Great issues occur once we learn the documentation. As an example, we’ve all seen a Raspberry Pi work as an Ethernet adapter over USB, or a ESP32-S2 presenting as a storage system. Nicely, [parkerlreed] has made his Steam Deck work as a USB printer after studying the Linux kernel docs on the USB gadget configuration, and all it took was some C code and a BIOS setting change.
“Wouldn’t it’s cool if our USB tablets uncovered a faux printer interface and saved the obtained paperwork as PDF?” With a SteamDeck, you are able to do simply that – because of the g_printer kernel module. The C code is pretty simple, and even permits you to configure some elements of the printer system.
In fact, there’s gotta be a cherry on the cake, and [parkerlreed]’s shell script hides an addition that makes your PDF printing expertise all that extra lifelike! To not spoil it an excessive amount of – you must watch the video of the script in motion, showcasing each the benefit of use and the added realism.
Jokes apart, the usefulness of this script is simple, and homeowners of USB-device-capable moveable Linux units will discover this script essential. It’s severely cool when somebody dives into documentation and pulls out a intelligent answer to a “wouldn’t it’s cool” concept – basically, it’s the identical mindset that gave us the venerable RTL-SDR. What’s your favorite ‘dig into docs and determine a intelligent function’ hack?
We thank [Myself] for sharing this with us on the Hackaday Discord!