On Thu, 27 Oct 2011 17:41:38 +0100 Matthew Seaman articulated: > On 27/10/2011 16:29, Polytropon wrote: > > In my opinion, CUPS is the "Windows" way of doing things, > > not the UNIX way. Hate me for having that opinion, but I > > feel to say it. > > Actually you can't blame Bill for this one. CUPS is an Apple / MacOS > X thing. I must say, it works really smoothly on my MacBook -- I just > plug in the USB cable from my printer and hit print -- but I never got > it to work properly under FreeBSD. (Mostly that was because I had the > system lpr working just fine on my old FBSD machine connected to the > printer using a parallel port. Newer hardware doesn't even have a > parallel port now.)
Printing under MS Windows is a breeze. The *nix community has never
gotten printing up to that lever. While there are those who continually
blame the "manufacturers", the truth is that any COO, CFO {or any other
alphabetic combination that you like} that seriously proposed the
creation of a department dedicated to the writing of drivers for
non-windows based systems, a department that would therefore have a zero
based projected cash flow, would be removed from office posthaste.
Even the few companies that do write a limited set of drivers for the
exceedingly fragmented *.nix community tend to stick with vanilla Linux
and perhaps Debian. It took nVidia years (literally) to get FreeBSD to
update their product to the point when nVidia could supply 64 bit
drivers.
I recently spoke with a representative from Brothers regarding
securing a driver for one of their laser printers. He himself is a
Linux man and said that he felt my pain. He also informed me that while
it had been discussed from time to time, it was always felt that it
would be a lose-lose situation. They do supply drivers for Linux and
Debian but that is about it. He stated that it was felt that the cost
of writing drivers for a widely fragmented community and then having to
support said drivers would just not be financially feasible.
Printing has come a long way from the "parallel port" configuration.
Many now use wireless connections for instance. I love wireless
printers myself. However, here again problems arise. FreeBSD supplies
virtually no "N" protocol certified drivers which negates the
effectiveness of an "N" protocol based wireless printer.
--
Jerry ✌
jerry+f...@seibercom.net
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