Dos to USB

rdonnelly · Post by **rdonnelly** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 8:28 am

Hi, I have a windows app that allows an old dos program that will only print to LPT, to redirect to a USB printer. I was able to use this in native windows. But Wine does not seem to be able to launch a dos box like windows could. The program is at:

http://www.dos2usb.com/download.htm

Unless there is some other way to redirect an LPT port?

Thanks Bob

vitamin · Post by **vitamin** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 9:33 am

rdonnelly wrote:Hi, I have a windows app that allows an old dos program that will only print to LPT, to redirect to a USB printer.

Wine doesn't support USB. Do you have your printer properly configured with CUPS? Wine can't talk to non-CUPS printers.

Also note that Wine's DOS support has many issues.

Post by **André H.** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 11:57 am

Try it with DOSBox(http://www.dosbox.com/)

rdonnelly · Post by **rdonnelly** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 12:59 pm

I have a cups printer, but wine and dosbox or dosemu do not run in the same space, so the dos box is not sending printing queue to the wine printer. I am no computer expert, but that is what I beleve is happening. But if wine does not do USB, I suppose it will not run the Dos to USB prog any ways?

Usurp · Post by **Usurp** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 1:15 pm

rdonnelly wrote:I have a cups printer, but wine and dosbox or dosemu do not run in the same space, so the dos box is not sending printing queue to the wine printer. I am no computer expert, but that is what I beleve is happening. But if wine does not do USB, I suppose it will not run the Dos to USB prog any ways?

IIRC, DOSBox already redirects LPT to CUPS.
You Dos to USB is no use here, since you are able to print with your dos program if it runs in DOSBox.

vitamin · Post by **vitamin** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 1:23 pm

rdonnelly wrote:I have a cups printer, but wine and dosbox or dosemu do not run in the same space, so the dos box is not sending printing queue to the wine printer. I am no computer expert, but that is what I beleve is happening. But if wine does not do USB, I suppose it will not run the Dos to USB prog any ways?

Wine DOES NOT use dosbox. They are totally separate programs. Wine has it's own DOS emulation layer.
Wine CAN NOT print to non-CUPS printers.
Wine DOES NOT support USB.

Did you try to run your DOS program under Wine? Does it work? If not, what error do you get? Can you print to this printer from Wine's notepad?

Don't ask here anything related to dosbox/dosemu/etc that's not part of Wine. Go to their forms and ask there.

rdonnelly · Post by **rdonnelly** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 1:28 pm

vitamin wrote:
Don't ask here anything related to dosbox/dosemu/etc that's not part of Wine. Go to their forms and ask there.

Dos to USB is a windoze app.............. I am here to learn. Thanks for your knowledge.

English_Mohican · Post by **English_Mohican** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 4:31 pm

Clarification please:

1. Stating that Wine will not talk to a non-Cups printer presumably means that it will talk to a Cups printer. So if Linux can print to a USB printer that is a CUPS printer, presumably so can Wine. Yes?

2. If this Dos programme can be persuaded to run under Wine (I accept that may be asking too much - Wine primarily emulates Windows rather than DOS) does it matter whether the printer is serial/usb/networked/whatever, surely Wine simply redirects it to "the" printer and Linux looks after the rest.

James Mckenzie · Post by **James Mckenzie** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 4:43 pm

English_Mohican <[email protected]> at: Dec 11, 2008 2:31 PM (MST) wrote about: [Wine] Re: Dos to USB

Clarification please:

1. Stating that Wine will not talk to a non-Cups printer presumably means that it will talk to a Cups printer. So if Linux can print to a USB printer that is a CUPS printer, presumably so can Wine. Yes?

Correct. Wine does not care where the printer is located. If you can print to it using CUPS, then Wine should be able to do so likewise.

2. If this Dos programme can be persuaded to run under Wine (I accept that may be asking too much - Wine primarily emulates Windows rather than DOS) does it matter whether the printer is serial/usb/networked/whatever, surely Wine simply redirects it to "the" printer and Linux looks after the rest.

Correct. Wine will direct all output to CUPS. However, you must go into CUPS and configure the printer and I recommend that it be the primary or default printer. Your DOS program may not be able to switch printers. Windows programs, depending on when they were made, should.

James McKenzie

rdonnelly · Post by **rdonnelly** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 5:26 pm

OK, so dos does not print through wine, so I guess I wont need dos to usb. when I print out of a dos box, it sends a printer error to my GDI printer. I am going to search this further on the dos forums. Thanks for all your input.