Date: Thu, 7 May 2020 11:14:55 +0700 From: Victor Sudakov <vas@sibptus.ru> To: freebsd@johnea.net Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Brother HL-L2340D printer and lpd? Message-ID: <20200507041455.GA6626@admin.sibptus.ru> In-Reply-To: <55f0a9dd-1089-9e80-4e8e-6eb181824864@johnea.net> References: <20200503171259.GA48627@admin.sibptus.ru> <20200505161952.GA34844@admin.sibptus.ru> <20200505185510.00b622e3.freebsd@edvax.de> <20200505180101.GA35751@admin.sibptus.ru> <2c213d5f-8c18-812e-8770-dd5312b1edf7@panix.com> <55f0a9dd-1089-9e80-4e8e-6eb181824864@johnea.net>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
--/9DWx/yDrRhgMJTb
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
freebsd@johnea.net wrote:
> On 2020-05-05 11:49, Kurt Hackenberg wrote:
> > On 2020-05-05 14:01, Victor Sudakov wrote:
> >=20
> >> A PostScript translator (GhostScript or any other) can be expected to
> >> "raster" the PS input incorrectly if this input contains encodings it =
does
> >> not understand, or glyphs/fonts it is lacking.
> >>
> >> I've seen so many problems with Cyrillic in my life, believe me. I've
> >> seen PDFs with some Cyrillic glyphs replaced by garbage, and much more
> >> of such weird stuff than I wish to see.
> >=20
> >=20
> > It would be nice if you could send plain Unicode to a printer. Ideally,=
=20
> > I guess, either compressed or not -- UTF-8, UTF-16, or UTF-32. I don't=
=20
> > expect it to happen.
>=20
> In support of the "I don't expect it to happen" statement:
>=20
> For many many years, in many many printers, no rendering of any kind
> is performed inside the printer.
>=20
> These printers expect all input in the form of a binary raster, many
> times this raster itself is in a proprietary non-standard format. This
> is regardless of interface type: network, USB, LPT, etc.
>=20
> All rendering of all fonts, embedded images, everything, is performed
> in a "driver" running on the computer interfaced to the printer. Often
> these "drivers" are also proprietary binary blobs which only function
> on a specific operating system.=20
The above observation is true only about el cheapo winprinters. I have
30 years of experience with different office grade printers (beginning
=66rom dot matrix Epsons and some Soviet clones thereof) and I can assure
you that any decent printer (above the minimum budget level) attached to
a DOS box could print text by simply typing
COPY CON LPT1
at the DOS prompt. No "driver" required.
More expensive printers could print PostScript directly:
COPY /b BOOK.PS LPT1
Again, no driver required.
>=20
> Conclusions:
>=20
> 1) Why, at this point, would anyone be surprised that a printer will
> not take plain text directly as input?=20
Experience, just experience.
I've seen numerous Canons, HPs, Xeroxes, Kyoceras and what not with a
built-in TCP/IP printserver, or attached to printserver appliances -
they all could print plain text when sent to the appropriate queue
("rp").
True, very often they would not print Cyrillic, and I had to install
printcap filters to load a Cyrillic font into printer before actual
printing. The Cyrillic font was usually a blob to be concatenated with
the text job (before it). It has always worked.
Moreover, in some recent larger office color printers I've seen the
ability of uploading a PostScript or PDF file via FTP or even from a USB
flash drive which is then printed autonomously.
Speaking about this particular Brother HL-L2340D printer - I read the
specifications, found out that it supported the LPD protocol and was
sure that this one was like others. Probably I was being too optimistic.=20
With this new experience, I'll be more cautious in the future, but I
don't have an idea yet how to filter out printers without line printing
capability.
--=20
Victor Sudakov, VAS4-RIPE, VAS47-RIPN
2:5005/49@fidonet http://vas.tomsk.ru/
--/9DWx/yDrRhgMJTb
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc"
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
iQEcBAEBAgAGBQJes4s+AAoJEA2k8lmbXsY0iXQH/24Rytm/Z8WCbSkYovuDSO6S
5RGzm5m/LFhS7OSuzdEtgtnH4nRO9RhHKCmKEFxDKcmKiOr/Z0qq/GDBSH+pwy1z
9Z+0XrQR0C65+pkO6Oj32VHHH2CLOvZ7kx5lxdSuPr52SdfN2pTefYskcSAotVw7
0QSd/B2Xolg0GNlUUmEkDSqmeIXOhQ2ooG5hMkDNMvL+wAlBgmr9OAI+f91DNtJ6
tQoF9N//ejklu1UkFmy8gVHyMEOHGKMGqdFXdklBMKyaO5enqIGuboBcoKiMylGo
Cb/g5yDDiesPxtIm2Zir2rUR73F0Txf0n8D/DDxXNYoQPdTwRYIxJKfcdmkE584=
=d64M
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--/9DWx/yDrRhgMJTb--
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20200507041455.GA6626>