*BSD News Article 53727


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From: jabaker@grail-cba-csuohio.edu (jason baker)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.misc
Subject: Why does unix printer support suck?
Date: 30 Oct 1995 10:55:42 -0500
Organization: Cleveland State University
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Message-ID: <5h3fcbx8xt.fsf@grail.cba.csuohio.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: grail.cba.csuohio.edu
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I have a pc running netbsd, a new printer and a bitter whining
attitude.  I was looking at a package called LPRng, which has all
sorts of nifty features like support for up to 26 different filters
and the ability to pass them device specific args from lpr.  I was
amazed that this software still lacks basic features, like the ability
to back up a job some number of pages, or actually tell someone if the
printer is stopped (rather than let the device driver write a message
to the syslog and hope for the best).  Is there any unix printer
daemon which can do these things?  And, why is lpr so amazingly bad?

Jason