(v13) Module registration

This page applies to Harlequin v13.1r0 and later; both Harlequin Core and Harlequin MultiRIP

Each Screening module is identified by an internal name, for use in configuring the RIP for example, and an additional UTF-8 name for display purposes.

Each screening module also indicates at registration time the source (contone) and destination (halftone) raster depths and interleaving formats it supports.

The source Raster depth is that used to deliver the contone pixels to the screening module for halftoning. It will be either 8-bits or 16-bits.

Note that for screening modules requesting object-type information to accompany the raster, the bit depth of the object-type information is always the same as that of the source (contone) raster.

All screening modules should support both 8-bit and 16-bit source rasters.

It is an error condition if the RIP is unable to adopt a source raster depth satisfying all screening modules used within a page.

The destination raster depth is that required by the output device driver or plugin. Destination raster depths are expected to be 1, 2, 4, 8 or 16-bits.

The interface between the RIP and screening modules only permit the use of band-interleaved or frame-interleaved raster formats. The RIP does not currently support screening of a pixel-interleaved raster. If required, it is the responsibility of the output device driver/plugin to convert the raster to pixel interleaving.

Attempts to use screening modules that do not support the destination bit depth or interleaving format will be an error condition.

Screening module security

The RIP only registers Screening modules that pass an initial security check.

Creating modular screen definitions

To use a screen defined by a module, you would create a type 100 halftone dictionary. Using these is discussed the next section.

You will also want to create entire screen sets with screens for all the colorants, using a standard type 5 halftone dictionary, and possibly sets with different screens for different types of objects, using the Harlequin extension, type 195. For more information see the Harlequin Extensions Manual , Section “GGS extension, HalftoneType 195”.

You may also want to register these screens by name, so they can be used as override screens. For more information see the Harlequin Extensions Manual , Section “Adding extra dot shapes”.

Please see our examples in SW/Sys/ExtraStart/HtmEg and SW/TestConfig/HTM.