But KDEPrint doesn't stop here. It is now fit for use in network environments with hundreds or thousands of users. This talk will highlight the new achievments of KDEPrint.

KDEPrint is very flexible in its handling of printing environments. It can easily be adapted to include any external print utility or format conversion filter, either in the form of a permanent "Special Printer" or as an additional filter used before transfering the file to one of the regular printers. One example is the pre-configured "pamphlet print filter"; another is the integration of "a2ps" into the KDEPrint framework. All this works independently of the chosen printing subsystem.

It is already well known that KDEPrint is capable of building on and using different printing subsystems, including generic LPR/LPD, RLPR, LPRng and CUPS.

The most advanced printing features are available with CUPS. This talk will start with a short outline of KDEPrint as a GUI frontend for LPRng. The switchover to CUPS will then be described, with an explanation of how KDEPrint extends its own features for the user by means of various IPP parameters and operations. (IPP, the "Internet Printing Protocol", is the evolving IETF and industry standard for network printing, described in a series of RFCs).

KDEPrint makes heavy use of the CUPS API. Even experienced CUPS users will be surprised to discover a wealth of semingly "hidden" features of their printing subsystem by exploring the dialogs and menus of the "kprinter" and "Printing Manager" GUIs. In the past, these options were "buried" in man pages, user manuals and CUPS programming references--now they are brought to light by the KDE "point and click" interface. Command-line and scripted printing may thus be stimulated to integrate these advanced CUPS print options in non-GUI environments too...

A few highlights:

• Creating and understanding IPP reports on printers and jobs.
• Marking jobs for accounting purposes.
• KDEPrint in the central repro department of an enterprise or organisation.
• Moving jobs to different queues.
• Post-editing of job options for jobs in remote and local queues.
• Reprinting jobs with different job options.
• Sending jobs into queues "on hold" for manual release.
• Scheduling jobs for printing at a specific time.
• Increasing and decreasing job priorities.
• Setting and controlling user quotas.
• Allowing and denying specific users access to printers.
• Creating statistics, reports and charts from the page_log file.
• Using advanced options of "kprinter".
• "Add Printer Wizard".
• "Printing Manager".
• "kjobviewer".
• "KDEPrint Configurator".
• "KDEPrint Command Builder"

Kurt Pfeifle [also offering a 4-hour workshop on CUPS during LinuxTag 2002]