AN-07
December 5, 2005
OVERVIEW OF THERMAL EASY PRINT PRINTING
If your print job is more than a succession of lines of text, you might want to consider Easy Print. This control language
alternative to Line Printer mode permits not only text but also bar codes, stored graphics, rotated images and rotated
fields within those images – plus a lot more. Easy print was designed to be minimally cryptic – once your job is encoded,
as a human you should be able to read the control codes in the job and know what the printed image will look like.
To send any command, including the print command, in Easy Print, you must first sen
d the three byte command ESC EZ
(0x1b 0x45 0x5A). The printer will then remain in Easy Print until (1) it falls asleep, (2) it is reset, or (3) a command to
switch to another
All Easy Print commands begin with the opening curly brace “{“ (0x7B) and end with the closing curly brace “}” (0x7D).
Inside the b
races is the command. If any data is required, a colon “:” (0x3A) separates command from data, and the data
follows the command. The general form of all Easy Print commands is:
{[COMMAND]<:DATA>}
To print using Easy Print, the command is PRINT a
nd the DATA is a succession of descriptors for each field, or “thing” to
be printed (whether the “thing” is text, bar code, or graphic). Optional global parameters affect the entire print job:
{PRINT<,GLOBALPARAMETERS>:
[FIELD 1]
[FIELD 2]
•
•
•
[FIELD n]
}
Each field, regardless of what is to be printed is virtual
ly identical. Each FIELD has the form:
@ROW,COL:NAME<FIELD PARAMETERS>
|DATA|
Begins with an “@” (0x40)
Is followed by WHERE the data is to be printed (ROW,COL
). The row and column are always followed by a
colon “:” (0x3A)
That is followed by HOW is to be printed (NAME)
That is followed by WHAT is to be printed which is the
DATA to be printed (except for the case of stored
graphics). Data is always delimited by a vertical bar (0x7C) before and after the data. If no data is required,
as in the case of stored graphics and lines, then only a single vertical bar is required
Optionally, a comma “,” (0x2C) can follow HOW to be printed for m
odifiers (or “field parameters”) for that
FIELD
Each field can be modified by a set of “Field Parameters” that ca
n increase the height and or the width of the field, can
rotate the field 90 degrees to the left or right, or rotate 180 degrees. And the field can be printed inverse (i.e. white on
black rather than black on white).
