Bug#704238: Need to document the CUPS client's new server-version option
Package: cups-client
Version: 1.6.2-3
The CUPS client recently gained new configuration logic to allow the IPP
version of a CUPS server to be specified, whether on the command line
(-h option), in the CUPS_SERVER environment variable, or in the
/etc/cups/client.conf config file. Some examples of the syntax:
$ lpr -h cups.example.com/version=1.1 foo.ps
$ CUPS_SERVER=cups.example.com/version=1.1 lpr foo.ps
ServerName cups.example.com/version=1.1
Being able to specify the server's IPP version is vitally important---
the CUPS client currently defaults to IPP 2.0, and if the server talks
1.1 or older, the client cannot downgrade the protocol automatically and
thus cannot communicate at all with the server. Details of the problem
are described in this upstream bug report:
https://www.cups.org/str.php?L4231
This information should be of interest to anyone using CUPS in a client-
only configuration, because the IPP version default changed for the new
1.6.x series and thus client-only users upgrading from 1.5.x may find
that they mysteriously can't print anymore. (Indeed, this happened to
me, and the problem was *not* easy to diagnose.)
The new server-version option needs to be documented in the cups-client
package's example client.conf file. Mention of it should probably be
added to README.Debian. Furthermore, because of the potential for
breakage when upgrading from 1.5.x, I believe a notice in a package
maintainer script would be warranted (perhaps limited to systems that do
not have the "cups" server package installed).
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