Hard copy

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In information handling, the U.S. Federal Standard 1037C (Glossary of Telecommunication Terms) defines a hard copy as a permanent reproduction, or copy, in the form of a physical object, of any media suitable for direct use by a person (in particular paper), of displayed or transmitted data. Examples of hard copies include teleprinter pages, continuous printed tapes, computer printouts, and radio photo prints. On the other hand, physical objects such as magnetic tapes, floppy disks, or non-printed punched paper tapes are not defined as hard copies by 1037C. [1]

Contents

A file that can be viewed without printing on a screen is sometimes called a soft copy. [2] [3] The U.S. Federal Standard 1037C defines "soft copy" as "a nonpermanent display image, for example, a cathode ray tube display." [4]

The term "hard copy" predates the digital computer. In the book and newspaper printing process, "hard copy" refers to a manuscript or typewritten document that has been edited and proofread and is ready for typesetting or being read on-air in a radio or television broadcast. The old meaning of hard copy was mostly discarded after the information revolution. [5]

Use in computer security

One often-overlooked use for printers is in the field of IT security. Copies of various system and server activity logs are typically stored on the local filesystem, where a remote attacker – having achieved their primary goals – can then alter or delete the contents of the logs in an attempt to "cover their tracks" or otherwise thwart the efforts of system administrators and security experts. However, if the log entries are simultaneously given to a printer, line-by-line, a local hard-copy record of system activity is created – which cannot be remotely altered or otherwise manipulated. Dot matrix printers are ideal for this task, as they can sequentially print each log entry, one at a time, as they are added to the log. The usual dot-matrix printer support for continuous stationery also prevents incriminating pages from being surreptitiously removed or altered without evidence of tampering.

"Dead-tree" dysphemism

The hacker's Jargon File defines a dead-tree version to be a paper version of an online document, where "dead trees" refer to paper.

A saying from the Jargon File is that "You can't grep dead trees", which comes from the Unix command grep, which searches the contents of text files. This means that there is an advantage to keeping documents in digital form, rather than on paper, so that they can be more easily searched for specific contents. A similarly entry in the Jargon File is "tree-killer", which may refer either to a printer or a person who wastes paper.

Dead-tree edition refers to a printed paper version of a written work, as opposed to digital alternatives such as a web page. [6]

Related Research Articles

In computing and telecommunication, a control character or non-printing character (NPC) is a code point in a character set that does not represent a written character or symbol. They are used as in-band signaling to cause effects other than the addition of a symbol to the text. All other characters are mainly graphic characters, also known as printing characters, except perhaps for "space" characters. In the ASCII standard there are 33 control characters, such as code 7, BEL, which rings a terminal bell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Manuscript</span> Document written by hand

A manuscript was, traditionally, any document written by hand or typewritten, as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in some indirect or automated way. More recently, the term has come to be understood to further include any written, typed, or word-processed copy of an author's work, as distinguished from the rendition as a printed version of the same.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teleprinter</span> Device for transmitting messages in written form by electrical signals

A teleprinter is an electromechanical device that can be used to send and receive typed messages through various communications channels, in both point-to-point and point-to-multipoint configurations. Initially they were used in telegraphy, which developed in the late 1830s and 1840s as the first use of electrical engineering, though teleprinters were not used for telegraphy until 1887 at the earliest. The machines were adapted to provide a user interface to early mainframe computers and minicomputers, sending typed data to the computer and printing the response. Some models could also be used to create punched tape for data storage and to read back such tape for local printing or transmission.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Machine-readable medium and data</span> Medium capable of storing data in a format readable by a machine

In communications and computing a machine-readable medium, or computer-readable medium, is a medium capable of storing data in a format easily readable by a digital computer or mechanical device.

grep is a command-line utility for searching plain-text data sets for lines that match a regular expression. Its name comes from the ed command g/re/p, which has the same effect. grep was originally developed for the Unix operating system, but later available for all Unix-like systems and some others such as OS-9.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blueprint</span> Document reproduction created by using a contact print process on light-sensitive sheets

A blueprint is a reproduction of a technical drawing or engineering drawing using a contact print process on light-sensitive sheets. Introduced by Sir John Herschel in 1842, the process allowed rapid and accurate production of an unlimited number of copies. It was widely used for over a century for the reproduction of specification drawings used in construction and industry. The blueprint process was characterized by white lines on a blue background, a negative of the original. The process was not able to reproduce color or shades of grey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stationery</span> Writing materials

Stationery refers to commercially manufactured writing materials, including cut paper, envelopes, writing implements, continuous form paper, and other office supplies. Stationery includes materials to be written on by hand or by equipment such as computer printers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Newline</span> Special characters in computing signifying the end of a line of text

Newline is a control character or sequence of control characters in character encoding specifications such as ASCII, EBCDIC, Unicode, etc. This character, or a sequence of characters, is used to signify the end of a line of text and the start of a new one.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Carbon copy</span> Copy of a document made by carbon paper

Before the development of photographic copiers, a carbon copy was the under-copy of a typed or written document placed over carbon paper and the under-copy sheet itself. When copies of business letters were so produced, it was customary to use the acronym "CC" or "cc" before a colon and below the writer's signature to inform the principal recipient that carbon copies had been made and distributed to the parties listed after the colon. With the advent of word processors and e-mail, "cc" is used as a merely formal indication of the distribution of letters to secondary recipients.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dots per inch</span> Measure of dot density

Dots per inch is a measure of spatial printing, video or image scanner dot density, in particular the number of individual dots that can be placed in a line within the span of 1 inch (2.54 cm). Similarly, dots per centimetre refers to the number of individual dots that can be placed within a line of 1 centimetre (0.394 in).

Prepress is the term used in the printing and publishing industries for the processes and procedures that occur between the creation of a print layout and the final printing. The prepress process includes the preparation of artwork for press, media selection, proofing, quality control checks and the production of printing plates if required. The artwork is often provided by the customer as a print-ready PDF file created in desktop publishing.

The vertical bar, |, is a glyph with various uses in mathematics, computing, and typography. It has many names, often related to particular meanings: Sheffer stroke, pipe, bar, or, vbar, and others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dot matrix printer</span> Computer printer popular in the 1970s and 1980s

A dot matrix printer is an impact printer that prints using a fixed number of pins or wires. Typically the pins or wires are arranged in one or several vertical columns. The pins strike an ink-coated ribbon and force contact between the ribbon and the paper, so that each pin makes a small dot on the paper. The combination of these dots forms a dot matrix image. They were also known as serial dot matrix printers.

A typographical error, also called a misprint, is a mistake made in the typing of printed or electronic material. Historically, this referred to mistakes in manual typesetting. Technically, the term includes errors due to mechanical failure or slips of the hand or finger, but excludes errors of ignorance, such as spelling errors, or changing and misuse of words such as "than" and "then". Before the arrival of printing, the copyist's mistake or scribal error was the equivalent for manuscripts. Most typos involve simple duplication, omission, transposition, or substitution of a small number of characters.

In Unix-like and some other operating systems, find is a command-line utility that locates files based on some user-specified criteria and either prints the pathname of each matched object or, if another action is requested, performs that action on each matched object.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Page layout</span> Part of graphic design that deals in the arrangement of visual elements on a page

In graphic design, page layout is the arrangement of visual elements on a page. It generally involves organizational principles of composition to achieve specific communication objectives.

A computer operator is a role in IT which oversees the running of computer systems, ensuring that the machines, and computers are running properly. The job of a computer operator as defined by the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics is to "monitor and control ... and respond to ... enter commands ... set controls on computer and peripheral devices. This Excludes Data Entry."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Listing (computer)</span>

A listing or program listing is a printed list of lines of computer code or digital data.

A contract proof usually serves as an agreement between customer and printer and as a color reference guide for adjusting the press before the final press run. Most contract proofs are a prepress proof.

cat (Unix) Unix command utility

cat is a standard Unix utility that reads files sequentially, writing them to standard output. The name is derived from its function to (con)catenate files. It has been ported to a number of operating systems.

References

  1. Hard copy Archived 5 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine as defined in Federal Standard 1037C.
  2. "Soft Copy". Collins English Dictionary.
  3. "Soft Copy". dictionary.com.
  4. "Soft copy", as defined in Federal Standard 1037C.
  5. hard copy as defined by Merriam-Webster Online.
  6. "Definition of DEAD-TREE". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 21 September 2018.

PD-icon.svg This article incorporates public domain material from Federal Standard 1037C. General Services Administration. (in support of MIL-STD-188).