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From: rws@EXPO.LCS.MIT.EDU (Bob Scheifler)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: printing at X terminals
Message-ID: <9007161804.AA23106@expire.lcs.mit.edu>
Date: 16 Jul 90 18:04:38 GMT
References: <9007161432.AA02724@smithkline.com>
Sender: daemon@athena.mit.edu (Mr Background)
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 44


    There are a many ways to print to an X terminal's
    printer, but none of them are as simple, straightforward, and obvious
    as doing it through X.

Since I haven't seen specifications for how vendors currently provide print
service, it's hard to argue.  But I think the real question is: can it
be made at least as simple, straightforward, and obvious, without going
through X.  It seems clear to me that it can be.

    The implementations of X terminal printing are
    currently all different, are not secure, and don't run on all transport
    layers supported by the server.

All of which are orthogonal to the question of whether it should be done
using an X extension.

    Because local printing is something you do through your terminal connection.
    Always has been.

Just because there once was a bad idea, we should perpetuate it?  Local
printing through the terminal stream was forced on people because the
terminal only supported a single connection.  X terminals do not suffer
from this defect.

    The security  and access concerns of most users vis-a-vis
    their terminal are the same  for their printer as for their terminals.

I'd say that's a conjecture, rather than a fact.  But if you want the
security of the printer to default to the security of the X server, fine
with me.  I still don't see that it needs to be bundled as an X extension
to achieve that.

    The printer is an extension of the terminal.

But not an extension of X.

    It doesn't print.

And it shouldn't.  It still seems that the only argument that has really been
put forward for making printing an X extension is the belief that the
X Consortium could make a standard, and it isn't clear what other organization
reasonably could.  Now that I've dispelled that myth :-) how about some good
technical arguments?