Linux Printers - Petition

There’s a petition going around asking printer manufacturers to support Linux with their driver base. This is a rather significant issue for making Linux a real desktop-replacement OS. Right now Linux is excellent at handling all of the various video/sound/networking interfaces that the hardware industry has thrown at it - but it’s seriously lacking in printer support.

I received a Canon i80 as a college graduation present from my grandmother. It’s a wonderful printer because it’s super-portable and prints high-quality documents quickly. The serious drawback is that I have to log into a Windows machine (or Mac OS X) to use it.

This petition has only 85 signatures so far but considering the need for printer support it could quickly become popular. It can only ever be a gesture because petitions don’t work unless accompanied by something with more bite to it, but I think it’s a good start.

If you’re looking to buy a printer or replace your current non-Linux printer, check out the Linux Printer Database. It’s a comprehensive (nearly) list of various makes and models of printers. You can check to see if the printer you’re considering purchasing has support for Linux.

This is one step closer to a full Linux desktop. As soon as we get better printer support we’ll be all that much closer to converting large offices to Linux.

Thanks to Yet Another Linux Blog for the scoop.