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EN Introduction 6-1
6
Cursor Positioning
Introduction
This section describes the cursor positioning commands.
Although the printer does not actually have a cursor, the PCL
cursor position refers to the Current Active Position (CAP), like
the blinking underline character (cursor) used on most
computers. This “cursor” identifies the current position on the
page; the pointer, where a printing command begins laying out
page data. The cursor can be moved anywhere within the logical
page using a combination of horizontal and vertical cursor
positioning commands and control codes.
In addition to cursor commands positioning the cursor, the cursor
is automatically positioned after certain operations, such as
printing characters and graphics. After printing a character, the
cursor is positioned to the right, at a distance equal to the width
of that character. This is controlled by the character design
described under “Character Width” in Chapter 10, and allows
printing characters without requiring a cursor position command
for each character printed. When printing graphics, the cursor
can also be positioned at a new location. These new positions
are identified in the graphics sections.
HP-GL/2 vector graphics has its own HP-GL/2 cursor (referred
to as the “pen”) that can be positioned within the HP-GL/2
addressable area. For additional information on HP-GL/2 pen
positioning refer to Chapter 17, An Introduction to HP-GL/2
Vector Graphics.