[Tfug] ethernet to USB?

[Adrian]

On Friday 01 July 2005 18:06, Michael Salivar wrote:
[snip]
> I haven't worked much with Linux and print spooling yet, so I'm not sure if 
we'll be able to run
> Linux yet.  Do you need to have a printer driver to spool for it, or can the 
server just pass jobs
> on without understanding them?
>

Yes, no, and both... A print spool is really just a temporary queue to hold 
the print data and pass it bit-by-bit to the printer, as needed, so that the 
originating application can go back to doing other work. In the good-ol-days 
of serial line printers, this was a good thing as it meant your application 
didn't have to sit and monitor the serial port... These days, the OS itself 
manages a print spool, so the applications doesn't have to.

A print spool as your referring to it (as most generally do) is both the print 
spool and a print driver/manipulation/encapsulation in one. The standard 
Linux CUPS is the latter, but is completely configurable to be with or 
without any processing to pass print jobs directly thru. In a typical 
situation, you set up a printer on the Linux machine (say a HP LJ) with a PS 
(or PCL) driver and then share it out on the network. Any local application 
printing to that would send the data to CUPS, which would process it into 
Postscript and que to the printer. A Windows machine on the network pointed 
at CUPS as a print server would typically do its on PS conversion, send it to 
CUPS, which would see it's already PS and que it to the printer. (You could 
have CUPS do additional work as well, such as reformatting the PS to put 
multiple pages on a single piece of paper.)


> Anyway, the real thing that's holding me back right now is USB and 
distances.  The server would
> optimally be with the switches and DSL modem on one side of the building, 
while there are a bunch
> of USB printers, plotters, scanners, and plate makers in graphics.

Well, that depends... What it sounds like you want to do is separate the 
Windows machines from direct (local) connection with lots of devices (i.e., 
it's not Bob's printer, it's everyones printer). But how do you want to 
manage that printer?

If all you want to do is make the printer a network device and you don't want 
to manage/munipulate the printer jobs, then don't think about using Linux at 
all... What you really want is an Ethernet->USB print server. Something like 
the D-Link DP-301U (or the DP-300U):
http://www.dlink.com/products/?sec=0&pid=165

You just pull an ethernet cable to the printer, connect to the printer with 
one of these, which act as a server/spool. Configure the windows machine (use 
the standard printer's driver, but change the port from USB to a mock-USB 
TCP/IP port on the D-Link). Now on the other hand, if you want to manage who 
can print what/where and provide accounting data, then a Linux print server 
may be the way to go.

But now a second question, why do you need a print server? You go on to say 
above printers, scanners, and plate makers... So does that mean that this is 
a professional print shop and what you really want is a RIP processor to send 
out to high-end printers, not a print spool for temporarily holding PS data?

I haven;t messed much with RIP, I assume you could it with CUPS as well. There 
are software drivers for Windows that act like a print driver, but 
most?/many? professional shops use a dedicated RIP server (like a FieryRIP), 
which is a pricy and specialized item.

Adrian