81–90 of 96 posts
Question, why the printers cannot act like web servers? Just receive a REST api request and then proceed to do their own thing (aka drive the printer to execute the request). Why my computer needs to know how to operate the printer?
I have two old photo printers that work quite well and replacing them would be extremely expensive. The driver among other things contains features to match up color profiles.
I have label printers that are old that also work well.
All rely on custom printer drivers.
I hope this new system is going to be phased in over a long timeframe, so I can keep using old printers. Even if writing software to integrate these printers with the new system no printer manufacturer is going to revisit 10 - 15-year-old printeres with a new set of drivers.
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You need the user to select paper trays, simplex or duplex, etc. For bigger devices that might include document finishing options. Label printers might have a guillotine. Print/release where you need a pin at the printer to release the document are becoming more prevalent. All this requires some interaction with the user. IPP Everywhere covers a lot but I'm guessing there will be some niche requirements that it misse…
This happens at a different layer than the printer driver; you just need to modify the postscript. Paper trays, duplex, duplex with tumble, and cutting are specifiable in postscript; this is `setpagedevice`. Even things like custom stapler options (staple first two pages, etc) can be specified. See something like https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/bpp01888 for docs
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> Printer manufacturers also don't thing like this at this point, what are they gonna do? Not provide windows drivers?
My family has an HP printer. My father uses Windows, and has had to install an HP app to scan documents. My Mac, on the other hand, can connect, print, and through the built-in "Printers & Scanners" panel in System Settings, or through the Print Center app. I think this is probably a solved problem. Windows would have to support whatever API Macs use.
The problem isn't a technical one.
Obviously the printing situation has been a nightmare for everyone involved for years. That said, Microsoft et al have made me so cynical at this point that I can’t read about “protected printing”, “secure printing”, and “putting the user first” without assuming this is a way to put some DRM filters in place to make sure you don’t print out those locked PDFs regardless of what tool you’re using. I’ll be glad to be wr…
Otherwise you can always decrypt/unlock a PDF using open source software.
This is a step in the right direction, but IMO not far enough. Printers can (IIUC) cause the client machines to automatically install “printer support apps”, which are like somewhat limited drivers. They do this stuff: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/d... This includes intercepting the raw XPS data being sent to the printer and modifying it. It looks like these things are lightly sandboxed,…
You very often also need some backchannel from the printer, e.g. for toner levels, available paper sizes, installed options. But there is a more important point: Printer manufacturers also don't think like this. They desperately want to know what you are printing, order overpriced ink for you, sell additional services like print-by-mail, etc. All that won't work without lots of permissions for the printer support app…
Fine. That runs in a separate sandbox with access to the printer and the ability to display a UI. No other privileges.
> Printer manufacturers also don't think like this.
This is irrelevant. The whole article is about MS forcing a certain model on printer manufacturers.
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Some problems arise when users print large high resolution images. Printers often dont have the buffer to store it all and so it needs to be sent in chunks/streams etc. There are other examples this is just one.
So basically the blocker is the cost of having a processor and sufficient memory in the printer? Judging from the smartphones the bom of that would be like less than $10? I saw that a Motorola g play smartphone with MT6765 and 3gb of ram is <$70.
However, I think there are plenty of Linux SBCs (single board computers) that have 4GB of RAM for around $50, just no screen, GPS, cellular modem, cameras, speakers... all sorts of things that add cost to a cell phone. $10 is a far-fetched claim, in my opinion, and citations are needed. The Pi Zero 2W is $15 and only has 512MB of RAM. So, sure, let's go with $50.
Have you considered how cheap printers are? I see multiple inkjet printers on Amazon that cost $59. Adding $50 would nearly double the price of the unit. Other manufacturers would eat their lunch, so you can see why no one is rushing to offer a $59 printer with an additional $50 worth of computer built in. Even if it were "only" $25 extra, that is still significant.
At the higher end, printers do start to include more of everything, but those aren't the printers the average consumer is buying.
I wonder if this will impact specialized photo and other graphic art printers? Things like the large format Epson and other Pro printers. What about plotters and vinyl cutout printers? They usually have a ton of driver specific settings, etc. for tuning the output. How will these settings be managed without drivers specific to them?
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So basically the blocker is the cost of having a processor and sufficient memory in the printer? Judging from the smartphones the bom of that would be like less than $10? I saw that a Motorola g play smartphone with MT6765 and 3gb of ram is <$70.
If the recent revelations in the Epic vs Google court case are anything to go by, Motorola is likely getting paid by Google for every single Google search and Google Play Store transaction that occurs on that phone. It could even be sold at a loss. I don't think pointing at a low-cost smartphone is a very useful point of reference given that context. However, I think there are plenty of Linux SBCs (single board compu…
[1] https://www.martview.com/mtk-cpu-mt6765v-cb-1839-amsh-btpkvx... [2] https://tinyurl.com/5zretykj
Plus I doubt that a printer needs that much memory or strong cpu to print.
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If the recent revelations in the Epic vs Google court case are anything to go by, Motorola is likely getting paid by Google for every single Google search and Google Play Store transaction that occurs on that phone. It could even be sold at a loss. I don't think pointing at a low-cost smartphone is a very useful point of reference given that context. However, I think there are plenty of Linux SBCs (single board compu…
MTK6765V is $9.9 [1] 3GB LPDDR3 is $10 [2] [1] https://www.martview.com/mtk-cpu-mt6765v-cb-1839-amsh-btpkvx... [2] https://tinyurl.com/5zretykj Plus I doubt that a printer needs that much memory or strong cpu to print.