Lotus PIC

Also Known As:

Alias	Lotus Picture, PIC
Type	Vector
Colors	6
Compression	NA
Maximum Image Size	Apparently 64Kx64K
Multiple Images Per File	No
Numerical Format	NA
Originator	Lotus Development
Platform	MS-DOS
Supporting Applications	Lotus 1-2-3 and competing programs, word-processing and desktop-publishing applications, others
See Also	Microsoft SYLK

Usage
Used by the graphing program associated with Lotus 1-2-3

Comments
A widely used format for interchange of data, primarily business graphics. Somewhat dated. Big-endian in format, although originating under MS-DOS on Intel-based machines.

Lotus PIC appeared in support of early versions of Lotus 1-2-3; files in PIC format were generated by the main application for use by an auxiliary program called Lotus Print Graph. Although recent versions of the application still support PIC, they have started using the Computer Graphics Metafile (CGM) as well, and we can safely assume that the days of PIC are numbered. Nevertheless, a great deal of data still exists in PIC format.

Contents:
File Organization and Details
For Further Information

File Organization and Details

The file is very simple and consists of a header, vector data, and an end-of-file indicator. The header appears to be arbitrary and contains the following hex string:

01 00 00 00 01 00 08 00 44 00 00 00 0C 7F 09 06

Following the header is a list of encoded drawing commands, stored either as byte pairs or as 16-bit values. Either form may be followed by arguments. Commands are recognized by reading data either one byte at a time, assembling 16 bits of data in memory, or reading data 16 bits at a time and examining the first byte of each item. Coordinate values are always stored as 16-bit signed integers. Although positional data can theoretically be in the range -32,767 to 32,767, Lotus Print Graph always scales data to fit into the rectangle 0, 0, 3200, 2311.

Drawing commands supported by PIC are listed below:

BN	color	N is an 8-bit color value
A0 XX YY	move	Move drawing cursor to XX,YY
A2 XX YY	draw	Draw to XX,YY, update cursor
30 N-1 X1 Y1...XN YN	fill	Filled polygon of N vertices
D0 N-1 X1 Y1...XN YN	fill outlined	Filled polygon with outline
AC XX YY	text size	XX and YY are char cell size
A7 N	font	Set font: type 0 or 1 only
A8 N STRING	text	Draw NULL-terminated text string STRING, N contains direction and alignment information:
		00horizontal
		10vertical up
		20upside down
		30vertical down
		00center aligned
		01left center aligned
		02top center aligned
		03right center aligned
		04bottom center aligned
		05top left aligned
		06top right aligned
		07bottom left aligned
		08bottom right aligned
60-6F	end	End of image

The following example draws a line from 0,0 to 100,100 and draws the string "text" with characters fitting into an 8 by 10 cell:

A0 00 00 00 00 A2 00 64 00 64 AC 00 08 00 0A A8 00 74 65 78 74 60

For Further Information

Lotus no longer supports PIC, so it is difficult to get information about it. You might try contacting Lotus at:

Lotus Development Corporation
55 Cambridge Parkway
Cambridge, MA 02142
Voice: 617-577-8500
Voice: 800-831-9679
FAX: 617-225-1197

The following book, available in bookstores or from Lotus, provides additional information about Lotus PIC:

Lotus Development Corporation, Lotus File Formats for 1-2-3, Symphony, & Jazz, Lotus Books, Cambridge, MA, 1986.

Copyright © 1996, 1994 O'Reilly & Associates, Inc. All Rights Reserved.