Bug 2705 - Consider skipping pdftops on platforms which can print PDFs directly
Summary: Consider skipping pdftops on platforms which can print PDFs directly
Status: NEW
Alias: None
Product: ThinLinc
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Client platforms (show other bugs)
Version: 2.0.0
Hardware: PC Unknown
: P2 Normal
Target Milestone: MediumPrio
Assignee: Peter Åstrand
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2008-02-20 09:16 CET by Peter Åstrand
Modified: 2017-02-21 10:28 CET (History)
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Description Peter Åstrand cendio 2008-02-20 09:16:16 CET 
Many modern Linuxes can print PDFs directly, for example, via the "lpr" command. In this case, running pdftops is unneccessary and might even lose information. It would be better to print the PDF directly. We would need some way of determining if the printing system accepts PDFs or not.
Comment 1 Peter Åstrand cendio 2008-02-20 09:24:31 CET 
According to http://www.cups.org/articles.php?L249+TFAQ+P1+Q, all CUPS systems should be able to handle PDFs:

>Yes! CUPS translates your file into information that your printer will >understand.
>
>By default CUPS takes your current media size you have assigned and centers each >page of the PDF to that. 

So perhaps all we need to do is to determine if the queue is a CUPS queue or not.
Comment 2 Peter Åstrand cendio 2008-02-26 14:11:28 CET 
Advantages of printing the PDF directly:

* Support for things that PS cannot handle, such as transparency. 

* Faster print time. For example, thin terminals might take a very long time to convert PDF to PS. The conversion might even run out of RAM. During the conversion, tlclient is blocked. 

* Reliability. The fewer conversion steps, the better. For example, fonts are problematic.
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