Functional specification
10
CDE/Motif PST
CDEnext
Because Print Contexts can be shared among processes, applications can enlist the help of a secondary process to
manipulate print options in the Print Context rather than taking on the task directly. For CDEnext, the call
XpGetPdmStartParams
is being provided to enlist the help of the Dt Print Dialog Manager. By externalizing
this task, new configuration dialogs and capabilities can be added without having to modify individual applications.
In most cases, the dialogs displayed by a Print Dialog Manager will be tuned to the capabilities of the
corresponding ddx driver. It is possible to have multiple Print Dialog Managers, each one responsible for handling
setup tasks for a different PDL.
Once the application has, with or without a Print Dialog Manager's help, set options within the Print Context, the
application can make calls such as
XpStartJob
to delineate jobs, documents and pages within a sequence of
normal X calls. Conceptually, a "job" is a collection of "documents", where each document is in turn a collection
of "pages". When
XpEndJob
is called, the resuling PDL is sent to a print spooler, or can be retrieved by the
application.
At this point, the end user should have on paper (or other non-display media) what was once only available on the
display.