Ubuntu 11.10 & 11.04 To Support Apple AirPrint 67
kai_hiwatari writes "According to an email in the Ubuntu-Devel mailing list, AirPrint support is now available for Ubuntu 11.10 'Oneiric Ocelot' and Ubutnu 11.04 'Natty Narwhal' as well — although it is in the testing phase for now. Developer Till Kamppeter sent an email to the mailing list inviting testers to test out his patch that enables AirPrint in Ubuntu."
Nothing much new here. (Score:4, Informative)
I've been doing this for months. Avahi can share any cups queue as an Airprint queue. I used this howto:
http://www.finnie.org/2010/11/13/airprint-and-linux/ [finnie.org]
There are also scripts that will autogenerate the Avahi service files for you. The only real new thing here might possibly be a better UI for doing this.
Fewer drivers (Score:4, Informative)
What does this allow that simply connecting to wifi and printing to a networked printer on the same wifi network can't do?
Basically, fewer drivers involved, a somewhat higher level abstraction for the printer.
The practical use is that from any iPad/Touch/iPhone device, they can discover and print to that print queue. So if you have any of those devices and are using a Linux box as a print server, this would be very handy...
Re:Nothing much new here. (Score:3, Informative)
The funny thing is that apple also uses cups for printing, right? x_x
It is more than that. Apple actually owns CUPS. They bought it in 2007 [cups.org]
AirPrint = IPP + Zeroconf/DNS-SD (Score:5, Informative)
"AirPrint" is just a fancy name for what is basically networked printing using the IPP protocol, with automatic discovery of available printers with zeroconf (using DNS-DS).
The linux solution uses Avahi for the zeroconf discovery part, and CUPS for the IPP printing service.
- CUPS can be a vanilla version, as long as the printer is supported.
- Avahi needs to be manually configured, in order to output the few extra data which is required for an iDevice to recognise it as a AirPrint and list it as a possible printing target.
Upstream merging shouldn't be too troublesome. Expect AirPort appearing in the next iteration of distros.
As mentionned elsewhere among the discussion, what would really be needed is a nice interface to help do this configuration. I suspect that openSUSE's YaST will do a nice job here, as usual.
Re:How long? (Score:3, Informative)
How long before they receive some legal love from Apple^h^h^h^h^h Steve?
You mean for developing a zeroconf implementation, with help from Apple engineers and referencing the open source implementation from Apple and the RFC Apple largely wrote? Or do you mean for integrating it with CUPS which is another open source project Apple currently funds and develops?
Apple wants the open source technologies they build their OS's on as widely adopted as possible because it makes their devices more useful, which sells more of them, which makes them more money. That's why Apple open sources things like bonjour in the first place.
AirPrint = IPP + zeroconf (Score:4, Informative)
So what is AirPrint?
"AirPrint" is just a fancy name for what is basically networked printing using the IPP protocol, with automatic discovery of available printers with zeroconf.
IPP is simply provided by regular CUPS versions under Linux (nothing new here).
As mentioned by others, the zeroconf is done by Avahi under linux and a couple of extra fields need to be provided, so an apple device can recognise an avahi-advertised printing queue as "AirPrint".