Name

Synopsis

Description

This program has the capability of showing the file shrunken by various (integer) factors, and also has a ``magnifying glass'' which allows one to see a small part of the unshrunk image momentarily.

Before displaying any page or part thereof, it checks to see if the dvi file has changed since the last time it was displayed. If this is the case, then xdvi will reinitialize itself for the new dvi file. For this reason, exposing parts of the xdvi window while is running should be avoided. This feature allows you to preview many versions of the same file while running xdvi only once.

In addition to using keystrokes to move within the file, xdvi provides buttons on the right side of the window, which are synonymous with various sequences of keystrokes.

xdvi can show PostScript<tm> specials by any of three methods. It will try first to use Display PostScript<tm>, then NeWS, then it will try to use Ghostscript to render the images. All of these options depend on additional software to work properly; moreover, some of them may not be compiled into this copy of xdvi.

For performance reasons, xdvi does not render PostScript specials in the magnifying glass.

If dvi_file is not specified, a file-selection widget is popped up for you to choose the dvi file.

Options

+page

Specifies the first page to show. If + is given without a number, the last page is assumed; the first page is the default.

-allowshell

(.allowShell) This option enables the shell escape in PostScript specials. (For security reasons, shell escapes are disabled by default.) This option should be rarely used; in particular it should not be used just to uncompress files: that function is done automatically if the file name ends in .Z, .gz, or .bz2 Shell escapes are always turned off if the -safer option is used.

-altfont font

(.altFont) Declares a default font to use when the font in the dvi file cannot be found. This is useful, for example, with PostScript <tm> fonts.

-background color

(.background) Determines the color of the background. Same as -bg.

-base base URL

(.urlBase) Sets the base URL value that external links given in the dvi file are assumed relative to - normally this should be the URL of the document itself (?).

-bd color

(.borderColor) Determines the color of the window border.

-bg color

(.background) Determines the color of the background.

-bordercolor color

Same as -bd.

-borderwidth width

(.borderWidth) Specifies the width of the border of the window. Same as -bw.

-browser WWWbrowser

(.wwwBrowser) Defines the World Wide Web browser to be used to handle external URL's, for example mosaic. If neither the command-line option nor the X resource are set, uses the environment variable WWWBROWSER.

-bw width

(.borderWidth) Specifies the width of the border of the window.

-copy

(.copy) Always use the copy operation when writing characters to the display. This option may be necessary for correct operation on a color display, but overstrike characters will be incorrect. If greyscale anti-aliasing is in use, the -copy operation will disable the use of colorplanes and make overstrikes come out incorrectly. See also -thorough.

-cr color

(.cursorColor) Determines the color of the cursor. The default is the color of the page border.

-debug bitmask

(.debugLevel) If nonzero, prints additional information on standard output. The number is taken as a set of independent bits. The meaning of each bit follows. 1=bitmaps; 2=dvi translation; 4=pk reading; 8=batch operation; 16=events; 32=file opening; 64=PostScript communication; 128=Kpathsea stat(2) calls; 256=Kpathsea hash table lookups; 512=Kpathsea path definitions; 1024=Kpathsea path expansion; 2048=Kpathsea searches. To trace everything having to do with file searching and opening, use 4000. Some of these debugging options are actually provided by Kpathsea. See the Debugging section in the Kpathsea manual.

-density density

(.densityPercent) Determines the density used when shrinking bitmaps for fonts. A higher value produces a lighter font. The default value is 40. If greyscaling is in use this argument does not apply; use -gamma instead. See also the `S'. keystroke. Same as -S

-display host:display

Specifies the host and screen to be used for displaying the dvi file. By default this is obtained from the environment variable DISPLAY.

-expert

(.expert) Prevent the buttons from appearing. See also the `x' keystroke.

-fg color

(.foreground) Determines the color of the text (foreground).

-foreground color

Same as -fg.

-font font

(*font) Sets the font for use in the buttons.

-gamma gamma

(.gamma) Controls the interpolation of colors in the greyscale anti-aliasing color palette. Default value is 1.0. For 0 < gamma < 1, the fonts will be lighter (more like the background), and for gamma > 1, the fonts will be darker (more like the foreground). Negative values behave the same way, but use a slightly different algorithm. For color and greyscale displays; for monochrome, see -density. See also the `S' keystroke

-grid1 color

(.grid1Color) Determines the color of level 1 grid (default as foreground)

-grid2 color

(.grid2Color) Determines the color of level 2 grid (default as foreground)

-grid3 color

(.grid3Color) Determines the color of level 3 grid (default as foreground)

-geometry geometry

(*geometry) Specifies the initial geometry of the window.

-gspalette palette

(.palette) Specifies the palette to be used when using Ghostscript for rendering PostScript specials. Possible values are Color, Greyscale, and Monochrome. The default is Color.

-gsalpha

(.gsAlpha) Causes Ghostscript to be called with the x11alpha driver instead of the x11 driver. The x11alpha driver enables anti-aliasing in PostScript figures, for a nicer appearance. It is available on newer versions of Ghostscript. This option can also be toggled with the `V' keystroke.

-hl color

(.highlight) Determines the color of the page border. The default is the foreground color.

-hush

(.Hush) Causes xdvi to suppress all suppressible warnings.

-hushchars

(.hushLostChars) Causes xdvi to suppress warnings about references to characters which are not defined in the font.

-hushchecksums

(.hushChecksums) Causes xdvi to suppress warnings about checksum mismatches between the dvi file and the font file.

-hushspecials

(.hushSpecials) Causes xdvi to suppress warnings about \special strings that it cannot process.

-icongeometry geometry

(.iconGeometry) Specifies the initial position for the icon.

-iconic

(.iconic) Causes the xdvi window to start in the iconic state. The default is to start with the window open.

-install

(.install) If xdvi is running under a PseudoColor visual, then (by default) it will check for TrueColor visuals with more bits per pixel, and switch to such a visual if one exists. If no such visual exists, it will use the current visual and colormap. If -install is selected, however, it will still use a TrueColor visual with a greater depth, if one is available; otherwise, it will install its own colormap on the current visual. If the current visual is not PseudoColor, then xdvi will not switch the visual or colormap, regardless of its options. The default value of the install resource is the special value, maybe. There is no +install option. See also -noinstall, and the GREYSCALING AND COLORMAPS section.

-interpreter filename

(.interpreter) Use filename as the Ghostscript interpreter. By default it uses gswin32c.

-keep

(.keepPosition) Sets a flag to indicate that xdvi should not move to the home position when moving to a new page. See also the `k' keystroke.

-l

(.listFonts) Causes the names of the fonts used to be listed.

-margins dimen

(.Margin) Specifies the size of both the top margin and side margin. This determines the ``home'' position of the page within the window as follows. If the entire page fits in the window, then the margin settings are ignored. If, even after removing the margins from the left, right, top, and bottom, the page still cannot fit in the window, then the page is put in the window such that the top and left margins are hidden, and presumably the upper left-hand corner of the text on the page will be in the upper left-hand corner of the window. Otherwise, the text is centered in the window. The dimension should be a decimal number optionally followed by any of the two-letter abbreviations for units accepted by (pt, pc, in, bp, cm, mm, dd, cc, or sp). By default, the unit will be cm (centimeters). See also -sidemargin, -topmargin, and the keystroke `M.'

-mfmode mode-def

(.mfMode) Specifies a mode-def string, which can be used in searching for fonts (see ENVIRONMENT, below). Generally, when changing the mode-def, it is also necessary to change the font size to the appropriate value for that mode. This is done by adding a colon and the value in dots per inch; for example, -mfmode ljfour:600. This method overrides any value given by the pixelsPerInch resource or the -p command-line argument. The metafont mode is also passed to metafont during automatic creation of fonts. By default, it is unspecified.

-mgs size

Same as -mgs1.

-mgs [n ] size

(.magnifierSize [n ]) Specifies the size of the window to be used for the ``magnifying glass'' for Button n. The size may be given as an integer (indicating that the magnifying glass is to be square), or it may be given in the form widthxheight. See the MOUSE ACTIONS section. Defaults are 200x150, 400x250, 700x500, 1000x800, and 1200x1200.

-noghostscript

(.ghostscript) Inhibits the use of Ghostscript for displaying PostScript<tm> specials. (For this option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -noghostscript corresponds to ghostscript:off; +noghostscript to ghostscript:on.)

-nogrey

(.grey) Turns off the use of greyscale anti-aliasing when printing shrunken bitmaps. (For this option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -nogrey corresponds to grey:off; +nogrey to grey:on.) See also the `G' keystroke.

-nogssafer

(.gsSafer) Normally, if Ghostscript is used to render PostScript specials, the Ghostscript interpreter is run with the option -dSAFER. The -nogssafer option runs Ghostscript without -dSAFER. The -dSAFER option in Ghostscript disables PostScript operators such as deletefile, to prevent possibly malicious PostScript programs from having any effect. If the -safer option is specified, then this option has no effect; in that case Ghostscript is always run with -dSAFER. (For the -nogssafer option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -nogssafer corresponds to gsSafer:off; +nogssafer to gsSafer:on.)

-noinstall

(.install) Inhibit the default behavior of switching to a TrueColor visual if one is available with more bits per pixel than the current visual. This option corresponds to a resource of install:off. There is no +noinstall option. See also -install, and the GREYSCALING AND COLORMAPS section.

-nomakepk

(.makePk) Turns off automatic generation of font files that cannot be found by other means. (For this option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -nomakepk corresponds to makePk:off; +nomakepk to makePK:on.)

-nopostscript

(.postscript) Turns off rendering of PostScript<tm> specials. Bounding boxes, if known, will be displayed instead. This option can also be toggled with the `v' keystroke. (For this option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -nopostscript corresponds to postscript:off; +postscript to postscript:on.)

-noscan

(.prescan) Normally, when PostScript<tm> is turned on, xdvi will do a preliminary scan of the dvi file, in order to send any necessary header files before sending the PostScript code that requires them. This option turns off such prescanning. (It will be automatically be turned back on if xdvi detects any specials that require headers.) (For the -noscan option, the logic of the corresponding resource is reversed: -noscan corresponds to prescan:off; +noscan to prescan:on.)

-offsets dimen

(.Offset) Specifies the size of both the horizontal and vertical offsets of the output on the page. By decree of the Stanford Project, the default page origin is always 1 inch over and down from the top-left page corner, even when non-American paper sizes are used. Therefore, the default offsets are 1.0 inch. The argument dimen should be a decimal number optionally followed by any of the two-letter abbreviations for units accepted by (pt, pc, in, bp, cm, mm, dd, cc, or sp). By default, the unit will be cm (centimeters). See also -xoffset and -yoffset.

-p pixels

(.pixelsPerInch) Defines the size of the fonts to use, in pixels per inch. The default value is 600. This option is provided only for backwards compatibility; the preferred way of setting the font size is by setting the Metafont mode at the same time; see the -mfmode option.

-paper papertype

(.paper) Specifies the size of the printed page. This may be of the form widthxheight optionally followed by a unit, where width and height are decimal numbers giving the width and height of the paper, respectively, and the unit is any of the two-letter abbreviations for units accepted by (pt, pc, in, bp, cm, mm, dd, cc, or sp). By default, the unit will be cm (centimeters). There are also synonyms which may be used: us (8.5x11in), usr (11x8.5in), legal (8.5x14in), foolscap (13.5x17in), as well as the ISO sizes a1-a7, b1-b7, c1-c7, a1r-a7r (a1-a7 rotated), etc. The default size is 21 x 29.7 cm (A4 size).

-rv

(.reverseVideo) Causes the page to be displayed with white characters on a black background, instead of vice versa.

-s shrink

(.shrinkFactor) Defines the initial shrink factor. The default value is 8. If shrink is given as 0, then the initial shrink factor is computed so that the page fits within the window (as if the `s' keystroke were given without a number).

-S density

(.densityPercent) Same as -density, q.v.

-safer

(.safer) This option turns on all available security options; it is designed for use when xdvi is called by a browser that obtains a dvi or file from another site. In the present case, this option selects +nogssafer and +allowshell.

-shrinkbuttonn shrink

(.shrinkButtonn ) Specifies that the nth button changing shrink factors shall change to shrink factor factor. This is not very usefull in the normal run of things. xdvik scales the scaling factors according to resolution (currently 300dpi and 600dpi). Here n may be a number from 1 to 4. Typical factors are powers of 2.

-sidemargin dimen

(.sideMargin) Specifies the side margin (see -margins).

-srcMode

(.srcMode) Starts xdvi in src special mode (see the section SRC SPECIAL MODE below for details). The mode can be toggled with `Ctrl-s'; when the mode is on, the cursor has a different shape (see the -srcCursor option below). For security reasons, evaluation of src specials is off by default, and it might be a good idea to enable it only for selected .dvi files on the command line.

-srcVisibility

(.srcVisibility) Makes the source specials visible by drawing small tick marks for each special. This can be toggled with the `V' key (see the section SRC SPECIAL MODE for more details).

-srcTickShape n

(.srcTickShape) Specifies the shape of the src tick marks, where n can be one of 0 , 1 , 2 or 3 : 0 is a rectangle, 1 is a triangle, 2 is an upward angle and 3 is a downward angle. See the section SRC SPECIAL MODE for more details.

-srcTickSize geometry

(.srcTickSize) Specifies the size of the src tick marks in pixels width x height , with respect to magnification factor 1. Default is 40x70, which is a reasonable value for 600dpi fonts. For higher resolutions, you might want to increase the size. The two attributes width and height only have a natural meaning for the rectangle shape; for the triangle , width is ignored; for the angle shapes, width is half the width of the lines, and height is the length of the lines. See the section SRC SPECIAL MODE for more details.

-srcCursor n

(.srcCursor) The shape of the cursor in SRC SPECIAL MODE. For possible values, see e. g. `cursorfont.h'.

-srcJumpButton button

(.srcJumpButton) The mouse button used in SRC SPECIAL MODE to jump to the next special near point. See the section SRC SPECIAL MODE for more details.

-srcEditorCommand command string

(.srcEditorCommand) Specifies the editor command that will be called when the user wants to jump to a src special. This should be a C format string containing 2 placeholders (aka `conversion specifications'): %s (for the filename) and %u (for the line number) pointed to by that special. You should always enclose both of these conversion specifications into a pair of quotes like this: '%u'; this will ensure that the shell won't interpret the resulting format string directly. This way it will do no harm when some evil user puts commands like `ls -lR /` into the src specials of a .dvi file, instead of the ordinary filename. The default for this command string is:

emacsclient --no-wait '+%u' '%s'

which will work together with Emacs. For Xemacs you would have to use something like:

gnuclient -q +'%u' '%s'

Note that when the command-line option, you'll have to enclose the string into another pair of quotes; don't enclose the string in quotes when specifying it as an X resource.

-srcSpecialFormat n

(.srcSpecialFormat) The format of the \special strings in the dvi file. The formats currently supported are:

0 \special{src:filename:linenumber}

1 \special{src:linenumber<space>filename}

2 \special{src:linenumber<space>*filename}    

In the first format, the colon separating the linenumber from the filename is the last colon in the entire string.

The second format requires exactly one space between the line number and the file name.

In the third format, there can be any number of spaces (including 0 -- but then of course the file name shouldn't start with a digit, so using no space at all is usually not a good idea).

Xdvi will warn you about specials that don't conform to the format currently selected.

-thorough

(.thorough) xdvi will usually try to ensure that overstrike characters (e.g., \notin) are printed correctly. On monochrome displays, this is always possible with one logical operation, either and or or. On color displays, however, this may take two operations, one to set the appropriate bits and one to clear other bits. If this is the case, then by default xdvi will instead use the copy operation, which does not handle overstriking correctly. The -thorough option chooses the slower but more correct choice. See also -copy.

-topmargin dimen

(.topMargin) Specifies the top and bottom margins (see -margins).

-underlink

(.underLink) Underline links. Default is true.

-version

Print information on the version of xdvi.

-warnspecials

(.warnSpecials) Causes xdvi to issue warnings about \special strings that it cannot process.

-xoffset dimen

(.xOffset) Specifies the size of the horizontal offset of the output on the page. See -offsets.

-yoffset dimen

(.yOffset) Specifies the size of the vertical offset of the output on the page. See -offsets.

Keystrokes

q

Quits the program. Control-C and control-D will do this, too.

Q

Quits the program with exit status 2.

n

Moves to the next page (or to the nth next page if a number is given). Synonyms are `f', Space, Return, and Line Feed.

p

Moves to the previous page (or back n pages). Synonyms are `b', control-H, and Delete.

g

Moves to the page with the given number. Initially, the first page is assumed to be page number 1, but this can be changed with the `P' keystroke, below. If no page number is given, then it goes to the last page.

P

``This is page number n.'' This can be used to make the `g' keystroke refer to actual page numbers instead of absolute page numbers.

Control-L

Redisplays the current page.

^

Move to the ``home'' position of the page. This is normally the upper left-hand corner of the page, depending on the margins as described in the -margins option, above.

u

Moves up two thirds of a window-full.

d

Moves down two thirds of a window-full.

l

Moves left two thirds of a window-full.

r

Moves right two thirds of a window-full.

c

Moves the page so that the point currently beneath the cursor is moved to the middle of the window. It also (gasp!) warps the cursor to the same place.

M

Sets the margins so that the point currently under the cursor is the upper left-hand corner of the text in the page. Note that this command itself does not move the image at all. For details on how the margins are used, see the -margins option.

s

Changes the shrink factor to the given number. If no number is given, the smallest factor that makes the entire page fit in the window will be used. (Margins are ignored in this computation.)

S

Sets the density factor to be used when shrinking bitmaps. This should be a number between 0 and 100; higher numbers produce lighter characters. If greyscaling mode is in effect, this changes the value of gamma instead. The new value of gamma is the given number divided by 100; negative values are allowed.

t

Toggles to the next unit in a sorted list of dimension units for the popup magnifier ruler.

R

Forces the dvi file to be reread. This allows you to preview many versions of the same file while running xdvi only once.

k

Normally when xdvi switches pages, it moves to the home position as well. The `k' keystroke toggles a `keep-position' flag which, when set, will keep the same position when moving between pages. Also `0k' and `1k' clear and set this flag, respectively. See also the -keep option.

x

Toggles expert mode (in which the buttons do not appear). Also `0x' and `1x' clear and reset this mode, respectively. See also the -expert option.

G

This key toggles the use of greyscale anti-aliasing for displaying shrunken bitmaps. In addition, the key sequences `0G' and `1G' clear and set this flag, respectively. See also the -nogrey option.

If given a numeric argument that is not 0 or 1, greyscale anti-aliasing is turned on, and the gamma resource is set to the value divided by 100. E.g., `150G' turns on greyscale and sets gamma to 1.5.

D

This key toggles the use of grid over the document. If no number is given, the grid mode toggles. By prepending number, 3 grid levels can be set. The grid in each level is drawn in the colour specified. See also the -grid1, -grid2, and -grid3 options.

v

This key toggles the rendering of PostScript<tm> specials. If rendering is turned off, then bounding boxes are displayed when available. In addition the key sequences `0v' and `1v' clear and set this flag, respectively. See also the -nopostscript option.

V

This key toggles tha anti-aliasing of PostScript<tm> specials when Ghostscript is used as renderer. In addition the key sequences `0V' and `1V' clear and set this flag, See also the +.B -gsalpha option.

F

Read a new dvi file. A file-selection widget is popped up for you to choose the dvi file from.

Mouse Actions

If the cursor is on a hypertext link (underlined by default), then that link overrides the magnifying glass for Buttons 1 and 2. If Button 1 is clicked over a link, then xdvi jumps to the target in the current window. If Button 2 is clicked over a link, then xdvi opens a new window on the target.

More precisely, for internal links, Button 1 jumps in the same window to the link, while Button 2 starts up a new xdvi on the link. For external links to dvi files, Button 1 changes the current xdvi to be reading that file, while Button 2 starts a new xdvi on that file. For other file types, mime.types and mailcap are parsed to determine the viewer; finally, if no suitable mailcap entry was found, if the WWWBROWSER environment variable is set, or -browser was specified on the command line, it is started up on the file.

The scrollbars (if present) behave in the standard way: pushing Button 2 in a scrollbar moves the top or left edge of the scrollbar to that point and optionally drags it; pushing Button 1 moves the image up or right by an amount equal to the distance from the button press to the upper left-hand corner of the window; pushing Button 3 moves the image down or left by the same amount.

Signals

Greyscaling and Colormaps

Typically this problem occurs on displays that allocate eight bits of video memory per pixel. To see how many bits per pixel your display uses, type xwininfo in an xterm window, and then click the mouse on the root window when asked. The ``Depth:'' entry will tell you how many bits are allocated per pixel.

Displays using at least 15 bits per pixel are typically TrueColor visuals, which do not have this problem, since their colormap is permanently allocated and available to all applications. (The visual class is also displayed by xwininfo.) For more information on visual classes see the documentation for the X Window System.

To alleviate this problem, therefore, one may (a) run with more bits per pixel (this may require adding more video memory or replacing the video card), (b) shut down other applications that may be using much of the colormap and then restart xdvi, or (c) run xdvi with the -install option.

One application which is often the cause of this problem is Netscape. In this case there are two more alternatives to remedying the situation. One can run ``netscape -install'' to cause Netscape to install a private colormap. This can cause colors to change in bizarre ways when the mouse is moved to a different window. Or, one can run ``netscape -ncols 220'' to limit Netscape to a smaller number of colors. A smaller number will ensure that other applications have more colors available, but will degrade the color quality in the Netscape window.

Environment

Handling of PostScript Figures

If a file name is given (as opposed to a shell command), if that file name ends in ``.Z'', ``.gz'', or ``.bz2'' and if the first two bytes of the file indicate that it was compressed with compress(1) , gzip(1) , or bzip2(1) respectively, then the file is first uncompressed with uncompress -c, gunzip -c, or bunzip2 -c, respectively. This is preferred over using a backtick to call the command directly, since you do not have to specify -allowshell and since it allows for path searching.

Src Special Mode

- general description (concept of separate mode; maybe something more about security issues)

- description of keys/buttons available in src special mode (V toggles visibility of tick marks, X highlights next special without jumping to it, T changes the shapes of the marks, Mouse button 2 jumps to next special unless user has specified another button with -srcJumpButton )

- meaning of the tick marks (reference points: the reference point is the upper-left corner for the rectangle shape, the top of the triangle for the triangular shape, the inner angle point for the upangle and the outer angle point for the downangle shape).

- searching of `next' special on page (xdvi will search `linewise', i.e. it will jump to the next special on the current line (to the right of the mouse click) if there is one, and to the first special on the next line else).

Environment

DISPLAY

Specifies which graphics display terminal to use.

KPATHSEA_DEBUG

Trace Kpathsea lookups; set it to -1 for complete tracing.

MIMELIBDIR

Directory containing the mime.types file, if ~/.mime-types does not exist.

MAILCAPDIR

Directory containing the .mailcap file, if ~/.mailcap does not exist.

WWWBROWSER

The browser used to open URL's, if neither the -browser option nor the .wwwBrowser resource are set. For more information on hyper- support, see the `Hypertext' node in the dvipsk manual.

TMPDIR

The directory to use for storing temporary files created when uncompressing PostScript files.

Limitations

La2e color and rotation specials are not currently supported.

Files

Copyrights

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL PAUL VOJTA OR ANY OTHERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

See Also

Authors

Table of Contents

• Name
• Synopsis
• Description
• Options
• Keystrokes
• Mouse Actions
• Signals
• Greyscaling and Colormaps
• Environment
• Handling of PostScript Figures
• Src Special Mode
• Environment
• Limitations
• Files
• Copyrights
• See Also
• Authors