[cups] Newbie seeks help / FreeBSD 12.0 / Brother MFC-7860DW

[Ronald F. Guilmette]

Greeting,

I'm trying to set up a fresh new FreeBSD system to be my main server+desktop
system.  It's been a LONG time since I last did this, and thus, I've now
forgotten most of what I did to get this all working last time.  Also, last
time, I'm quite sure that I just fudged stuff, in a very hacky sort of way,
to get printing working at least somewhat.  Now, if possible, I'd like to
do this the Right Way.  But so far, despite my best efforts, things are
looking VERY bleak, specifically with respect to printing.  I hope someone
here will take pity on me and handhold me through the problems, which I am
guessing may be numerous.  (FreeBSD is not primarily intended as a desktop
OS, but I'm trying to use it as such anway, so most of my problems are
self-induced, I'm sure.)

Here's the situation in a nutshell:

The new system is running FreeBSD 12.0-RELEASE, which I have only recently
installed.

Both lpr and lpd have been installed and configured, and I have verified that
they do work for simple (plain text) test cases, exactly as suggested in
sections 9.5.2, 9.5.3, and 9.5.3.1 of the FreeBSD Handbook:

    https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/printing-lpd.html

I already have the cups-2.2.11 package installed.

I also have the following applications installed, from which I would
like to be able to print:

	firefox-67.0.2
	xpdf-4.01
	gimp-2.10.10,2

The above applications only seem to be providing me with a single printing
option, which is to allow printing to a file (which is not really helpful).

My printer is a (local) network-connected Brother MFC-7680DW.  This printer
works perfectly, and is supported right out of the box by my Ubuntu Linux
16.04 system.  This printer may be simultaneously connected via -both- 
(local network) ethernet -and- also a single direct USB connection.

If necessary, I can and will connect this printer to my new FreeBSD system
only via USB, e.g. if that proves to be the simplest or only workable option.

At present, and on my new FreeBSD 12.0 system, none of the applications
listed above even seem aware of the fact that any actual printer exist on
the local (RFC1918) network.

As I say, this printer works perfectly, and right out of the box, when used
(bvia the local network) from my Ubuntu Linux system.  Despite that fact, a
check for this specific printer (Brother MFC-7680DW) on the openprinting.org
web site suggests that -somenone-, in their infinite wisdom, has decreed that
this printer is suitable only for use as a "paperweight":

    https://www.openprinting.org/printer/Brother/Brother-MFC-7860DW

(Note that the above page contans a link, purportedly to take one to the
openprinting.org "forum for printers from Brother".  However that link is
currently broken.)

The Brother MFC-7680DW printer supports plain text, PCL, and also something
called BRScript, which I gather is Brother's own proprietary and (mostly)
Postscript-compatible Postscript[tm] implementation.

Previously, on my old FreenBSD (9.1) system, I had just barely managed to get
this printer working by connecting it up via USB -and- hacking things...
somehow (and I forget how now)... so that applications like those listed
above would offer me the option of directly printing/piping to the command
"lpr" and I had some stuff set up so that the lpr command would intuit what
kind of content was being sent (e.g. plain text or Postscript), and would
diddle it, as necessary, before sending it on to the printer.  I have seriously
forgotten now how this all worked, -or-, mor importantly, how I managed to
get my various applications to see "lpr" as yet another option for printing,
in addition to "Print to File".

If necessary, I'm more than willing to re-implement all of this hacky stuff,
which bypassed CUPS altogether, so long as I can just figure out how the
bleep various applications decide what the set of print options they will
offer to the user should be.  (This specific bit of magic is apparently
about as well documented as the most opaque internal that Microsoft ever
tried to hide from everybody.)

Thanks in advance for any assistance and/or guidance, or even just sympathy.


Regards,
rfg


P.S.  It really is rather unfortunate that a printer that's supported right
out of the box on Linux is totally invisible to CUPS on FreeBSD, but then,
as I've said, FreeBSD is not really primarily oriented towards use as a
desktop OS.  More troubling still is that fact that openprinting.org lists
the thing as a "paperweight" when it fact it has been working perfectly for
me for years and years now.  If this is their definition of a "paperweight"
then please, give me more of them!