[Info-vax] Direct print of PDF files on PDF compatible printers.

[chris]

On 03/02/22 15:53, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> On 3/2/22 10:08, chris wrote:
>> On 03/01/22 23:05, gah4 wrote:
>>> On Tuesday, March 1, 2022 at 9:16:42 AM UTC-8, Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote:
>>>
>>>> Some of the Xerox laser printer models support direct print of PDF
>>>> files.
>>>> Now, we uses DCPS för most of our printing needs. So, should I look for
>>>> a way to setup a DCPS queue that will be transparent and just let the
>>>> PDF file through (DCPS itself dosn't support PDF input)? Or is it
>>>> simpler to just setup a queue using the telnetsym, lpd_smb or such?
>>>
>>> As well as I know it, PDF is a subset of PS.
>>>
>>> Enough of a subset that there is an automated process to convert
>>> PDF into PS, and the program pdftops to do it.
>>>
>>> Are there printers that support PDF, but not PS?
>>
>> One thing that might solve the problem long term would be to port
>> cups. Pretty foolproof and works out of the box on all the systems
>> and os's tried here. Just about every printer model supported as well.
>>
>> You could argue that it's not the os's task to process pdf or any
>> other format, other than transparently passing the data. Pdf should be
>> handled by the pdf reader itself, as with most systems these days...
>>
>
> Who would argue that? Most of us remember when printers were just
> dumb boxes. Used to have to put a loop of punched paper tape in just
> so it could find the beginning of the page!
>
> bill
>
>

Different world now, isn't it ?. Similar problems with terminals on
unix, where the termcap file could be megabytes of special control
character sequences. As I said, the os cups system is very flexible
and keeps all the printer specific stuff in one place where it
belongs, but like the termcap example, is quite bulky because of the
myriad  of printer types. No easy way around that I guess.
Can also be managed with a browser for setups and monitoring as well.

Might be worth looking at for vms.

Chris