newbie help wanted with installing/using netpbm through macports

[Matt]

I have looked at the man pages by opening ppmtomd.man in the original  
source download.  I haven't been able to run man on any software I  
have downloaded through macports.  Do I still have something wrong  
with my macports install?

I'm not surprised that you haven't heard of the file.... its a pretty  
obscure printer.  Its great though... the only piece of computer  
equipment I have bought that is worth as much now as when I bought it  
new 10 years ago.  I really wish the technology had caught on...  If  
you are curious, here is a brief description of the printer:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MicroDry

I really want to get it to work with my new computer...  I have a  
black and white laser for everyday printing, but I occasionally want  
color, and I hate ink jets...  Its nice to be able to print white on  
black too!  :)

Thanks for all your help... I'll poke around in the open printing  
forums and maybe poke the gutenprint people, and see if they can give  
me some advice.

-Matt


On Jan 15, 2008, at 11:37 PM, Ryan Schmidt wrote:

> On Jan 15, 2008, at 20:06, Matt wrote:
>
>> Hmmm....
>>
>> So I got the ppmtomd port installed, but it creates a unix  
>> executable, not a ppd.
>
> True...
>
>> Because the filetype was listed as type: Filter on the source page
>>
>> http://www.openprinting.org/show_driver.cgi?driver=ppmtomd&fromprinter=Alps-MD-1000
>>
>> I tried putting a copy of the executable in with the /usr/libexec/ 
>> cups/filters
>>
>> It doesn't allow me to select it as a printer though...
>>
>> I don't suppose you know how to go about making a ppd out of it...
>
> The first time I heard about ppmtomd was when you mentioned it, so  
> no, I don't know any more about it than you do.
>
> You can read its manpage to see if it's really the software you want.
>
> After you install ppmtomd, type
>
> 	man ppmtomd
>