Use Real LPT port with Cygwin?

Use Real LPT port with Cygwin?

[tlake]

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I can use an emulated LPT port to a shared network printer from Cygwin but
I'd like to print to a local LPT port also.

The local printer has no IP address. Is it possible to print to a physical
LPT port?

 

If I do this:

 

ls > LPT1:

 

a file called LPT1: is created on the hard drive rather than sending the
data to the printer on LPT1:

 

 

Re: Use Real LPT port with Cygwin?

[Hans-Bernhard Bröker]

Am 18.06.2023 um 21:35 schrieb tlake--- via Cygwin:
> I can use an emulated LPT port to a shared network printer from Cygwin but
> I'd like to print to a local LPT port also.

> The local printer has no IP address. Is it possible to print to a physical
> LPT port?>   
> 
> If I do this:

> 	ls > LPT1:

> a file called LPT1: is created on the hard drive rather than sending the
> data to the printer on LPT1:

The fact that works at all is a remarkably ancient quirk that made it 
into MS-DOS by way of it trying to emulate even older quirks from CP/M. 
We're talking 1970s computing, there.  Because the dogma of backwards 
compatibility is so strong in Seattle, this quirk is still available in 
Windows to this very day.

But as it's a massive DOS-ism that really does not fit into he POSIX 
world at all, it's not entirely surprising that it doesn't reproduce in 
a Cygwin shall, just like that --- Linux doesn't do that, either.

What you do get instead is a Unix-style /dev tree of device 
pseudo-files.  I might be cool if that gave you a /dev/lpt1 on Cygwin, 
but alas, I don't think it does.

What you do get is a /proc/sys/DosDevices/Global tree.  A printer, if 
existing as a Windows device "LPT1", should show up there as a character 
device.