What Is Cloud Printing?

Printing Without a Printer

It's common to have a printer attached to your desktop or laptop PC. But what about printing from mobile devices, or printing when you're away from home? Cloud printing tech enables any Internet-connected device to access a printer via the Internet “cloud” of hidden resources. The device does not need any printer-specific driver software; that’s a big selling point for anyone who’s dealt with obtaining and updating drivers.

Cloud printing enables you to send print jobs from your phone, tablet, laptop, a public computer, or anything else to a printer in your home, office, a library, or a specialty printing company, where your printouts will wait for you to pick them up (or be delivered to wherever you like).

Simple jobs like printing photos from your phone will no longer require transferring image files from phone to computer, or plugging a SD card into a printer. If you do any document preparation (word processing, spreadsheets, etc.) on your smartphone or tablet, you can use cloud printing in the same manner, to avoid transferring the file to your computer before printing.

If you need sophisticated printing functions that your home printer doesn’t support, you can send your document to a printing company as easily as to your desktop printer. You may even be able to dispose of your personal printer (as many of us would like to do).

All of the major printer brands offer mobile apps which will connect your smartphone or tablet to a printer. Some print to a local printer using Wi-Fi. Others use an Internet connection or email to send printouts to local or remote destinations.

Where Can I Print My Stuff?

Office Depot offers a wide variety of printing services via cloud printing, for those who have registered accounts. So does Fedex Office, the office services division of the overnight delivery giant; you don’t need a business, just sign up and start printing. But both are kind of expensive for the usual consumer’s needs.

Google Cloud Print is a free service from the search giant that can connect any printer you own to the Internet and make it available to any of your devices. It does so in one of two ways depending on whether your printer supports cloud printing or is a “classic” printer, to use Google’s polite term for “old.”

Printers that support cloud printing natively don’t need to be connected to an Internet-connected computer; classic printers do. Google provides help to determine if your printer is cloud-ready, but any wireless printer that uses WiFi should able to support cloud printing too.

Classic printers are connected to a home or office network, and one of the network’s nodes is a computer directly connected to the Internet. Google Cloud Printing can be implemented on that gateway computer if it is running Windows XP or higher and the Google Chrome browser; just follow these instructions.

The Grand Rapids Public Library System is one of several library systems nationwide that offers cloud printing to the public via Google Cloud Print. Search for your library system and “google cloud print” to see if this marvelous library service is available to you. Prices will definitely be lower than commercial print shops.

Can you think of uses for cloud printing in your home or office environment? Does your library offer cloud printing? What do you think of cloud printing in general? Your thoughts on this topic are welcome. Post your comment or question below...