths of mm: iso-a4.210000-297000, na-letter.215900-279400
e. Units as a separate third field: iso-a4_210-297_mm, na-letter_8.5-11_in
We reaffirmed that the Media Size Self Describing Names are primarily for
program to program communication, such as from a Printer to a client, a
client to a Printer, or from a data description file to a client. Also
that
a recipient of a name need only do a straight string comparison to see if
it
recognizes the name; in comparisons of the dimension part it need not
perform any unit conversion, rounding, or closest size match.
The dimension part of the Media Size Self Describing Names are not
intended
for internal use within a program. However, we also clarified that when a
client receives a Media Size Self Describing Name that it does not
recognize
(either by parsing or straight string match), it is very useful for that
client to be able to display the string to the user. Therefore, if the
units are explicitly expressed, then the user will more readily understand
the fallback presentation from the client.
Mark also explained that in his experience, the client does not bother to
localize the Media Size Names for the user, except for the units, since
the
names are fairly independent of human language. So the client needs to be
able to easily parse and convert the dimensions to the user's units for an
unrecognized size name. Having the units expressly provided helps such
fallback conversion no matter how many classes are added in the future.
Also by having the units explicitly expressed, if there ever are new units
added, they will not be confused with the two existing units (in and mm).
Therefore, we agreed that only alternative a or e met the requirements.
We then unanimously agreed to method a, since it was more user friendly
for
the fallback display case and not much harder to parse than method e.
We also agreed that in order to be able to do a straight character for
character string match of the entire Media Size Self Describing Names
string
including custom names, the fraction part must not have trailing zeros
(and
the decimal point must be omitted if there is no fraction part), i.e.,
na-letter_8.5x11in, NOT na-letter_8.50x11.in
BTW, this syntax is the same as the original UPnP BasicPrint Template
Media
Size syntax, with the single change that the media name field is separated
from the dimensions by the underline character (_) , instead of by the
hyphen (-), providing a more straightforward parsing algorithm, since the
media name field can have hyphens too. So the UPnP group should be happy
with our decision as well.
3 Details of merging the Media Finish Names into Media Type Names
(decision
at Portland).
At Portland, we recognized that having separate Finish Names, while good
for
new standards, such as IPP Production Printing extension and JDF, which
have
separate attributes for front and back coating, it does not help existing
implementations of print systems and protocols, which have only the Media
Type, Media Size, and Media Color mechanism. Even IPP/1.1 has only the
"media" Job Template attribute mechanism which can carry both Media Type
Names and Media Size Self Describing Names. So at Portland, we agreed to
fold back the Finish Names into sub-types of the photographic Media Type,
since we though that the primary use for the coatings (glossy, matte,
satin,
etc.) was for photographic paper. The definitions are:
stationery
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material
stationery-coated
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material with a coating of unspecified
type
stationery-inkjet
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material whose coating is designed to
minimize the spread of liquid inks
photographic
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material to produce photographic
quality
images. The coating is unspecified.
photographic-glossy
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material that has a "glossy" coating to
produce photographic quality images.
photographic-high-gloss
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material that has a "high-gloss"
coating
to produce photographic quality images.
photographic-semi-gloss
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material that has a "semi-gloss"
coating
to produce photographic quality images.
photographic-satin
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material that has a "satin" coating to
produce photographic quality images.
photographic-matte
Separately cut sheets of an opaque material that has a "matte" coating to
produce photographic quality images.
photographic-film
Separately cut sheets of film used to produce photographic quality images.
back-print-film
Separately cut sheet of a translucent film that the user can view with or
without backlighting.
After discussing the criteria for adding a Media Type Name, there was
general agreement that the criteria for adding a Media Type name should be
one of:
a. If the client software or Printer can alter its actions based on a
Media
Type Name, then it is a candidate for addition. For example, if the way
the
ink is put down would be altered (in some implementations) by a proposed
Media Type Name, then that name should be added.
b. If the user would like to choose between two different Media Type
Names,
even if the client or Printer does not behave any differently for the two,
then that name should be a candidate.
Also extra weight should be given to a Media Type that is used in existing
systems should be another criteria and we should not add theoretical
values,
if they aren't used in real systems.
ACTION ITEM (Tom): Check with office equipment stores to see if there are
coatings for both photographic and for more ordinary paper.
ACTION ITEM (Melinda): Check with HP experience in this area as well.
There was some concern that there might be some use of the 'xxx' coating
parameters defined for 'photographic' with the 'stationery' Media Type as
well.
Bob pointed out that there will be a gateway mapping problem between
systems
that have only the Media Type mechanism and ones (like IPP Production
Printing Extension - see IEEE-ISTO 5100.3-2001 and JDF), that keep the
Finish attribute separately from the rest of the other Media Type values
(and can keep them separate for front and back sides as well, where some
media might have different finish for front and back).
However, these additional media attributes are only OPTIONAL for a Printer
to support, so what happens when the Printer implements the Media Type
attribute, but doesn't implement the "media-coating-back" and
"media-coating-front" attributes? Can such implementations then use our
photographic-glossy, photographic-matte, values, or does that mean that
the
Printer cannot represent the media finish at all? Is it better to have
two
standard ways to do something (so that gateways can be implemented), or
only
one way, but half the systems have to do something non-standard in order
to
get the required functionality? We agreed to keep the new
'photographic-xxx' values, because of their use in existing systems and
emerging standards that don't have separate finish media attributes.
4. Details of adding some commonly used Media Type Names, such as bond and
recycled
IBM has proposed a list of additional Media Type Names that they have
found
in various printers and print systems over the years. Two of them are also
prevalent in other existing systems: bond and recycled.
We discussed adding them to the Media Type. We agreed that they should be
a
sub-type of stationery. While a person can buy recycled envelopes in a
store, we did not know of a print system in which the user could select
between 'envelopes' and 'envelopes-recycled'. Usually, the envelopes are
either recycled or they aren't as decided by the system administrator, so
we
did not agree to add 'envelopes-recycled' to Media Type Names. Although
there was the same concern over recycled and bond that was expressed above
in finish that recycled should be a separate media attribute and bond
should
be a separate stock type media attribute. The IPP Production Printing
Extension (IEEE-ISTO 5100.3-2001) has a separate "media-recycled" media
attribute with keyword values. JDF has a separate Recycled media
attribute
with a boolean value and a Stock Type media attribute with values:
Bristol,
Cover, Bond, Newsprint, Index, Offset - this includes book stock, Tag,
Text.
In spite of this concern, we still agreed to add recycled and bond as
sub-types of stationery, i.e., 'stationery-bond' and
'stationery-recycled'.
Tom and Ron
editors of the PWG Media Standardized Names standard
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu May 03 2001 - 00:23:24 EDT