printing dot matrix from FileMaker

[Roger Howard]

On Wed, February 14, 2007 11:08 am, Dan Shoop wrote:
> At 4:32 PM -0800 2/13/07, Roger Howard wrote:
>>All of that said, printing to dot matrix isn't just like any other
>> device,
>>in the sense that you don't tend to send high-resolution page images to
>>the device and let it work out how to lay down antialiased dots to form
>>the printed image - you ideally want it to send a stream of raw
>> characters
>>to the device. So you may not in fact even use a typical OSX print driver
>>for that; perhaps a custom serial driver instead (and it is possible to
>>pump data to a serial port from FMP with a plugin, but you'll have to
>> work
>>out the print protocol unless that comes with the plugin too).
>
> Specifically a dot-matrix or line printer is not the same as a print
> queue but is rather merely a serial device. That is it's a TTY that
> receives text output.
>
> Trting to incorporate such a beast w OS X's concept of CUPS is going
> to be a near impossible lose as they are incompatible in concept.

Absolutely, that's why I suggested it's possible to interface with such a
beast directly via a serial port, which can be done from FileMaker using a
serial plugin. Since I don't know the specifics of the customer needs I
left open the possibility of an OSX print driver, but if I were doing it
I'd first question the whole idea, but if it was needed I'd format and
write data out to a serial port from FMP directly. I think we're in total
agreement Dan.

-R