No configuration. No complication. Thanks to Bonjour technology, getting computers and smart devices to work together is as easy as connecting them.
The automatic connection.
Computers and devices with Bonjour automatically broadcast their own services and listen for services being offered for the use of others. Your computer might see a printer available for printing, an iTunes playlist available for listening, an iChat buddy available for video conferencing. Or even another computer available for file sharing.
Join the party.
Every major printer manufacturer has now adopted Apple’s Bonjour technology, so you can add any modern printer to a network without configuring it at all. Your Mac will automatically discover and connect to any available Bonjour-enabled printer it sees on the network.
Bonjour spoken here.
Safari, Apple’s industry-leading browser, uses Bonjour to find any Bonjour web addresses on your local network. With the help of Bonjour, iChat lets you see which buddies are available for audio or video chats on your local network and removes them when they leave. iTunes and iPhoto use Bonjour to help you share music and photos on your local network.
Mobility redefined.
Having Bonjour lets you think of networking in a whole new way. Say you and your colleague are out on the road with your MacBooks, you need to share a large file, and you’re miles from the nearest wireless network. Bonjour to the rescue. Your AirPort-enabled MacBooks will discover each other and make file sharing simple.
A standout in standards.
Bonjour works with the popular standard connection technologies, including Ethernet and AirPort (802.11). It uses the standard, ubiquitous IP networking protocol for its connections, the same protocol that runs the Internet itself. And all of the technologies driving Bonjour are open — part of the standards creation process of the IETF, like Bonjour itself.
Zero configuration, anywhere.
Even Windows PCs can take advantage of Bonjour. For free. The Bonjour Setup Wizard makes setting up a printer in Windows as easy as in Mac OS X (we can’t make it as beautiful, unfortunately). Bonjour for Windows includes a plug-in for Internet Explorer, so you can set up a Bonjour-enabled device without knowing its IP address. You can even print to printers connected via USB to an AirPort Extreme Base Station or AirPort Express. If you’re an open source enthusiast, you’ll be able to download the Bonjour source code to create software for virtually any platform.