I have to admit that I don't know what xps is as I have not used Windows in
about ten years.

You can print to pdf in Linux. Just print any page and then choose print to
file and then click the pdf button and give it a name. I hope that this is a
similar feature.

That should work. I will try it.

I'm not familiar with windoze - what exactly is the "XPS printer"?

It prints to a file with the .xps extend and you put you own name
on it and you
can then save it in a folder of your own choice. I use it to print out
my receipts for
on line payments. Then if you need a hard copy you click on it and it
gets read into
you browser window and you can then print it out, or send it to someone
via email.
Quite handy. There may be something kinda like it only to PDF format,
called I think
cute writer or something like that. I will have to look it up again.
With cute writer you
edit something in your favorite editor and send it to cute writer and
the output is PDF
formatted and can be either sent or printed from there. I thing the XPS
tool puts it in
XML or HTML format for saving.

Have you looked at a program called a2ps. It is similar to what you
described and I believe that there is a Debian version that runs under
a GUI.
I only very seldom use it nowadays.

I have used CutePDFWriter for years (in windoze). This was before XPS was
available. I like it because it is a quick and easy way to create a .pdf file.
It install a pseudo printer so anything you can send to a printer can be sent to
CutePDFWriter instead. This allows you to send it or print it (or selected
portions of it) later.

I have not tried it on linux. There may not be a need for such a program these
days.They have a free download but it may be a windoze only program.

Web site is cutepdf.com

I think that what the the cute pdf writer does, ubuntu can do it by default. At
least thats what i think roy was saying... I remember i followed some steps to
get print-to-pdf working when i first started using ubuntu, and when i was done,
came to the conclusion i had not actually changed anything.

There are two routes to go with Linux. You can install the cups-pdf printer
which gives you a printer that will print to pdf or you can print to file
and choose either pdf or ps as the print format. Either way works.

I prefer print to file method because it gives me control over the file
name. Otherwise you have to rename them with something sensible later. I use
pdf printing every day to go paperless. I print recipes, webpages, articles
from e-zines and rss feeds to pdf rather than print them to paper and then
have a mess of paper to file. I have a sizeable library of articles archived
this way. I can read them later and even bookmark them. Linux is just is so
much more sensible than other OSes that cannot print to pdf out of the box.

Creating pdfs doesn't get any easier than the OpenOffice.org method. Create the
document in the word processor, adding pictures, whatever, format as you wish,
then simply select "Export as PDF" from the file menu, or click the pdf icon
next to the Print icon, and you get a perfect pdf every time. I've been using it
for years.

That is great if you are creating a document. However, if you use 'print to
file' then you can make a pdf from anything that can be printed, not just
things that you create in OpenOffice.org.

Another Windows solution is PDF Creator
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/. It installs as a printer and
can create a pdf of anything that can be printed. It doesn't have a Linux
programme but "print to file" works very well for me.

Which is good and you can print a PDF, what we are talking about
is printing to a file from a browser. I suppose you could do a screen
shot, drop it in OO, and save it, but in my mind just printing from
the browser page and saving it as a PDF file in my receipts folder
is better and easier.

We are glad that you are a happy camper.

I am not sure why postscript is the default when pdf is the first button. It
would be nice if pdf was the default. Postscript files work as well as pdf.
I have at times forgotten to click on pdf and it comes out ps, but I can't
tell the difference and ps files are easier to edit.

The bottom line is that it works and that we have good tools to do what we
want.

I think thats what it does,
it works from mozilla browser ok.

A couple of minutes ago I answered another email saying the print to
file was to ps. Now I just tried it out found it was either and PDF was
checked. So I am happy with this too.

I looked at it last night and when you choose "print to file"
in Ubuntu the file type is ps, which if I remember right is
"postscript" in Unix world. I have an HP laser printer so I think
it understands ps format, but I haven't tried it out yet.