Inside OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion: Enhanced Printing & Scanning

Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014


Printing and scanning will be enhanced in this summer's release of OS X Mountain Lion, offering a cleaner user interface with simplified menu bar buttons.



Replacing the Aqua-inspired customizable toolbar of the printer queue, Mountain Lion now offers a utilitarian menu bar with fewer, fixed icons that look more like those of Preview, Safari or Mail.



In the Printer view, Mountain Lion shows the same printer status and jobs information, but includes a thumbnail of your current job, which you can double click to view via Quick Look (Command Y also works).



The printer queue's Quick Look window sports a Sharing Sheet you can use to email, message or AirDrop the printer preview document.









In place of the large colored toolbar icons of previous OS X releases, Mountain Lion presents just four action buttons: delete, resume, pause and information. Rather than providing job information, this button pulls down the sheet formerly presented by the Printer Setup button (and essentially duplicated by the old Supply Levels button).









The scanning features of Lion are also enhanced in Mountain Lion, with a simple, automated scan interface presented when you click on the scanner button of a supported multifunction device.











Click Show Details and Mountain Lion presents the full scanner interface, with image correction and resolution settings, depicted below scanning an product page from Parallels.









[ View article on AppleInsider ]

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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 27
    If there are printer jobs queued but not running, does your computer refuse to sleep no matter what you try to do until said jobs are completed?



    Because that nonsense needs to stop.
  • Reply 2 of 27
    tylerk36tylerk36 Posts: 1,037member
    Yes Master. I will buy a new Mac to run this OS. I am your slave master.
  • Reply 3 of 27
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    By the time Apple gets their printing and scanning straightened out no one will be printing or scanning.
  • Reply 4 of 27
    technotechno Posts: 737member
    I am sorry but I think I missed it. Where are the enhancements? All I see is further movement towards a gray world.
  • Reply 5 of 27
    rokradrokrad Posts: 143member
    I wish there was just an easy printer... Printers now a days just don't "just work"
  • Reply 6 of 27
    nagrommenagromme Posts: 2,834member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by techno View Post


    I am sorry but I think I missed it. Where are the enhancements? All I see is further movement towards a gray world.



    Although the beauty (?) of the seldom-seen printer toolbar icons is now more subdued, check out the article text too: many other changes besides that one.
  • Reply 7 of 27
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Rokrad View Post


    I wish there was just an easy printer... Printers now a days just don't "just work"



    I just bought one last week for work, and it "just worked". I needed a laser printer with a duplexer, picked up an HP P2055DN and as soon as I plugged in the usb cable, it was recognized and I was printing my two sided documents. Running the latest Snow Leopard on a 3year old iMac.



    I love not needing to even open HP's install cd.
  • Reply 8 of 27
    The simplified interface is great but does this mean Image Capture is gone?



    Also does this open up AirPrint for all printers instead of HP printers?
  • Reply 9 of 27
    oh please, as if i can get excited about printing in snow lion while I'm trying to DOWNGRADE to snow LEOPARD so I can print properly on my xerox 6010. #vomit
  • Reply 10 of 27
    Photosmart? I do not care Canon had maintenance extension for Mac since Tiger I believe.



    I still use it so for me those are just differnt look of what I already know.



    Obviously Apple will make those incompatible to promote "new way" so mountain lion sells while offering foolish tight coupling between application and document.



    I really think about alternatives as this is not the same Apple I knew in 2006 when I would go for it blindy knowing it was going to be good.
  • Reply 11 of 27
    pmzpmz Posts: 3,433member
    I discovered the new Scanning interface in Preview when I went to scan a bunch of documents earlier today. Pleasantly surprised that it worked VERY well, and was much faster than it had been in Snow Leopard & Lion.



    I always thought my Brother PS&C was horribly slow and unreliable....turns out it was Preview all along.
  • Reply 12 of 27
    gtrgtr Posts: 3,231member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by nonanoplease View Post


    oh please, as if i can get excited about printing in snow lion while I'm trying to DOWNGRADE to snow LEOPARD so I can print properly on my xerox 6010. #vomit



    Snow Lion?
  • Reply 13 of 27
    addaboxaddabox Posts: 12,665member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by GTR View Post


    Snow Lion?



    I think he meant Mountain Leopard.
  • Reply 14 of 27
    gtrgtr Posts: 3,231member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by addabox View Post


    I think he meant Mountain Leopard.



  • Reply 15 of 27
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by nonanoplease View Post


    oh please, as if i can get excited about printing in snow lion while I'm trying to DOWNGRADE to snow LEOPARD so I can print properly on my xerox 6010. #vomit



    I had some trouble initially printing to and scanning from my HP 6110 on a new Macbook Pro with 10.7.2 - after first adding the printer to get the software to load - I removed the printer - powered down the computer and the printer - then rebooted the computer and then the printer - and when added back again it worked perfectly.
  • Reply 16 of 27
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by techno View Post


    I am sorry but I think I missed it. Where are the enhancements? All I see is further movement towards a gray world.



    I don't get that either - I don't avocet bright gaudy distracting colors - but subtle clues such as color and even sound (cross fingers that Unsanity will get updates out soon) - can make the computer experience easier and better.
  • Reply 17 of 27
    That they added a "Descreen" feature but the still need add a document straightener.
  • Reply 18 of 27
    You know, I would like to print from an iOS device. Perhaps they could get that to work. I tried one third party software and it sometimes works, but most of the time not. I bought a new printer right before they came out with this AirPrint thing but it's not supported by HP for AirPrint and I'm not about to buy a new one for a while.
  • Reply 19 of 27
    I have one of the HP Airprint printers and sometimes my Mini gets recognized when I try to print and sometimes nothing I do makes it get recognized. About half the time I have to go over to the printer and reboot it to make it notice my printer. My Mac will say the printer isn't connected. Granted, that printer is only hooked up to a power cord and we're using its wireless functionality, but it doesn't always "just work" for me. Hopefully ML tweaks that a bit
  • Reply 20 of 27
    So far all my mulitfunction USB printer can do when driven with my Airport is print (then it is only 50% of the time without restarting). Scanning, Faxing, checking toner, fuggetaboutit!



    Apple should get the printing part right BEFORE adding more and better nonworking features.
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