Book Image

CUPS Administrative Guide

By : Ankur Shah
Book Image

CUPS Administrative Guide

By: Ankur Shah

Overview of this book

Table of Contents (16 chapters)
CUPS Administrative Guide
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgement
About the Reviewer
Preface

Printer Drivers


Printer drivers are pieces of software that convert the data to be printed in a form that can be understood by the printer. Printer drivers allow the applications to print without being aware of the technical details of each printer model that means "they are responsible for sending the characteristic information of the printer to the OS". Although, besides the PostScript language, CUPS understands other formats such as PDF, image, and text, but it normally converts them into PostScript.

PostScript Printer Description (PPD) Drivers

Let us first understand what is PostScript. PostScript is a platform-independent page description language which is used by many middle and high-end laser printers, and even by some high-end inkjet printers.

The PPD (Postscript Printer Description) files written in PostScript language are used by CUPS to describe printer technical details that are required by the OS to understand each printer model. Normally, PostScript printers are always shipped...