sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) (12/20/88)
I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too expensive, so those items are out. I'm using Xenix System V, version 2.2.3 on an 80386 clone. We are using an Arnet Multi-port board with 4 serial ports on it, and we have one other serial port available on the machine. One of the people on the machine is going to have to take some time off, and she wants to be able to do her work at home. She is the head of our accounting department, and we NEED her to be able to balance the books (especially at the end of the year). In order to do this, she needs to have both a printer and a terminal at home. This, then, is the problem: we need her to have both a terminal and a printer at home. There is the obvious answer of her having two modems and two phonelines, and our having to install those. I think that there must be a better answer, though. In my mind, a person should be able to live with only having to purchase two modems and one phone line. The terminal should be able to queue up print requests, and the shell script interface program for the printer should be able to wait until the user has logged off, then dial the modem to call her house, dump the file(s), and clear the line. She would also need a serial switch box so that when she was done with the terminal (and she had hung up the phone line), she could switch the modem's output over to the (serial) printer. This is my theoretical solution, but I don't know HOW it would be done IF it can be done. Therefore, I'd like to solicit your help: you've seen my problem. Can you help me find a way to get her a terminal and a printer at home with only one modem? I'll take all the help I can get. Thanks in advance, Steve Goodrich (sdg@loft386)
sandy@turnkey.TCC.COM (Sanford 'Sandy' Zelkovitz) (12/22/88)
In article <178@loft386.UUCP>, sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes: > > This, then, is the problem: we need her to have both a terminal and a > printer at home. There is the obvious answer of her having two modems > and two phonelines, and our having to install those. I think that > there must be a better answer, though. In my mind, a person should be Steve, Here are two possible solutions for you: 1) Many terminals, like Wyse, have printer ports attached which can be commanded to be turned on and the visual display to be turned off. This way, when commanded, the terminal will simply pass the data through to the printer. Once the printing session has completed, the terminal can be commanded to turn off the printer port and re-enable the visual display. SCO, around a year or so ago, published in their user magazine, a shell script which can be used. I have used this setup in the past. 2) Instead of installing a terminal, use a PC with terminal emulation which has file capture capabilities. The printer can simply be installed on the PC and your accountant and easily print any data out when she needs to. Her is some "food for thought", if this configuration is desirable, she maybe able to do some of the work locally without even calling in to the main system until she is ready to merge the data files. If you choose either suggestion, only one serial/modem line will be required. I hope that this helps, Sanford <sandy> Zelkovitz -- Sanford <sandy> Zelkovitz XBBS 714-898-8634 UUCP: ....att!hermix!alphacm!sandy ....trwrb!ucla-an!alphacm!sandy ....uunet!turnkey!alphacm!sandy ....ucbvax!ucivax!icnvax!alphacm!sandy DATA: 714-898-8634 VOICE: 714-894-7898
debra@alice.UUCP (Paul De Bra) (12/22/88)
In article <178@loft386.UUCP> sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes: >I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer >and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too >expensive, so those items are out. I'm using Xenix System V, version >2.2.3 on an 80386 clone. We are using an Arnet Multi-port board with >4 serial ports on it, and we have one other serial port available on >the machine. One of the people on the machine is going to have to >take some time off, and she wants to be able to do her work at home. >She is the head of our accounting department, and we NEED her to be >able to balance the books (especially at the end of the year). In >order to do this, she needs to have both a printer and a terminal at >home. >... Most terminals have a "printer port". You hook up the terminal to the modem and the printer to the terminal. When you want to print something the computer sends a special control character (or escape sequence) to the terminal, which "turns on" the printer port. Everything the computer sends will be displayed on the screen AND printed at the same time. Yet another control character will "turn off" the printer port. This is a very common setup, and I haven't come accross terminals without printer ports yet. However, there are no standards on the control-chars required for turning on/off the printer port. But whatever they are, a small shell script can do the trick, so she won't have to log off and she doesn't need a second modem. Paul. -- ------------------------------------------------------ |debra@research.att.com | uunet!research!debra | ------------------------------------------------------
tony@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Tony Holden) (12/22/88)
in article <178@loft386.UUCP>, sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) says: > > Therefore, I'd like to solicit your help: you've seen my problem. Can > you help me find a way to get her a terminal and a printer at home with > only one modem? I'll take all the help I can get. One way of doing this is to create a lp script that locks the keyboard (if you can't keep her from touching it) and then send the reports out the AUX port on the terminal. Nearly all terminal have a AUX port and codes to send data out thru them. Tony Holden tony@killer.dallas.tx.us
jbayer@ispi.UUCP (Jonathan Bayer) (12/23/88)
In article <178@loft386.UUCP>, sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes:
= I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer
= and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too
= expensive, so those items are out. I'm using Xenix System V, version
= 2.2.3 on an 80386 clone. We are using an Arnet Multi-port board with
= 4 serial ports on it, and we have one other serial port available on
= the machine. One of the people on the machine is going to have to
= take some time off, and she wants to be able to do her work at home.
= She is the head of our accounting department, and we NEED her to be
= able to balance the books (especially at the end of the year). In
= order to do this, she needs to have both a printer and a terminal at
= home.
=
= This, then, is the problem: we need her to have both a terminal and a
= printer at home. There is the obvious answer of her having two modems
= and two phonelines, and our having to install those. I think that
= there must be a better answer, though. In my mind, a person should be
= able to live with only having to purchase two modems and one phone line.
= The terminal should be able to queue up print requests, and the shell
= script interface program for the printer should be able to wait until the
= user has logged off, then dial the modem to call her house, dump the file(s),
= and clear the line. She would also need a serial switch box so that when
= she was done with the terminal (and she had hung up the phone line), she
= could switch the modem's output over to the (serial) printer. This is
= my theoretical solution, but I don't know HOW it would be done IF it can
= be done.
=
There is a better way than that. Most reasonable terminals these days
have an aux output. This is designed for a printer. The terminal can
be told to go to sleep and direct all data to the printer. What you
want to do is to create a new printer called "remote" or some other
name. Then have the first characters sent be the sequence telling the
terminal to go to sleep. Have the last characters sent be the sequence
telling the terminal to wake up.
SCO published a way to make this portable (applicable to whichever
serial line is in use. I don't have it available, but it should be
available from SCO tech support.
Jonathan Bayer
Intelligent Software Products, Inc.
--
life used to be so simple.fred@cdin-1.uucp (Fred Rump) (12/23/88)
In article <178@loft386.UUCP>, sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes:
,> I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer
,> and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too
[stuff deleted]
,> In order to do this, she needs to have both a printer and a terminal at
,> home.
,>
,> I think that
,> there must be a better answer, though. In my mind, a person should be
,> able to live with only having to purchase two modems and one phone line.
,> Therefore, I'd like to solicit your help: you've seen my problem. Can
,> you help me find a way to get her a terminal and a printer at home with
,> only one modem? I'll take all the help I can get.
Well this is an easy one. Anybody ever hear of transparent printing?
We use it all the time at terminals in house. The customer would have a bunch
of terminals scattered all over a building or set of buildings. Rather than
have users climb all over themselves to get to a central printer, they have a
little cheapy right at their terminal plugged into the aux port.
Arnet and others have available transparent printing drivers that share the
one line while the SLOW user types at his station the printer gets plenty of
spare time to print at the same time.
I would suggest you give your local Arnet vendor a call. You do need the smart
card though. I suppose nobody buys the dumn one anymore.
fred rump
--
Fred Rump, Pres. | UUCP: {rutgers,cbmvax,bellcore}!bpa!cdin-1!fred
CompuData, Inc. | or ...{allegra killer gatech!uflorida decvax!ucf-cs}
10501 Drummond Rd. | !ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fred
Philadelphia, Pa. 19154| or ...!bikini.cis.ufl.edu!ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fredcdold@starfish.Convergent.COM (Clarence Dold) (12/23/88)
From article <178@loft386.UUCP>, by sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich): > I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer > and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too We use several different vt100 compatibles, including Kermit on PC. They all respond favorably to the 'local print controller' code. Normally, the LPDEST variable is automatically set to a printer name that corresponds to the modem port being used ( we have 12 ). This will take a normal lp job and print it locally, with the CRT disabled. Keyahead continues without echo, during the printout, with echo coming later. If you want to force the printout to wait until the user is ready to log off, just enable and disable the printer, as needed, maybe even with a trap "turnon_printer_script" 0 to catch her when she logs out. # LP model script vt100 created by lptool # This lp model will cause printout on a local printer # attached to a vt100-compatible terminal (MS-Kermit parallel printer). # Tested on: # MS-Kermit 2.31 to parallel printer: Good # LINK vt220 version 1.08 to Aux port: Good # HewlletPackardEmulator (CTOS VM 4.0): No echo "\033[5i\c" # the ? causes printout to appear on the screen also. # echo "\033[?5i\c" [ standard lp model kind of stuff deleted ... ] echo "\033[4i\c" exit 0 -- Clarence A Dold - cdold@starfish.Convergent.COM (408) 434-2083 ...pyramid!ctnews!professo!dold MailStop 18-011 P.O.Box 6685, San Jose, CA 95150-6685
fred@cdin-1.uucp (Fred Rump) (12/24/88)
In article <88@cdin-1.uucp>, fred@cdin-1.uucp (Fred Rump) writes: - In article <178@loft386.UUCP- , sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes: - ,- I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer - ,- and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too - [stuff deleted] - - ,- In order to do this, she needs to have both a printer and a terminal at - ,- home. - ,- - ,- I think that - ,- there must be a better answer, though. In my mind, a person should be - ,- able to live with only having to purchase two modems and one phone line. - - ,- Therefore, I'd like to solicit your help: you've seen my problem. Can - ,- you help me find a way to get her a terminal and a printer at home with - ,- only one modem? I'll take all the help I can get. - - Well this is an easy one. Anybody ever hear of transparent printing? - We use it all the time at terminals in house. The customer would have a bunch - of terminals scattered all over a building or set of buildings. Rather than - have users climb all over themselves to get to a central printer, they have a - little cheapy right at their terminal plugged into the aux port. - - Arnet and others have available transparent printing drivers that share the - one line while the SLOW user types at his station the printer gets plenty of - spare time to print at the same time. - - I would suggest you give your local Arnet vendor a call. You do need the smart - card though. I suppose nobody buys the dumn one anymore. - fred rump After I wrote this last night I had second thoughts. Maybe you need a special cabling arrangement that can't be used via modem. Checking here at the office this morning reveals that we've used a small multiplexor/modem arrangement for this type of thing. Perhaps others have some input? - -- - Fred Rump, Pres. | UUCP: {rutgers,cbmvax,bellcore}!bpa!cdin-1!fred - CompuData, Inc. | or ...{allegra killer gatech!uflorida decvax!ucf-cs} - 10501 Drummond Rd. | !ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fred - Philadelphia, Pa. 19154| or ...!bikini.cis.ufl.edu!ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fred -- Fred Rump, Pres. | UUCP: {rutgers,cbmvax,bellcore}!bpa!cdin-1!fred CompuData, Inc. | or ...{allegra killer gatech!uflorida decvax!ucf-cs} 10501 Drummond Rd. | !ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fred Philadelphia, Pa. 19154| or ...!bikini.cis.ufl.edu!ki4pv!cdis-1!cdin-1!fred
itkin@mrspoc.UUCP (Steven M. List) (01/01/89)
In article <178@loft386.UUCP> sdg@loft386.UUCP (Steve Goodrich) writes: > I have an interesting problem: I need a way to use both a printer > and a terminal on one modem. Multiplexers and stat-muxes are too > expensive, so those items are out. I'm using Xenix System V, version > 2.2.3 on an 80386 clone. We are using an Arnet Multi-port board with > 4 serial ports on it, and we have one other serial port available on > the machine. > ... > This, then, is the problem: we need her to have both a terminal and a > printer at home. I don't know about the Arnet board, but the Wyse700 subsystem drivers include the capability to use the port both for terminal and printer. You can then define a printer that uses the alternate device on that port. It may be that this is directly tied to the Wyse products and requires a Wyse terminal at the other end. I haven't actually used it. However, Wyse and other manufacturers often have a "pass-through" or "transparent" print to the AUX port on the terminal that is enabled and disabled with a simple escape sequence. Just write a print spooler script that sends those sequences out to the port. -- : Steven List @ Transact Software, Inc. : {coherent,limbo,mips,pyramid,ubvax}!mrspoc!itkin : Voice: (415) 961-6112