Internet printing in OS X

[Matt Broughton]

In article <24632-cups.general at news.easysw.com>,
 Jim Syler <Calion at mac.com> wrote:


> > I'm trying to do something that should be very, very simple: set up my 
> > Powerbook to print to my home printer (a USB HP DeskJet 840C hooked to an 
> > iMac. Both computers are running OS X 10.3.9 Panther) while I'm on the 
> > road.
> >
<snip>

> Well, what do you know; I fixed it. After I wrote this, a horrible feeling 
> came over me, as I remembered something I had seen when logged into CUPS on 
> the iMac: The Device URI of the printer. It was "file:///dev/null". "What 
> if," I thought, "THAT was where the print jobs were being spooled to? That 
> would certainly explain why they seemed to vanish into nothingness...they 
> DID." So I created a new printer on the iMac, using GIMP drivers this time, 
> hooked up to THAT one from the PowerBook...and wonder of wonders, it worked.
> 

It sounds like you were using the HP supplied drivers the first time.  
The device URI of "file:///dev/null" would indicate that.  The HP 
printer drivers do not support ipp printing.  They only support the USB 
connection.  HP like most of the other major manufacturers that write 
their own drivers for Mac OS X, bypass most if not all of CUPS.  The 
Gimp-Print (Gutenprint) drivers are made to work properly with CUPS.  
They do, therefore,  support ipp printing.

> *#$% counterintuitive @^&&! un-mac-like !^$@&&* rotten user-hostile UNIX 
> @$^!$ grumble grumble...

Here I would tend to grumble at the printer manufacturers for not 
writing drivers that integrate with CUPS.

-- 
Matt Broughton
Only relatives are absolute.