Abstract: An approach for automatically customizing printer drivers generally includes installing a generic printer driver on a client. The client is configured to allow communications between the generic printer driver and a printing device. The generic printer driver automatically retrieves configuration data from the printing device and stores the configuration data on a non-volatile storage. The configuration data indicates one or more attributes of the printing device and allows data to be printed to the printing device via the generic printer driver. The approach allows a generic printer driver to be used with many different printing devices, thereby reducing development costs and installation overhead.

Abstract: An interface for connecting one of a plurality of industrial machines having different data format and storage configurations to a communications medium for remote monitoring and control, includes a programmable apparatus having a memory for storing data in predetermined locations and in a predetermined format, and for storing configuration information relating to the at least one of the machines; a configurable electrical interface responsive to the configuration information for receiving machine data from the machine and sending data to the machine; a data translator responsive to the configuration information, receiving data from the interface and transforming the data to the predetermined format; a processor responsive to the configuration information for reading data from and writing data to the predetermined locations in the memory; and a communications port connected to the communications medium.