From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Oct 29 20:09:11 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 08055106564A for ; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:09:11 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from bonomi@mail.r-bonomi.com) Received: from mail.r-bonomi.com (mx-out.r-bonomi.com [204.87.227.120]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BA2E98FC13 for ; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:09:10 +0000 (UTC) Received: (from bonomi@localhost) by mail.r-bonomi.com (8.14.4/rdb1) id p9TK9DCo083010 for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Sat, 29 Oct 2011 15:09:13 -0500 (CDT) Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2011 15:09:13 -0500 (CDT) From: Robert Bonomi Message-Id: <201110292009.p9TK9DCo083010@mail.r-bonomi.com> To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <20111029072824.76540c54@scorpio> Subject: Re: Fast personal printing _without_ CUPS X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:09:11 -0000 > From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Sat Oct 29 06:29:33 2011 > Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2011 07:28:24 -0400 > From: Jerry > To: FreeBSD > Subject: Re: Fast personal printing _without_ CUPS > > On Fri, 28 Oct 2011 17:27:03 -0500 (CDT) > Robert Bonomi articulated: > > > Your insistance on trying to impose -your- standards on the world, and > > denying them the 'freedom of choice' to make their own decisions on > > the matter -- e.g. "anyone offering such products should be to some > > degree held legally responsible to their worth" -- is a fascist > > mind-set. You 'know better' than anybody else, what is 'right' _for_ > > them. > > > > BTW, I'd _love_ to see Microsoft "held legally respnsible" for _their_ > > product shortcomings. They'd be out of business in a week at the > > outside. > > Once again your argument is pathetic. What argument is that? That you are trying to impose _your_ standards on on the world? That you would deny people the freedom to make up their own minds about whether they want vendor liability, versus accepting that risk for themselves? > This discussion has gone on long enough and I am already bored by it. [drivelectomy -- ad hominems, and fact-free ranting removed] Poor ignorant, ill-informed, Jerry. The fool doesn't know that there *is* an existing, absolutely 'standard -- meaning 'totally uniform across all versions of Unix, *AND* Unix look-alikes -- that is available to every printer vendor. Any printer manufacturer that so desires _can_ produce a *SINGLE* program source that will allow a 'host based' printer to work on _any_ Unix (or look-alike) platform. That program can be distributed as a single 'platform- independant' file, using any (platform independant) 'interpreted' language OF THEIR CHOICE -- e.g.Java, Perl, Python, Ruby, or anything similar -- or as a 'native' executable (although that would probably require compiling and linking on each environment) for optimum performance/efficiency. The entire specifications that this program must be written to are about eight lines long. Installation/use directions are even shorter: Put the file 'somewhere convenient' in the file system. Make sure it is marke 'executable' by all -- i.e. 'chmod a+x' Place the complete pathname of the installed file as the 'if' paramter in the '/etc/printcap' entry for the printer queue(s) for this printer, and set the 'lp' paramter to the name of the I/O port to which it is attached. Writing to -this- standard is a _lot_ of work. And it *is* understandable that very few printer manufacturers have done so. It is worth noting, though, that printer manufacturers _have_ done it. Lexmark did it for an early color ink-jet (the ZX-80), providing a SunOS host-based executable that provided, self-contained in the executable, a full "Color PostScript Level 3" 'driver' for that printer. A _far_simpler_ approach -- which *still* meets the requirements of 'not disclosing anything proprietary', and writing _one_ driver that works on all Unix systems -- is to write a 'device-driver' module for GhostScript. The _single_ source-code does have to be compiled for each supported CPU architecture, There is a theoretical 'worst case' of needing to produce as many as three object files ('a.out', ELF, and COFF format) for a given CPU architecture. I don't expect this to convince the frothing loon of anything. But it should demonstrate that his screaming screeds are not based in fact.