Subject: RE: IPP> RE: Printer Instance Creation/Installation -Reply

From: "Scott A. Isaacson" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 11:00:01 -0700

I agree with Babak.  We need to be able to support all existing drivers.
But I doubt that we can be successful with any kind of "minimal driver". 
We already have that with the generic Apple Laserwriter PS driver and
the HP 3 PCL driver.  These can be used for almost any printer in the
world.  We don't need to create any new ones.

Scott

************************************************************
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: [email-masked]
W: http://www.novell.com
************************************************************

>>> Babak Jahromi <[email-masked]> 12/17/96 07:46pm >>>
>
>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

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From: Randy Turner <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 10:20:43 -0800

Concerning the issue of drivers, isn't this outside the scope
of IPP? We are just trying to architect a transport for delivery
of print data over a network. Typically a Windows print driver
will generate Postscript or PCL that includes printer-specific
features. Once the final form of the PDL is submitted (via
re-director or other method), that is where we come in with
IPP.

Like I suggested a week or so ago with the separate document
scoping, I think the entire driver issue is non-sequitur with
our efforts at prioritizing our work with the IPP transport
protocol.

This is not to say that easy installation of drivers is not an
issue, it just shouldn't be OUR issue, at least initially.
Besides, when you are talking about drivers you are probably
undoubtedly talking about the Windows/Win95/Winnt environment,
and I think that IPP should address more than solving the problem
of internet printing within Microsoft environments.

Randy

-- 
Randy Turner
Network Architect
Sharp Laboratories of America
[email-masked]