[rhelv6-list] Parallel Port Support

[Stephen John Smoogen]

On Fri, Jun 17, 2011 at 08:36, Lamar Owen <lowen at pari.edu> wrote:
> On Thursday, June 16, 2011 11:21:05 AM Chris Adams wrote:
>> To be specific: they dropped line-printer support.  The parallel port
>> hardware drivers are still included (for uses other than line printer
>> mode).
>
> Which strikes me as being a wrong decision; I would have to wonder why, and if the reasons are documented somewhere.  Parallel printers aren't as common as they used to be, but I know I have a bunch left that are real workhorses.

While I work for Red Hat, I have no knowledge on this and am talking
only as a person who dealt with printers in previous jobs. My guess
would be that it is because a combination of the following

a) RHEL-6 has many requirements requiring newer computers
b) Those newer computers do not have parallel ports
c) the newer computers that have parallel ports support them usually
via some kludged up emulation mode which breaks in odd ways.
d) Most printer manufacturers are dropping parallel support faster
than you can spit.
e) application support for parallel printers are usually for older OS
releases (there is a reason my last job still keeps EL-2.1 going).

Combine those together and if you are going to use parallel printers
you are most likely going to be using the older RHEL releases and less
likely to jump that old P-III to EL6.

-- 
Stephen J Smoogen.
"The core skill of innovators is error recovery, not failure avoidance."
Randy Nelson, President of Pixar University.
"Let us be kind, one to another, for most of us are fighting a hard
battle." -- Ian MacLaren