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3.1.8 Output Options

These are the options to specify what you want to do out of what a2ps produces. Only a single destination is possible at a time, i.e., if ever there are several options ‘-o’, ‘-P’ or ‘-d’, the last one is honored.

Option: -o file ¶

Option: --output=file ¶

leave output to file file. If file is ‘-’, leave output to the standard output.

Option: --version-control=type ¶

to avoid loosing a file, a2ps offers backup services. This is enabled when the output file already exists, is regular (that is, no backup is done on special files such as /dev/null), and is writable (in this case, disabling version control makes a2ps fail the very same way as if version control was disabled: permission denied).

The type of backups made can be set with the VERSION_CONTROL environment variable, which can be overridden by this option. If VERSION_CONTROL is not set and this option is not given, the default backup type is ‘existing’. The value of the VERSION_CONTROL environment variable and the argument to this option are like the GNU Emacs ‘version-control’ variable; they also recognize synonyms that are more descriptive. The valid values are (unique abbreviations are accepted):

‘none’

‘off’

Never make backups (override existing files).

‘t’

‘numbered’

Always make numbered backups.

‘nil’

‘existing’

Make numbered backups of files that already have them, simple backups of the others.

‘never’

‘simple’

Always make simple backups.

Option: --suffix=suffix ¶

The suffix used for making simple backup files can be set with the SIMPLE_BACKUP_SUFFIX environment variable, which can be overridden by this option. If neither of those is given, the default is ‘~’, as it is in Emacs.

Option: -P name ¶

Option: --printer=name ¶

send output to printer name. See item ‘Printer:’ and ‘Unknown printer:’ in Your Printers and results of option ‘--list=defaults’ to see the bindings between printer names and commands.

It is possible to pass additional options to lpr or lp via the variable ‘lp.options’, for more information see How Can I Pass Options to ‘lpr’.

Option: -d ¶

send output to the default printer. See item ‘DefaultPrinter:’ in Your Printers.