View any PCL document

To create PCL (Printer Command Language), you just print a document 'to file' with any HP-compatible printer. When you open a PCL print file with EscapeE, you see the real live print job on screen — not a 'preview' in your word processor. Click here to see an example.

You can zoom in to look at details or check the whole page layout. If you use a non-’edge-to-edge’ PCL printer, you can opt to view the printable area to see clearly if any parts fall into the unprintable page border.

EscapeE displays useful information about the page, such as the fonts used and if a font was substituted, the resolution of images, the data fields (if defined).

View engineering drawings

EscapeE also displays a perfect screen view of HP-GL (Hewlett-Packard Graphics Language) images. So, for example, you can publish and share engineering drawings from Auto CAD and CAD CAM packages. Click here to see an example. Unlike other PCL viewers, EscapeE rotates the drawing to the correct orientation, so large drawings that have been output as landscape for printing can be viewed correctly on screen.

View TIFF archive documents

TIFF (Tagged Image File Format) files can also be opened and viewed in EscapeE with the same features as for PCL document viewing, above.

Check database print jobs

For the PCL print professional you can check every aspect of a PCL database job before printing and so save valuable time on the production printer. As an instant check of the layout on paper, you can sample all or part of a job straight to the default Windows printer for your PC; this is useful if your PCL printer is on a remote site or is dedicated to large production runs.

Reprint sections of a document after a paper jam

Another invaluable feature for the high-volume user is the sub-set reprint option. This can be used for reprinting part of a PCL print job when there is a paper jam in the middle of a print run. As a time-saver users can cancel further font downloads if fonts have already been sent to the printer.

Use PCL to archive and publish documents on intranets and the world wide web

No special distilling software is needed to create PCL: all standard PCs are delivered with a range of HP-compatible print drivers, and most people use PCL as their default Windows desktop printer. You just double click the file to open it up in EscapeE.

You can scroll through the pages, search for text or set up bookmarks and then jump to a bookmarked page.

Now you can publish PCL documents and HP-GL drawings on in-house intranets and public web sites. If you purchase a site licence, everyone in the organisation can view and print documents that were created for any HP printer. You can put PCL files on your web site for users to download and view with RedTitan EscapeE.

PCL provides a quicker and simpler way to publish documents than PDF and files sizes are smaller than TIFFs. Nevertheless, EscapeE gives you complete flexibility because you have the option to convert PCL files into PDF and TIFF for COLD and other professional archive systems.

System requirements