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NAME

       typerules - HylaFAX file type identification and conversion rules

DESCRIPTION

       Only  three  types  of  files  are  accepted  by the HylaFAX server for
       transmission as facsimile: POSTSCRIPT(R) files,  PDF  files,  and  TIFF
       Class F (bilevel Group 3-encoded) files.  All other types of files must
       be converted to one of these three formats.  The  facsimile  submission
       program  applies a set of rules against the contents of each input file
       to identify the file's type and to figure out how to convert  the  file
       to  a format that is suitable for transmission.  These rules are stored
       in the file /etc/hylafax/typerules, an ASCII  file  that  is  patterned
       after  the  /etc/magic  file  used  by  the  System  V file(1) program.
       However, there are significant differences, noted below.

       Type rules work by matching data patterns in a file; typically patterns
       that  appear  in the first few bytes of the file (i.e.  magic numbers).
       There are two types  of  rules,  primary  rules  and  secondary  rules.
       Secondary  rules specify additional rules to apply after a primary rule
       has been  matched.   When  secondary  rules  are  used,  rule  scanning
       continues up to the next primary type rule in the file.

       Each rule consists of a set of whitespace-separated fields:
            offset    datatype    match    result   command
       If  an  line  is  terminated  wth  a  backslash character, the entry is
       continued on the next  line  with  any  leading  whitespace  characters
       compressed  to  a  single  space.   Comments  are marked with the ``#''
       character; everything from  to  the  end  of  the  line  is  discarded.
       Secondary rules have a ``>'' character in the first column of the line;
       primary rules do not.

       The fields in each rule entry are:

       offset    The byte offset in the file at which data should be extracted
                 and compared to a matching string or value.

       datatype  The type of data value to extract at the specified offset for
                 comparison  purposes;  one  of:  ``byte''  (8  bit   unsigned
                 number), ``short'' (16 bit unsigned number), ``long'' (32 bit
                 unsigned number), ``string'' (an array of bytes), ``istring''
                 (a  case-insensitive  array of bytes), or ``ascii'' (an array
                 of ASCII-only bytes).

       match     The value and operation to use in matching; the value used is
                 based  on  the datatype field.  If value is ``x'', then it is
                 interpreted to mean match anything; otherwise  the  following
                 operators  are  supported  (where data is the value extracted
                 from the file and value is  specified  in  the  match  field)
                 except for types ``string'', ``istring'', and ``ascii'':
                 =     data == value              !=    data != value
                 >     data > value               <     data < value
                 <=    data <= value              >=    data >= value
                 &     (data & value) == value    !     (data & value) != value
                 ^     (data ^ value) != 0

       If no operation is specified then ``='' is used.

       For ``string'', ``istring'', and ``ascii'' no operator is allowed; the implicit
       operation is always ``=''.  In these cases, the field is terminated by
       a tab or end of line, not by ``#''.  Characters in the field have
       their literal value; there are no C-style character escapes.

       result    One  of  ``ps'',  ``tiff'',  or ``error'' (case insensitive).
                 The first two results specify whether the  rule  generates  a
                 POSTSCRIPT  file  or  a  TIFF/F file (Group 3-encoded bilevel
                 data), respectively.  The ``error'' result indicates  that  a
                 file  is  unsuitable  for  transmission  and, if supplied for
                 transmission, should cause the job to  be  aborted  with  the
                 command field used in an error message.

       command   A  command  description  that  is  expanded and passed to the
                 shell  to  convert  the  input  file  to  the  result  format
                 (suitable  for  sending  as facsimile).  Before the string is
                 passed to the shell, it is scanned and  the  following  ``%''
                 escape codes are substituted for:
                 %i      input file name
                 %o      output file name
                 %r      output horizontal resolution in pixels/mm
                 %R      output horizontal resolution in pixels/inch
                 %v      output vertical resolution in lines/mm
                 %V      output vertical resolution in lines/inch
                 %f      data format, ``1'' for 1-d encoding or ``2'' for 2-d encoding
                 %w      page width in pixels
                 %W      page width in mm
                 %l      page length in pixels
                 %L      page length in mm
                 %s      page size by name
                 %F      the directory where HylaFAX filter programs reside
                 %<x>    the <x> character (e.g. ``%%'' results in ``%''
       See below for example uses of these codes.

EXAMPLES

       The  following  rules  are  used  to match the formats that are handled
       directly by the server:
       #offset   datatype    match          result    command
       0         string      %!             ps                       # POSTSCRIPT
       0         string      %PDF           ps                       # POSTSCRIPT by Ghostscript
       0         short       0x4d4d         tiff                     # big-endian TIFF
       0         short       0x4949         tiff                     # little-endian TIFF

       These rules are used to process the  ASCII  version  of  IRIS  Inventor
       database  files  while  blocking  the transmission of the binary format
       variant:
       #offset   datatype    match          result    command
       0         string      #Inventor V    error     IRIS Inventor file
       >15       string      binary         error     binary IRIS Inventor file
       >15       string      ascii          ps        %F/textfmt -fCourier-Bold -p11bp\
                                                          -U -q >%o <%i

       This rule is typically the last entry  in  the  file  and  is  used  to
       convert all unmatched ASCII data files to POSTSCRIPT:
       #offset   datatype    match          result    command
       0         ascii       x              ps        %F/textfmt -fCourier-Bold -p11bp -U -q >%o <%i

NOTES

       It  is  much  better  to  convert  data  that  is  to be transmitted to
       POSTSCRIPT because this data format permits the facsimile server to  do
       the   final  imaging  according  to  the  optimal  transfer  parameters
       (resolution, binary encoding, etc.).

       It might be better to allow secondary rules to augment a  primary  rule
       rather  than just replace them.  This would allow, for example, command
       line options to be selected based on file type.

SEE ALSO

       sendfax(1), hylafax-client(1)

                                 May 12, 1993