Salvaging $1200 retail Richoh laser printer

[be80be]

I don't no but my kids print a lot never no ink and paper left after I fill the printer up to print a hand full of bills a month lol

 

[ClydeCrashKop]

I thought it funny when computers first got popular and they said computers would reduce paperwork. They created piles of it coming from all directions.
Maybe it has reduced paperwork now that junk mail comes to your inbox instead of your mailbox.

A laser printer has a multi-sided spinning mirror that directs the laser beam. I considered using 9 of these Mini LASER Head, 635nm, <5mw
Sale: $2.25 to project a line of dot matrix text on a wall or larger surface outside.

 

[unclejed613]

i've been working a temp job at a company that makes notebooks, notepads, wall calendars, etc... there's still plenty of paper in demand... it's a very reliable technology. there are industry segments that still rely totally on paper. if you spill coffee on a blueprint, you can still read it, but if you spill coffee on a laptop computer fuggetaboudit...

 

[unclejed613]

I thought it funny when computers first got popular and they said computers would reduce paperwork. They created piles of it coming from all directions.
Maybe it has reduced paperwork now that junk mail comes to your inbox instead of your mailbox.

A laser printer has a multi-sided spinning mirror that directs the laser beam. I considered using 9 of these Mini LASER Head, 635nm, <5mw
Sale: $2.25 to project a line of dot matrix text on a wall or larger surface outside.

it's interesting to note, that there was, before CRTs were invented, a device called an "oscillograph" that used a light beam, spinning mirror, and a mirror mounted on a meter movement to draw voltage vs time traces on a wall.

 

[JimB]

a device called an "oscillograph" that used a light beam,

Have you come across a device called a "UV Recorder" ?
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id...IJzAA#v=onepage&q=se labs uv recorder&f=false

One job I had, we used these things extensively for recording various events.
One thing I hated was spraying the UV sensitive paper with a yellow lacquer to stop it fading when we had results which had to be saved long-term.

JimB

 

[gophert]

still plenty of paper in demand...

Yes, 40% of a huge amount is still "plenty". Unfortunately, dozens of huge papermills that made office paper have been closed down or been retooled to make toilet paper. Apparently "plenty" is not nearly enough demand to keep all papermills open.

 

[dknguyen]

Well, that would require downloading a reasonably recent version of Adobe Acrobat to create and Free Adobe Acrobat Reader for people to sign - see link below for the automated cloud support security and certification. In other words, Every company with a recent copy (2013 or newer) of Adobe Acrobat.

Is that what you mean by "all the digital signature certification infrastructure"?

https://helpx.adobe.com/reader/using/sign-pdfs.html

No. The problem with a digital signature is that anyone can generate a digital signature and sign anything with it.

The simplest way I can verify that the digital signature is indeed yours is for me to personally have contact with you so that you can send me a copy of your digital certificate with which I can verify the document's digital signature against. But that is ineffective for anyone who doesn't have personal contact with you or doesn't know you since anyone can generate a digital certificate file with your name on it, sign documents with it, and just send the two files together as a pair. And what happens if you aren't even with the company anymore?

So you need a central server or service that is trusted that allow people to verify that the digital signature is actually from who it says it's from. That means you need a centralized server or service that holds all the digital signatures that the recipient can use to verify the authenticity of the document. Having such a service means having IT set something up or paying a monthly or annual fee to a service that does it for you. And then those signatures have to be maintained even after you leave the company/project such that anyone, even people who don't know or have contact with you are able to locate the certificate to verify the documents you signed, or else no one will be able to verify the authenticity of the document anymore.

I was assigned to set this up for a company I was working for. Management was legally required to use the system set in place by our governing professional practice body (and pay the associated service fee for maintaining digital authentication) to allow anyone to authenticate the documents. But management didn't want to pay the fee and tried to purposefully misinterpret the legal wording to support their position. They didn't even want to set up our own server to do the authentication.

The result was that clients could not authenticate documents of their own accord without personally contacting whoever signed it, sending the file to them, and getting that person to authenticate it. Another result was that if that person left the company there would be no obvious point of contact anymore to do the authentication, and setting up something to manually handle authenticating documents for everyone who had ever left the company ad-infinitum is a whole other can of worms. And all that is pointless if the company goes under. Not to mention that this particular digital signature in question is a legally liable seal of approval for whoever is signing it and so needed to be valid for the lifetime of the signer's career (i.e. tied to the person signing it), but the way the management wanted to set things up in-house would tie that authentication to the lifetime/whims of the company.

Eventually I was removed from the assignment and it was given to someone else because management didn't like the issues I was bringing up with their approach.

 

[gophert]

No. The problem with a digital signature is that anyone can generate a digital signature and sign anything with it.

The simplest way I can verify that the digital signature is indeed yours is for me to personally have contact with you so that you can send me a copy of your digital certificate with which I can verify the document's digital signature against. But that is ineffective for anyone who doesn't have personal contact with you or doesn't know you since anyone can generate a digital certificate file with your name on it, sign documents with it, and just send the two files together as a pair. And what happens if you aren't even with the company anymore?

So you need a central server or service that is trusted that allow people to verify that the digital signature is actually from who it says it's from. That means you need a centralized server or service that holds all the digital signatures that the recipient can use to verify the authenticity of the document. Having such a service means having IT set something up or paying a monthly or annual fee to a service that does it for you. And then those signatures have to be maintained even after you leave the company/project such that anyone, even people who don't know or have contact with you are able to locate the certificate to verify the documents you signed, or else no one will be able to verify the authenticity of the document anymore.

I was assigned to set this up for a company I was working for. Management was legally required to use the system set in place by our governing professional practice body (and pay the associated service fee for maintaining digital authentication) to allow anyone to authenticate the documents. But management didn't want to pay the fee and tried to purposefully misinterpret the legal wording to support their position. They didn't even want to set up our own server to do the authentication.

The result was that clients could not authenticate documents of their own accord without personally contacting whoever signed it, sending the file to them, and getting that person to authenticate it. Another result was that if that person left the company there would be no obvious point of contact anymore to do the authentication, and setting up something to manually handle authenticating documents for everyone who had ever left the company ad-infinitum is a whole other can of worms. And all that is pointless if the company goes under. Not to mention that this particular digital signature in question is a legally liable seal of approval for whoever is signing it and so needed to be valid for the lifetime of the signer's career (i.e. tied to the person signing it), but the way the management wanted to set things up in-house would tie that authentication to the lifetime/whims of the company.

Eventually I was removed from the assignment and it was given to someone else because management didn't like the issues I was bringing up with their approach.

Because you are (were) making it way too complicated -Adobe has it all under control. It works, it's been working and their cloud solution is the central repository. Also, a digital signature only connects an event (signing) with an individual. It does not give authority, permission or anything else. Real signatures don't do what you were hoping to do. That is not what a signature on a contract does.

<Mod edit: Removed rude and unnecessary comment - Matt>

 

[dknguyen]

I did this 5 years ago and Adobe Sign did not exist at the time. But it still wouldn't have mattered if it did because you seem to have already forgotten that the management already rejected paid authentication services, of which Adobe Signed is one. They kept pushing for it even after I told them out unmanageable in-house authentication procedures would be.

Also, a digital signature only connects an event (signing) with an individual. It does not give authority, permission or anything else. Real signatures don't do what you were hoping to do. That is not what a signature on a contract does.

Either you don't understand the situtation or you don't know what you're talking about. These digital signatures were to provide a digital equivalent of the signed engineering stamps that go on drawings for approval.

As a result, I'm uncertain if Adobe Sign would even qualify because although it might be good enough to replace a signature, in this case it was supposed to replace a professional practice stamp so there's a high chance that Adobe Sign would not be valid and it would actually have to be something certified by the engineering governing body.

Because you are (were) making it way too complicated

I wholeheartedly agree it was too convoluted, which is why I told management an in-house authentication solution wasn't workable and we needed to go with the paid authentication service.

Adobe has it all under control. It works, it's been working and their cloud solution is the central repository.

And now you've essentially done the same thing that got me removed from the project: pushing an paid authentication service.

Hence the reason for all the authentication convolutedness. Management didn't want to pay for a service to make things simple and instead wanted a procedure set up in-house to manually carry those tasks out. I got removed from the project because I kept pushing the external authentication service and pointed out how unmanageable and cumbersome in-house procedures would be.

I would have fired you too.

And here's where I hope you are able to get your head out of your ass and come to the realization you're doing the same thing I was doing which got me removed from the assignment: pushing a paid authentication service. So I guess that means you would have fired yourself too?

 

[ClydeCrashKop]

You two are among my top 15 people here that I respect for their knowledge, intelligence and helpfulness. Please don't change my opinion over something so meaningless.

 

[be80be]

I thought we was fixing a printer not how we get took with the so called digital signature I know that stuff don't work let's see I owe for a truck in a state I never been and some more stuff I signed for online just one problem I wasn't the one who did it.

But Fixing a printer if it's simple fix then yes if it's more then 100 to or even close I'd forget it. And take it apart

 

[atferrari]

Some 15 years ago, IIRC, one of my three most important customers, owners of a big fleet in Germany, forbade anyone around the globe to send them anything printed in paper, making compulsory the use of electronic documents. PDF was the star since then.

Using that as an inspiration, I convinced the rest of my customers and completely discontinued any printing in the next six months.

From using about two A4 reams / month at the moment, I am currently in one ream / year basically for short term working copies (documents I carry to the field in my pockets).

The four or five archive files here in my office, they all contain paper printed on both sides.

What a change!

 

[sircharlton]

So the idea is printers are still needed, but a $1100 machine (I managed to make it work, has one flaw which the machine registers the side compartment open when it's not, an easy fix I believe) that prints with a laser, copy's, faxes, and probably more isn't needed in this day and time?? All due to electronic mailing of information? Printing and copying are still essential, at least where I live in Florida, USA. An employer printing applications then copying them, printing"lost animal" posters, etc.. But possibly a massive robot printer isn't necessary and should be salvaged for parts? Lol unsure

 

[gophert]

So the idea is printers are still needed, but a $1100 machine (I managed to make it work, has one flaw which the machine registers the side compartment open when it's not, an easy fix I believe) that prints with a laser, copy's, faxes, and probably more isn't needed in this day and time?? All due to electronic mailing of information? Printing and copying are still essential, at least where I live in Florida, USA. An employer printing applications then copying them, printing"lost animal" posters, etc.. But possibly a massive robot printer isn't necessary and should be salvaged for parts? Lol unsure

Lost animal posters (printed copies) have been proven WAY less effective than a Facebook post. I've never had a Facebook account or a pet but I would certainly ask a local Facebook member to post a photo of my lost pet before I bother to have a Staples print any copies on paper for me.

 

[sircharlton]

You can ask people to do your job or you can do it yourself. Regardless paper is practically obsolete. I have magined to fix the mechanism causing the printer to send an alert to the screen. I'll try and sell it but we'll see. I'll let everyone know

 

[sircharlton]

I didn't mean to sound rude in my last comment btw

 

[gophert]

I didn't mean to sound rude in my last comment btw

I don't see anything that was (is) rude or even sounds rude.