Re: special printers config

The "lp5250d" daemon that's part of the Linux Tn5250 software (which is
what this mailing list is for) sends it's output in raw SCS format to
a pipe.   You can configure what the pipe is opened to.

Typically, you'd set the command up like:

       outputcommandÒscs2ascii | lpr"

which means the output from the tn5250 printer session will be piped to
the scs2ascii program, which translates from SCS format to ASCII format.
Then, scs2ascii pipes it to lpr, which sends it to the Unix spooler

However, you could just as easily chnge it to:
        outputcommandÒscs2ascii>/dev/lpt0"

so that it went directly to the parallel port....  or to a program if
you had one that should receive th data... or to a file if you like...
it's flexible.

As far as lpr/lpd goes (And this is NOT part of the Tn5250 suite, but
it a part of Linux or FreeBSD or whatever you're using) It spools the
data, and sends it to the printer.  If you WANT the data to be
transformed, you can define a script or program for it to call,
but otherwise it leaves it alone.  It's quite the opposite of the
Windows model.


On Sat, 18 Aug 2001, Pedro Mullor wrote:

> hello everybody
>
> i'd just like to know a few things printer sessions-related
>
> my question is if the data goes right from the tn5250 printer session to the 
>printer of if they have to pass through lpr.
> I know that there is no problem with a normal printer session but we once 
>tried to config a win3.11 to print to a Zebra printer (for labels) and all i 
>got is a Dali's picture from the output; never tried with one of our 
>Printronix (matricial). All beacuse the data passes via the win3.11 printer 
>manager (and there's no such drivers for that system).
> So, with a DOS system it's different because the drivers used come from a 
>.dat file that the CA session reads for output.
> And, as long as there'll be no support for SNA we want to pass our old 
>DOS-SNA machines to TCP/IP and NT's Not The_solution so i wondered if a thing 
>like that could be done with tn5250 just before laying hands on the config.
>
> Thanks for the advice,
>
> Pedro Mullor.
>