[comp.sys.mac] RS232 Laserwriter on Mac

keithl@vice.ICO.TEK.COM (Keith Lofstrom) (01/19/89)

   I am another of the Mac->UNIX->Laserwriter crowd (Actually, s/Mac/Lisa/,
but in this case things work the same).  I have a dedicated RS232 line to
the Mac, and am presently going through all the hassle of
control-foo -> mac-terminal -> lpr .  Blah.  I can easily set up the unix
end to swallow data and throw it at the LW, but the Mac end is NOT user
friendly.  

   Has anyone written a driver that takes the place of the laserwriter
driver in the system folder and spews out in RS232 serial rather than
Appletalk?  I've heard rumors of some developer code.  

   I can print postscript to RS-232 directly from my PC-AT.  Are you Mac
programmers going to let a PC-AT get away with something a Mac can't do?

(The gauntlet thrown down, he leaves the room, fully expecting a response
to appear in comp.binaries.mac within hours).

-- 
Keith Lofstrom   ...!tektronix!vice!keithl   keithl@vice.TEK.COM
MS 59-316, Tektronix, PO 500, Beaverton OR 97077  (503)-627-4052

ingemar@isy.liu.se (Ingemar Ragnemalm) (01/25/89)

In article <3219@vice.ICO.TEK.COM> keithl@vice.ICO.TEK.COM (Keith Lofstrom) writes:
>
>   I am another of the Mac->UNIX->Laserwriter crowd (Actually, s/Mac/Lisa/,
>but in this case things work the same).  I have a dedicated RS232 line to
>the Mac, and am presently going through all the hassle of
>control-foo -> mac-terminal -> lpr .  Blah.  I can easily set up the unix
>end to swallow data and throw it at the LW, but the Mac end is NOT user
>friendly.  
>
>   Has anyone written a driver that takes the place of the laserwriter
>driver in the system folder and spews out in RS232 serial rather than
>Appletalk?  I've heard rumors of some developer code.  
>
>   I can print postscript to RS-232 directly from my PC-AT.  Are you Mac
>programmers going to let a PC-AT get away with something a Mac can't do?

I use "Asynchronous LaserWriter Driver" from APDA. I connected the Mac
directly to the laser, while our Suns were connected to the other port.
With ALW, it works fine, at least from the Mac side.

The ALW can also be set up to do more complicated things, like calling
another machine over the phone or similar things, through a scripting
language. I can't say much about that, since I don't need it.

/Ingemar Ragnemalm
-- 
Dept. of Electrical Engineering	     ...!uunet!mcvax!enea!rainier!ingemar
                  ..
University of Linkoping, Sweden	     ingemar@isy.liu.se