Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com; run by ezmlm
Sender: cygwin-owner AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com
Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com
Message-ID: <37974007.E4E0AAC4@savantage.com>
Date: Thu, 22 Jul 1999 11:00:08 -0500
From: "Dan St.Andre'" <saint AT savantage DOT com>
Organization: Nu Thena Systems, Inc.
X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.6 [en] (WinNT; I)
X-Accept-Language: en
MIME-Version: 1.0
To: cygwin AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com
Subject: B20:  /dev/lp not supported
Content-Type: multipart/mixed;
 boundary="------------51D61C311F231AB0230D3DC6"

--------------51D61C311F231AB0230D3DC6
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

SITUATION:
   Since you so nicely provide for /dev/tty and others, why is /dev/lp so
obviously missing?

ANALYSIS:
   I know that you implement access to the dos devices PRN and LPT?.  However,
these
are not typical of unix software usage. Some tools use " ... >/dev/lp"  and rely
on the spooler.

   Most systems have a printer or "connection" to one. Eventually, many
applications want
[I can't say that they 'need'] paper output.

RECOMMENDATION:
This might be easy given existing support for PRN &c:
1.  Since DOS/windoze supports up to three printer devices in hardware,
implement /dev/lp1
... /dev/lp3 corresponding to LPT1: ... LPT3:  [Maybe unix convention is lp0 ...
lp2, but I
forget.]
2.  Support use of a sym link for the default printer:
        bash$  ln -sf  /dev/lp?  /dev/lp
These two items give the user access to the printer in unix syntax.

Eventually:
3.  Provide some sort of hook so that "... > /dev/lp" can hook a spooler.
If they want a spooler, they can do whatever they want by hooking /dev/lp
somehow.

It might be nice:
4.  Given that win-doze is lurking somewhere behind a CygWin session, you might
provide a new CygWin utility that grabs onto the win-doze print queues from the
command
line world.  This probably requires a win-doze aware daemon/service that watches
some spool
folder, grabs workorders, and passes jobs to win-doze printing.

Cordially,
~~~ Dan 0:-D
--
==============================================================
The Tenth Amendment ... its not only a good idea, its the law!
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html#amendmentx

==============================================================


--------------51D61C311F231AB0230D3DC6
Content-Type: text/x-vcard; charset=us-ascii;
 name="saint.vcf"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Content-Description: Card for Dan St.Andre'
Content-Disposition: attachment;
 filename="saint.vcf"

begin:vcard 
n:St.Andre';Daniel M.
tel;fax:512.335.8494
tel;work:512.335.7450x223
x-mozilla-html:TRUE
url:http://www.nuthena.com
org:Nu Thena Systems, Inc.;Product Development
version:2.1
email;internet:saint AT nuthena DOT com
title:Director, Quality Management
adr;quoted-printable:;;11824 Jollyville Road=0D=0ASuite 101;Austin;Texas;78759;USA
fn:Dan St.Andre'
end:vcard


--------------51D61C311F231AB0230D3DC6
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

--
Want to unsubscribe from this list?
Send a message to cygwin-unsubscribe AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com
--------------51D61C311F231AB0230D3DC6--