Linux Printing: Still Awful After All These Years

[Marcus Brubaker]

phiscock-g851W1bGYuGnS0EtXVNi6w at public.gmane.org wrote:
> It's my impression that many aspects of the Linux Installation Experience
> have become much more pleasant over the years. For example: no more manual
> partitioning or formatting! Network recognized instantly! Package
> management at the touch of a button! (Almost) No configuring video cards!
> No tweaking X-Window!*
>
> The one thing that doesn't seem to have changed is printer installation.
> My Suse 9.2 printer installation was a nightmare and Ubuntu 7.1 seems much
> the same. (In both cases the Samsung printer had to be spoofed as a
> Laserjet to ork.)
>
> So, is printer really difficult or am I missing something? Would someone
> like to give a TLUG tutorial evening on the different ways of connecting
> and driving printers?
>   


I have to say that I'm surprised by this!  I've had very little trouble 
setting up printers under Linux in the last 2 years in particular.  It's 
possible that I've been lucky with my printer choices (mostly HP) but 
most every time has been even more plug'n'play than Windows ever was.  
Heck, Ubuntu 7.10 even picked up my network printers for me 
automatically which I've never seen Windows or Mac do.


> * Nice that we don't have to feed 32 floppy disks into the machine any
> more, as well. Anyone here remember that?
>   

Sadly, yes.  I also remember spending hours watching them download over 
a 1200 baud modem!

Marcus


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