When it comes to producing a document many times the production of the text, or actual composition isn't where we have our trouble. The problem comes when we are trying to get from what we see on the screen to what comes out of our printer or what shows up in our email. To make matters worse, there is little help and less explanation of what goes on. Many times the user begins to believe that he is the source of the difficulty. In some cases the knowledge gap does wind up being the problem but usually it is software confusion.
Printers are dumb beasts that get their instruction from the computer system.
There are over 3500 makes or models on the market and each requires that the operating platform be prepared to talk to it. This is done by providing Windows a file called a printer driver and while that may not mean anything to you now, it can certainly mean a lot if you are trying to print a rush copy of a document. The printer driver tells the computer how to convert the screen document so that your printer can handle it. At best printer drivers are miserable little segments of code, all numbers that are treacherous to write, easy to foul up, and difficult to correct. When a printer hits the street with an error in its drivers, it can take a long time to get straightened out.