Brother Internet Print General Information
The BIP software is installed using a standard Windows® 98/Me/ 2000/XP Installation Wizard. It creates a virtual port on the Windows® 98/Me/2000/XP PC that operates in a similar way to the standard LPT1 printer port from the application program point of view. The user can use the Windows® 98/Me/2000/XP Print Manager to create a printer that uses this port along with a standard Windows® 98/Me, 2000/XP-compatible machine. Any Windows® 98/Me/2000/ XP applications program can therefore print to this machine (and hence to the virtual port) without modification or operational procedure.
When a job is printed to the BIP virtual port, it is actually MIME- encoded (converted to a standard Internet E-mail message) and sent out to a Brother Print/Fax server at the remote location. This means that BIP is compatible with most common E-mail software packages. The only requirement is that the E-mail server be capable of sending E-mail message over the Internet.
In more detail, the procedure works in the following way:
■If you are connected to a Local Area Network, the E-mail message is passed to the E-mail server, which in turn transmits the message out over the Internet using the SMTP protocol (Simple Mail Transport Protocol) to the remote Print/Fax server.
■If you are connecting via a modem directly to an Internet Service Provider (ISP), the ISP handles the routing of the E-mail to the remote Print/Fax server.
■At the remote site, an E-mail server receives the E-mail message. The remote Print/Fax server, which has its own E-mail address, uses the POP3 protocol (Post Office Protocol 3) to download the E-mail message from the E-mail server. It then decodes the attachment and prints it out on the machine.
If an E-mail is received that has not been configured to use the BIP virtual port driver, the machine will print the E-mail out as a text document.
CONFIGURING INTERNET PRINTING FOR WINDOWS® 3 - 2