There are two main alternatives for printing the finished chart:

PostScript printing
If you have a PostScript printer, you can use PostScrp.Write to write the chart definition directly to the printer:

PG„ch.Close              © Completed chart 
View PG                  © to see it on screen 
PostScrp.Write PG        © Print (portrait) to 'prn' 
'myfile.prn' PostScrp.Write PG     © Print to disk file

This is recommended rather than using the Windows printer driver, as Rain is around 10 times faster and the quality of the results is a little better. You can edit PostScrp.Write to switch to Landscape orientation (1.4 times larger) or enable colour support.

Windows printing
If you have a standard Windows printer (e.g. HP LaserJet or DeskJet) you can send your chart to the Windows print queue with:

PostScrp.Print PG

This will switch the printer to the orientation which best matches your chart, and will size the chart to be as large as possible (within the printable area of the page).

Output to a DTP package
If you have a package such as Word or PageMaker, you might like to include your charts as .EPS objects within a document. To export a chart in this form:

'myfile' PostScrp.WriteEPS PG

Rain includes bounding box, date and title information, so that you will be able to size the graphic within the document, and also view the title and date on screen. Note that such documents can only be printed on PostScript printers.

Copying the chart to the clipboard
To save the current chart in ‘Placeable Metafile’ format on the clipboard, use

PostScrp.Clip PG

You can then paste the chart into most Windows applications such as Microsoft Word. It can be sized within the document as required. If you prefer to save the chart on file (in placeable metafile format) provide a left argument giving the file name:

'c:\temp\chart.wmf' PostScrp.Clip PG

You can then use Insert,Picture in Word to make a link to the file from your document.

To save a bitmap image, use:

PostScrp.ClipBits PG
0.5 PostScrp.ClipBits PG  © Scale to half size
3 PostScrp.ClipBits PG    © Suitable for 300dpi printing

This defaults to 1:1 scaling, but you can choose to ‘thumbnail’ the image, or have it magnified to give reasonable results on the printer. If you scale this above 5 (suitable for 600dpi) you will need enough workspace to hold the resulting bitmap, say 4Mb minimum.

Printing from the View function
When your chart is displayed with PostScrp.View, you can use the right mouse button to choose from a list of options. If you choose Print you will write the chart to the default Windows printer as above. If you choose PostScript, you will be prompted for the device to write the output to. Just leave this as <prn> to send the chart to your printer. See Using the Chart Viewer for more detail.