Hello!
I am using debian which is similar to ubuntu.
They have 7 dot matrix printers some very old like this one http://www.omnidatasys.net/product/desc_printer_ti880.htm which works from 1979 daily and at text is faster than many inkjects.

I believe that it has his own language... Sending text to serial port (port server) prints garbage. However i think is prints only capital english up to 95 asccii and greek and the rest up to 127 i think greek capital.(special chip )

Sending english capital letters prints garbage i think but i amnt sure... i will try again...

The other printer are ESC/P compatible and i use generic epson driver provided from ghostscript... However i think that sending text via

lp -dpr1 filename

It prints the text as a grafic...Changing from printer font face(courier,times roman etc) or pitch has no effect...
I am wondering if is there any work arround for this? In AIX they claim that lp command printed output as text as it prints and cobol programs send raw text to to lp printers .
However in AIX they use some custom filters for the printers and has more options for dot matrix printers..

I would like to know if there is a solution for this.. To avoid graphics mode for text and change font face somehow.. The most Straight-through approach would be to use no driver ,just send ESC/P from cobol but this requires too much work... Thank you again!