I haven't seen the term come up yet, so: Apple's Mac<->Printer cables are null modem cables, serial cables are straight thru. Never heard that some non-Apple printers used a different variant of the crossover cable, interesting. Standard serial cables yes, IIRC my (first gen) Epson Stylus Color used a standard serial cable.I wound up using the AppleTalk network card in it though, so memories are even dimmer than 20 years worth ought to account.

You can also use a null modem cable to transfer files between Mac and PC, though not AppleTalk. Now I wish I'd snagged an ISA AppleTalk Card back in the day.