Arduino Library for Parallel Printers with Arduno and PFC8574 I/O Expanders or Shift Registers.
This is an Arduino Library to use with Parallel-interfaced Thermal Printers. I used a PFC8574 I/O Expander to communicate with the Parallel port. This code should work with most parallel port receipt printers that use the ESC/POS Communication mode.
I have used this library with A CBM-1000 printer, an Epson T88-III printer and a Star TSP 800 printer.
I have also added a library and example file that works with a standard 74HC595 shift register. If you are tight on space, you might use the 595 (SR) version, it uses less memory than the Wire Library (I2C) version.
Rename this directory 'Thermal_Printer_I2C' in your Arduino libraries directory, before you start the Arduino IDE.
ARDUINO LIBRARY LOCATION:
*On your Mac:: In (home directory)/Documents/Arduino/Libraries
*On your PC:: My Documents\Arduino\libraries
*On your Linux box: (home directory)/sketchbook/libraries
The example sketches show usage details. Supports Bold, underline, font size, fonta and fontb, upsidedown printing, bell, and more.
This uses an I/O expander or a shift register, but should be easily adapted to using I/O pins through port manipulation.
Thanks to Rob Tillaart on the Arduino Forum for helping me get this started.