Hendrik:
> On Mon, Jan 03, 2022 at 06:52:17PM +0100, karl@??? wrote:
> > Hendrik:
> > ...
> > > DeviceURI dnssd://Brother%20HL-3170CDW%20series._ipp._tcp.local/?uuid=e3248000-80ce-11db-8000-30055c5516df
> > From what I can see:
> > https://www.brother-usa.com/products/hl3170cdw
> >
> > that printer supports BR-script which is a postscript clone.
> > Why not set it to BR-script mode on the front panel, run plain old
> > lpr and be done with it. And tell your programs to always output
> > postscript.
>
> lpr is what I use to print. And it ends up going through CUPS. At least, it
> did last time I successfully printed.
> It turns out that there are several packages that provide lpr. CUPS is one of
> them. Presumably it provided an lpr that passes everything through CUPS.

You probably have the "cups-bsd" package, plain old lpr is in the package "lpr".

> I had anther machine where I did not use CUPS an spent quite a while figuring
> out how to find, install, and configure the 'plain old lpr'. Abd that involved
> getting a print driver from the manufacturer. Of course, they provided an
> 'installer' which had to be run as root and changed an plastered whatever it
> wanted around the file system (something I don't appreciate).

The point is that a postscript printers don't need a driver, so if you
only uses postscript printers (that are set up as such mode), then your
printcap file ends up with lines like:

granat:rm=granat:sd=/var/spool/lpd/granat:rp=lp:lp=:sh:mx#0:

> I no longer know how I accomplished that. But when I installed Devuan jessie on
> my new computer a few years ago, it came with CUPS and just worked.

Well, that is fine, but when it don't work, it is a black box.

///

Regarding driverless printing, that is what I always had it with
postscript. PCL could probably work also, but there is no PCL
previewer what I know of. Sending pdfs to printer usually gets
me a scaled down printout.

Regards,
/Karl Hammar