Classification:
Prologue:
Epilogue:
I don't think we can move to a common driver, but with the printer MIB and/or
IPP, we should be able to move to a model that is more like the postscript
printer definition file where the PDL generation is pretty generic for a given
family of printers (e.g. postscript or pcl), availability of unique printer
features (bins, finishing, paper handling, etc) is communicated via SNMP gets
or IPP getAttributes, and operation or selection of those features is through
IPP attributes provided with teh print job.
---------------------- Forwarded by Roger K Debry/Boulder/IBM on 12/19/96 06:26
AM ---------------------------
ipp-owner @ pwg.org
12/18/96 11:15 AM
To: IPP @ pwg.org at internet, babakj @ microsoft.com at internet, cmanros @
cp10.es.xerox.com at internet
cc:
Subject: RE: IPP> RE: Printer Instance Creation/Installation -Reply
There are some proposed common naming schemes and structures (MS
INF files) but these are very POORLY followed and lead to many errors.
They are changing over time and have not stablized.
This is an awfully big rat hole (elephant hole?, black hole?). We should
not waste our time on this initially, at all.
************************************************************
Scott A. Isaacson
Print Services Consulting Engineer
Novell Inc., 122 E 1700 S, Provo, UT 84606
V: (801) 861-7366, (800) 453-1267 x17366
F: (801) 861-4025, E: scott_isaacson at novell.com
W: http://www.novell.com
************************************************************
>>> Carl-Uno Manros <cmanros at cp10.es.xerox.com> 12/17/96 08:23pm
>>>At 06:46 PM 12/17/96 PST, Babak Jahromi wrote:
>>>>if I recall correctly, one of our user requirements was that we would
>>like to avoid having a separate print driver to install for every new
network
>>printer that a user may want to use. Compare this to fax today - you
do
>>not expect the user to download a new piece of software for every
new
>>fax address he/she wants to use. My hope would be that the "IPP print
driver"
>>is a generic piece of software, which can be used for many different
printers
>>in combination with a relatively short list of capabilities and options
for a
>>particular printer. This list could be stored locally or downloaded every
>>time.
>>Am I too optimistic here?
>>"Generic" is synonym to "poor feature list". Why do we want to force
>people who have invested in full feature printers to treat them like
>monochrome fax machines? If people like to use Internet Printing as a
>fax service, then the server can install the printer with a minimal
>driver, and we can arrage that all Internet clients would have that
>minimal driver. But beyond that, the driver would have to be
downloaded
>from the server. And the good thing is that the driver does not have to
>know anything about the new protocol. i.e. no change is needed in
>today's drivers.
>>Babak
>
OK. I can probably live with having at least a simple generic IPP driver
that does not require explicit download in advance, with downloading
and
automatic installation in other cases. Do we have any expectations about
the time needed to download a print driver over HTTP, using say in worst
case a 14.4 modem? Are there agreed naming conventions for drivers,
so
that the clients can identify if they already have the right driver
installed, or do we need to come up with a driver naming scheme?
Carl-Uno