Need print drivers for HP LaserJet 9000

[SNosko]

I need print drivers for the HP LaserJet 9000 on AIX. Where would I get these?

 

[bi]

Have you checked HP? I didn't see a driver out there for any Unix system (even HP-UX). Can this printer use an existing HP printer driver for AIX?

 

[jwtesch]

First it is important that you understand what a printer driver is and isn't. First of all AIX 5.1 has both AIX qdaemon based printing and System V printing. With AIX printing, the actual print driver (what sends the data to the printer on serial, parallel, or network is actually printer independent and the only differences between printer are special parameters such as timeouts and buffer sizes). What you probably mean by printer driver for AIX printing would be the virtual printer colon file, while for System V printing, it would be the 'interface script' model file. Neither of these are currently available for the HP LaserJet 9000 printer.
When it comes to using a different virtual printer, you might ask the question, what do I want from the virtual printer (or interface script). To understand this you first need to know if you are going to print PostScript or PCL. See:

http://service.boulder.ibm.com/rs6k/techdocs/index.v4.html#print

or the AIX printer manuals or the redbook "Printing for Fun and Profit under AIX 5L" for details on what AIX virtual printers or System V interface scripts do.
In general, they set the plex (simplex/duplex), paper tray, output tray, etc.). Then you can look at the HP LaserJet manual to see the commands and how they differ from other printers. I think you will find that say the 8500 printers will be very similar.
See:

http://h200003.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/bpl10629/bpl10629.pdf

for example.

So start with the 8500 printer, then if you have problems with the paper tray, landscape setting, etc. then ask a specific question on customizing the existing printer.