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System Administration Guide: Solaris Printing

PAPI Print Client Commands

Historically, printing commands have been tied to a specific print system because they have been implemented on top of print system specific protocols and interfaces. Examples include the BSD, LPR, SysV LP, LPRng, and CUPS printing protocols. The introduction of the PAPI, makes it possible to layer these print commands on top of a print service, protocol neutral, interface.

The PAPI provides applications a single interface for print service interaction. This means that applications can be written to use this interface and work with a variety of print services without requiring changes to the applications. Applications are no longer tied to a particular print service, such as the LP print service or CUPS. Instead, print services can easily be replaced on a system without impacting the protocol or application layers above. Ultimately, print services can be both developed and selected based on specific needs.

The PAPI interacts with the lpsched command and RFC-1179-based servers. PAPI also enables interaction with CUPS servers by using libcups and native IPP client-side support. The PAPI supports that is available in the Solaris OS includes the modification of several common BSD and SysV printing commands. The new command implementations are layered on the PAPI. Hence, these commands can work with a variety of printing services.

The PAPI implementation in the Solaris OS also includes server-side and client-side support for IPP, which is layered on top of the PAPI. IPP is implemented as a set of protocol-specific libraries and an Apache module. Like the command implementations, the IPP Listening Service can be used with any printing service that supports the PAPI. Server-side support for the RFC-1179 protocol is also available. For more information, see Chapter 3, Setting Up Printing Services (Tasks).

The following is a list of the PAPI supported components: