Re: Printers using free software only
On Thu 26 Jul 2012 at 17:10:12 +0000, Camaleón wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Jul 2012 17:27:26 +0100, Roger Leigh wrote:
>
> > No, while PDF does perhaps allow such things, it's far far better than
> > PostScript.
>
> (...)
>
> PostScript is a languge for machines not for human beings. It does not
> have to be "easy" but "accurate". One only have to read the full
> specification manual of both to start guessing "why" (hint: one of them
> has around 200 less pages) :-)
>
> (note that I don't want my printer to "read" but "interpret" the document
> I am sending it exactly "as is" and PS complexity is precisely for doing
> so)
Roger Leigh gave a good explanation of the role played by PDF in the
CUPS printing process on Debian. You snipped most of it, including this:
> A native PDF workflow is far, far better and vastly more
> flexible than a native PostScript workflow.
To understand its importance you need a better reference than the one
given to a page on the cups website a few posts back. For example, there
is:
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/collaborate/workgroups/openprinting/pdfasstandardprintjobformat
To illustrate the difference between printing in the olden days and now
we'll take someone who has set up a print queue to send a job to a
printer as PostScript. A text file is sent to CUPS, which filters it.
On Lenny: text --> texttops --> pstops ----> printer
On Squeeze: text --> texttopdf --> pdftopdf --> pdftops ----> printer
Note that the printer still gets PostScript (which should make you
happy) and the advantages of the PDF workflow which have been described
occur at the pdftopdf filtering stage.
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