ARCHIVED: What is PostScript?

This content has been archived, and is no longer maintained by Indiana University. Information here may no longer be accurate, and links may no longer be available or reliable.

PostScript is a page description language (PDL) developed by Adobe. In essence, it is a programming language for describing how a page is to be printed or displayed. Examples of other PDLs include Envoy, PDF, and PCL. PostScript files often have the file extension .ps or .eps, and consist of functions for describing and positioning lines, shapes, fills, and other graphical elements, as well as for placing and formatting text.

Since PostScript describes the nature of a file's contents rather than just specifying how they look, PostScript content can be scaled effectively to any size. For example, postcard-sized content in a PostScript file could be expanded to the size of a billboard without any loss in quality.

For more about PostScript, see Adobe's product page for PostScript or search Adobe's web site.

This is document aepw in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2018-01-18 12:27:20.