Aaron, here I think HPLIP (Mary, HPLIP is HP's driver package for their
printers and multi-function devices) should get more user-friendly.

As HPLIP PPDs are noe generated by CUPS DDK and not by Foomatic any
more, one could introduce an "Installable Options" group in which the
administrator can tell which hardware configuration of the given printer
is actually used, like we know already from the PostScript models.
UIConstraints can hide or gray (depends on the application's UI) extra
trays or duplex settings if appropriate accessories are not installed.

For LIDIL printers (and generally printers where the driver must know
about the actually installed cartridges) the group can in addition
contain also an "InkSet" option, in which the user configures which
cartridges he has actually installed. An UI constraint will then exclude
the "Quality" settings which are not suitable for the given ink set.

This would break the PrintoutMode option, as the "Quality" settings
behind of some of its choices could be disqualified by the given ink
set. And we must conserve the PrintoutMode option, as in the Common
Printing Dialog
(https://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/OpenPrinting/CommonPrintingDialog)
it will translate into the Quick Preset buttons.

So we do not let the PrintoutMode option be a Foomatic composite option
any more. We let Quality, PrintoutMode, and InkSet all inject command
line fragments into the GhostScript/HPIJS command line. If Quality is
not set to "FromPrintoutMode" HPIJS will use the Quality setting (and
perhaps use the closest suitable or exit with an error if it conflicts
with InkSet). If Quality is set to "FromPrintoutMode" HPIJS will take
the PrintoutMode setting and look up in an internal table which Quality
it has to use dependent on the given InkSet and PrintoutMode.

This way the default setting of PrintoutMode is always "Normal" and of
Quality always "FromPrintoutMode". Modern printer setup tools
automatically ask the user for setting the "Installable Options" and so
the user gets asked which cartridges he has. So InkSet gets set
correctly and the printer makes always best use of the cartridges. And
if the suer switches to "Draft", "High", or "Photo" HPIJS uses the
Quality setting which makes best use of the cartridges in these modes.

Aaron (or anyone else there at HP), what do you think?

-- 
"Print black" does not use black ink cartridge
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/235399
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