[a96]

There was no reason to sell a dot matrix printer that wasn't compatible with tractor feed. Especially when some of the biggest uses of those printers required that stock. Doesn't mean they required tractor feed paper to operate.

A Matrix printer is essentially a typewriter with extra steps and typewriters had been eating any paper for .. a century before?

[geonineties]

Are you thinking of Daisy wheel? Dot matrix uses a set of pins arranged in a matrix that they ram forward to press the ribbon against the paper. Daisy wheel uses a raised character glyph and slams it forward into the ribbon. Every typewriter I've used has full glyphs.

[a96]

I'm thinking of everything working on the principle of smashing an inked ribbon into paper to make markings.