Buffer

When you are in your lesson, your teacher will probably tell you to print off your work at the end of the lesson. So, there might be 30 of you all sending your precious hand crafted work to the printer.

Now think about that poor printer. How long does it take to print out your 3 page essay? A minute or so? Have you ever seen the printer print out 30 pieces of work all at the same time? Nope, I think it would go into meltdown.

So, 30 pieces of work have been sent to the printer, 30 students have logged off and are patiently, or not so patiently waiting for their masterpiece. Where did all the work go?

Well, it got stored in the buffer. A buffer - and in this case a print buffer - is a form of memory which allows you to send your document to the printer and go onto another piece of work or even log off. The work you sent or 'print job' will be stored in the buffer until the printer has finished printing out its current job. The buffer will then pass on the next piece of work to be printed and keep storing the other 28 pieces of work until the printer is free.

2020-10