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3. Fundamentals

KFax can not (yet) send or receive Fax files. For this I wholeheartedly recommend the mgetty/sendfax ftp://ftp.leo.org/pub/comp/networking/communication/modem/mgetty and hylafax fax ftp://sgi.com/sgi/fax send/receive packages which are available for free.

HylaFAX: http://info-sys.home.vix.com/flexfax/toc.html

sendfax/mgetty: http://www.leo.org/~doering/mgetty/

A "zoomed-in" document can be moved within the KFax view, by clicking and holding down the first mouse button down while moving the pointer.

KFax can not display image file formats which are not related to faxing, such as an arbitrary tiff or gif file.

By default raw fax files are interpreted as g3 files. If you want to display faxg3-2d and faxg4 files you have to specifiy this on the Fax Options dialog. In the case of raw g4 files you might also need to specify the height in scan lines of the fax if it differs from the default 2155.

3.1 Drag and Drop

KFax makes use of the KDE Drag and Drop protocol. This means that you can drag and drop files form the Desktop or kfm or some remote ftp site that you have open in one of kfm's windows onto KFax.

3.2 Dealing with files on the internet

You can open and save files transparently on the internet.

3.3 Printing

KFax supports PostScript printing natively. supported.

Make sure your system is set up for printing PostScript documents. If you don't have a native PostScript printer get yourself ghostscript/ghostview version 5 or newer from http://www.cs.wisc.edu/%7Eghost/.

3.4 Fax Options

KFax supports a number of options in order to allow you an optimal configuration for your specific usage.

Display Options.

• Landscape: Show the fax pages by default rotated by 90 degrees.
• Upside Down: Display the fax pages by default upside-down.
• Invert: Display the Fax as white on black background

Raw Fax Resolution.

• Auto: Some fax transmission programs set the first letter of the name of a fax of "fine" resolution to an f and to an n for a fax of "normal" resolution. If "Auto" is checked KFax will observe this convention. This options has no effect on Tiff and "PC-Research (DIGIFAX) facsimili. Those facsimili are self-specifying.
• Fine: Assume raw fax files (g3-g32d-g4) are fine resolution facsimili (7.7 lines/mm). Tiff and "PC-Research" (DigiFAX) files are self-specifying.
• Normal: Assume raw fax files (g3/g32d/g4) are of normal resolution (3.85 lines/mm). Each fax line is duplicated in the displayed image to give approximately equal vertical and horizontal scales.

Raw Fax Data:

Checking LS-Bit first will lead KFax to assume that the bit order of the fax data bytes is reversed. The official fax specification deals only with serial data transmission. Modem manufacturers have to decide whether the first bit received should be placed in the most significant or the least significant position in a byte. The consensus is to pack most significant first, but the options is available to deal with the opposite order.

Raw Faxsimili Format:

• g3: Assume the raw input files use group 3, 1-dimensional coding.
• g32d: Assume the raw input files use group 3, 2-dimensional coding.
• g4: Assume the raw input files use group 4 coding.

Raw Fax Data default height-width:

• height: specify the default number of line for raw fax data
• width: specify the default number of pixels in each scan line for raw fax data The default value is 1728.
• auto: this option is the recommended setting for g3 raw fax data. g3-2d and g4 need explicit dimensions.

3.5 Command Line Options

KFax supports the following command line options:

wuebben: ../kfax -h
usage: KFax <flags> file ...
        -f      fine resolution
        -n      normal resolution
        -h      height (number of fax lines)
        -w      width (dots per fax line)
        -l      turn image 90 degrees (landscape mode)
        -u      turn image upside down
        -i      invert (black/white)
        -m      memory usage limit in bytes (M m mega, K k kilo) default:8 megs
        -r      fax data is packed ls-bit first in input bytes
        -v      version information
        -2      raw files are g3-2d
        -4      raw files are g4    

3.6 KFax Key Bindings

KFax honors the following key bindings when the pointer is place on an open fax document view.

• h Show help page displaying the available keyboard-shortcuts
• q Return to the original document.
• n + Next PgDn Space Display the next page
• p - Prior PgUp Backspace Display the previous page
• Shift Home First Page
• Shift End Last Page
• u Turn Page upside down
• l Turn page 90 degrees
• m Show a mirror image of the current fax page
• i zoom in
• o zoom out

3.7 How to create fax files

Perhaps the easiest way to create fax files is by first creating PostScript file from you document that you wish to fax and then to use the ghostscript PostScript interpreter to transform the PostScript file into one of several fax file, conforming to one of several different fax file format.

In order to create fax files from ps documents you will need ghostscript. KFax can display all fax output modes of ghostscript:

• raw: fag3 faxg32d faxg4
• tiff: tiffg3 tiffg32d tiffg4

A raw file will have no pagination information and will be displayed as a whole in the fax window. Tiff files contain pagination information can be paged through in the fax window.

Example

How to create a fax file that sendfax/mgetty can accept and send:

gs -sDEVICE=faxg3 -sOutputFile=/tmp/fax.g3.%d yourdocument.ps

Assuming that your ps document yourdocumnet.ps contains three pages, this will result in the creation of fax.g3.1 fax.g3.2 fax.g3.3

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