

Printer: an open source kit for exploring internet-of-things printing - tomstuart
http://gofreerange.com/printer

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lazyatom
Somebody asked for a live stream - <http://www.ustream.tv/channel/freerange-
printer>

Send a message or a picture using the demo apps

<http://printer-mail.herokuapp.com/send/freerange>

<http://printer-paint.herokuapp.com/send/freerange>

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lazyatom
You can poke around the source on github:
<http://github.com/freerange/printer>

There's also some fairly comprehensive documentation on the github wiki,
including an architectural overview, and building your own printer:
<http://github.com/freerange/printer/wiki>

~~~
sjtgraham
James, I met you a couple weeks ago in the pub with Chris Roos. I would love
to come over and check this out. Looks dope!

~~~
lazyatom
That would be great! Just send us an email and we'll figure out a good time.

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reustle
So this is an open source BERG Cloud? <http://bergcloud.com/> (aka receipt
printer)

~~~
lazyatom
I suspect that BERG have much grander plans for BERG Cloud than this, and of
course BERG Cloud will be much more polished and suitable for normal people.
But that said, it's a tool that might help explore a similar 'space' of
possibilities, yeah.

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chrisbroadfoot
How much does an appropriate printer cost? eBay seems to indicate between
$100-$300.

~~~
lazyatom
The actual printer unit I'm using (i.e. not including the Arduino components)
is $50/£40 and is increasingly available:

<https://www.adafruit.com/products/600>
<http://www.sparkfun.com/products/10438> <http://proto-pic.co.uk/thermal-
printer/>

See [https://github.com/freerange/printer/wiki/Making-your-own-
pr...](https://github.com/freerange/printer/wiki/Making-your-own-printer) for
more information...

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_wdh
I wonder if you could print to this using a Rasberry Pi with a Gertboard?

~~~
lazyatom
You definitely could, and it would be much easier to write the HTTP client
code on a Raspberry Pi than it is on the Arduino!

If you look at the Arduino code
(<https://github.com/freerange/printer/blob/master/printer.ino>), all it does
is download a stream of bytes, doing some very rudimentary validation
(Content-length), and then sending the bytes out on a serial port.

