With Push for OS X Focus, CUPS Printing May Suffer On Other Platforms 267
CUPS is the popular open-source printing system that many projects have used successfully as a core, for desktop printing and as the basis of dedicated print servers. Reader donadony writes with word that Apple "has chosen to abandon certain Linux exclusive features, [while] continuing with popular Mac OS X features. The changeover is being attempted by Apple to set new printing standards that will not require 'drivers' in the future." However, as this message from Tim Waugh at Red Hat points out, all is not lost: "Where they are of
use for the Linux environment, those orphaned features will continue to
be maintained at OpenPrinting as a
separate project."
Until... (Score:4, Insightful)
...I can plug in a printer to my computer and without a single dialog box ever coming up asking/telling me about configuration, drivers, or anything else other than asking how many copies do I want, they need to keep trying.
Printers have been stuck in the early 80s for the last three decades.
Why are printer languages not unified? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:OK, whatever. (Score:5, Insightful)
Breaking compatibility for market advantage is so noble of them, clearly we all must approve.
Not every Linux distro includes every package by default. If you want to install the CUPS 1.6 package, or the filters for CUPS 1.5.x that are not supported by OS X you are free to do so.
I don't know if Apple will succeed with 'driverless printing', but if they do then every platform will benefit. Sometimes moving forward means letting go of some of the past.
Re:OK, whatever. (Score:4, Insightful)
On the other hand, there was printing on *NIX before there was CUPS. There can still be printing in a post-CUPS era.
Re:OK, whatever. (Score:5, Insightful)
Slashdot and GPL zealots rant and rave all the time about how awesome it is to use OSS because you can 'fork it' ...
Yes, that is an advantage.
funny how any time the situation arises where forking would get you right back to the state you desire ... no one wants to do it.
Well, of course not. Forking is a pain in the neck and splits resources. Noone wants to do it if they can avoid it since it is really the last resort. However, sometimes it is necessary and works very well (LibroOffice, Xorg, uCLinux, CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT, firefox, to name a few).
Apparently in your bizarro-world it is better not to have the option as a last resort? Not sure I follow that "logic".
What you'd rather do is bitch about someone else not doing exactly what you want them to do, and giving it to you at no cost while you have nothing to do with any of their products.
Everyone likes to bitch. So what? You're bitching about free posts on slashdot.
You're not bitching because Apple is doing something wrong. You're bitching because they aren't continuing to give you a free ride which benefits them in absolutely no way what so ever. Its not even like they get any good will out of it from the OSS community, douche bags like yourself bitch no matter how much they contribute back. This is why you're group of zealots will always be ignored. You do nothing but bitch about free shit given to you out of good will.
People are bitching because it is kind of irritating: they took what was a big Linux project, took all the lead developers and are now breaking it. It's their right, and they've funded development up to now, but the result is now becoming irritating.
Or are you just suggesting that a company's reputation should get a free ride into the future based on what they did in the past?
Re:Until... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Printer? (Score:4, Insightful)
... I have *never*, in my 24 years of life, owned a printer. I think those thing are really deprecated.
I don't know what kind of lifestyle you lead, but it must be very uneventful.
Have you never done anything with legal significance, like buying a house? You don't distrust putting everything in emails that someone afterwards could claim they never received or you never sent? You need to send things by registered post, on paper.
You have never made anything, which needs a drawing at the point of work. I am currently making a playhouse in the garden for which I have dimensioned drawing, done on the PC but which I need out there with me in the garden. Fondleslabs and mud don't mix well.
You have never needed to show eg family pictures in a casual way to visitors without having to drag them into the basement computer room or embarass them by asking them to use a fondleslab they have never used before.
You have none of your own pictures on your walls and shelves, at least not without a digital picture frame for each one - which would not only be expensive and OTT but need a lot of wall bricks and wires hanging around.
You have never at work needed to force someone to pay attention to something by plonking paperwork down in front of them. You never been in a situation where you have said "Would you mind going to the network directory xyz, subdirectory pqr, file abcdef12345.pdf [among thousands]" , or "Would you mind looking at the email I sent yesterday and opening the fifth attachment...?" and seen their eyes glaze over and been told to come back later?
Apparently not.