phomemo-driver#

Print to a Phomemo thermal printer like to any other printer.

The Phomemo M08F is an A4 thermal printer that only speaks Bluetooth LE, with a protocol of its own on top. The manufacturer means it to be used through their phone app only: an app that is mostly bloat, asks for more trust than it deserves, and even uploads your documents to the manufacturer’s servers before it prints them.

phomemo-driver turns the printer into an ordinary IPP printer instead. Your desktop, your phone and every other IPP client print to it like to any network printer, and your documents stay on your network. The Python library underneath also lets you control the printer from your own code.

Quickstart#

On Fedora, with the printer switched on, in range and not connected to a phone:

sudo dnf copr enable passionatebytes/phomemo-driver
sudo dnf install phomemo-driver     # installs and starts both services
sudo phomemo-printer-app autoadd    # registers every printer in range

The printer now shows up in your applications’ print dialogs. The details, other ways to install and the optional permanent CUPS queue are in Installation and First steps.

Where to start#

  • You want to print from your computer. Follow Installation, then First steps: install, register the printer, print a page. That’s it.

  • You want to print from Python. The library scans for printers, prints images and bitmaps and reports the printer’s sensors as events.

  • You want to know how it works, or contribute. The driver stack explains the parts, the protocol reference documents what is known about the M08F, and Contributing shows how to get started. New printer models are especially welcome.