There should be a special print queue for generating PDF files. Sending
a job to this queue should generate a PDF file from the document sent
into the queue. The PDF file should be easily accessible for the sender
of the job, but other users should not be able to read it.
The package cups-pdf provides the special CUPS backend which converts
incoming PostScript to PDF and puts the resulting PDF into the right
place.
To make this grandmother-proof, the installation of the package should
prepare everything to use this feature. Especially the mentioned print
queue is needed. As the package does not make sense without the print
queue and the print queue does not make sense without the package, the
queue should be created when the package finishes to be installed
(postinstall) and the queue should be removed when the package starts to
be uninstalled (prerm).
Creating and taking down the queue in the postinstall and prerm scripts
is easy. To create it do
lpadmin -p PDF -E -v cups-pdf:/ -m foomatic:Generic-PostScript_Printer-
Postscript.ppd -o PageSize=A4
and to take it down
lpadmin -x PDF
This should be somewhat refined, once when creating the queue it should
be checked whether the queue name already exists and if so, another
queue name should be used (PDF1, PDF2, ...). If there is already a queue
with a "cups-pdf:/" URI, no queue shoud be created.
On uninstallation of the package all queues with "cups-pdf:/" URIs
should be taken down.
A script can also easily find out which local queues already exist and
which URI they have:
lpstat -v | grep -v 'ipp://'
It should also be checked whether a default printer or class is set
("lpstat -d") and if not, the new PDF queue should be made the default.
Concerning the user's choice of the PPD file, he can always change it
with any printer setup tool. More important is grandmother-proofness and
this one reaches only by using a default PPD file.
The PPD file needed is one for a generic PostScript printer. Best is one
which has no tray and duplex options (there is no printer), no
resolution (both PostScript and PDF are vector formats and there is no
raster-based printing engine). It should have only things like color/bw,
quality vs. size, ... (see what options you can set when choosing
"Export to PDF" in OpenOffice.org).
** Changed in: cups-pdf (Ubuntu)
Importance: Undecided => Medium
Status: Unconfirmed => Confirmed
--
add/remove the PDF printer in CUPS at installation/removal time
https://launchpad.net/bugs/82674
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