From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Sep 22 19:36:30 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 66A2E1065674 for ; Wed, 22 Sep 2010 19:36:30 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from pgiessel@mac.com) Received: from asmtpout015.mac.com (asmtpout015.mac.com [17.148.16.90]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4FCA68FC12 for ; Wed, 22 Sep 2010 19:36:30 +0000 (UTC) MIME-version: 1.0 Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Content-type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Received: from Blue-Star-2.local ([12.12.31.232]) by asmtp015.mac.com (Sun Java(tm) System Messaging Server 6.3-8.01 (built Dec 16 2008; 32bit)) with ESMTPSA id <0L95002AZVOQDQ20@asmtp015.mac.com> for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Wed, 22 Sep 2010 11:36:29 -0700 (PDT) X-Proofpoint-Spam-Details: rule=notspam policy=default score=0 spamscore=0 ipscore=0 phishscore=0 bulkscore=0 adultscore=0 classifier=spam adjust=0 reason=mlx engine=6.0.2-1004200000 definitions=main-1009220155 X-Proofpoint-Virus-Version: vendor=fsecure engine=2.50.10432:5.0.10011,1.0.148,0.0.0000 definitions=2010-09-22_09:2010-09-22, 2010-09-22, 1970-01-01 signatures=0 Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2010 10:36:29 -0800 From: "Peter A. Giessel" To: David Brodbeck X-Priority: 3 In-reply-to: Message-id: X-Mailer: Mailsmith 2.2.5 Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: The nightmarish problem of installing a printer X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2010 19:36:30 -0000 On 2010/09/22 at 9:27, gull@gull.us (David Brodbeck) wrote: >If this were true, and there really were a big conspiracy on >Microsoft's part to make manufacturers only support Windows, then you >wouldn't see cheap printers that support both Windows and MacOS X. In >reality, such printers are pretty easy to find. > >Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by simple economics. ;) The question you are missing is *HOW* does MacOS X print to all these "cheap printers"? Lets take a couple of screen captures from Mac OS X.6 (Apple's latest released OS) with all current updates installed: http://giessel.org/pictures/OSX_printers1.png http://giessel.org/pictures/OSX_printers2.png Hmm, CUPS, and Gutenprint.... Are these methods available for FreeBSD? Mainly what Apple did was pre-install and pre-configure in a user-friendly way CUPS and Gutenprint.