How to alias existing CUPSprinterstogetadditionalpaper tray capability?

[Kurt Pfeifle]

 Michael Talbot-Wilson wrote:

> The slash is familiar to anyone dealing with files and directories
> .... for dealing with files and directories.

Oh, the world has moved on since that. My admins and customers are now
also familiar with the slash as a separator for CUPS printer instances.

[....]

> Dvips has been around a long time, it's how one prints under Linux, and
> CUPS is for printing.

Oh, is it?

The way you put it, dvips seems to be the *only* way. Let me tell you: it
*may*  have been. And it may still be used by some. But its high time is
over. Like it or not.

[...]

> It is a _valid_ assumption that a printer name can be used as a
> filename until you come along and, on dubious reasoning, create a
> totally unnecessary incompatibility.

The slash as a separator for CUPS instances has been an excellent choice
for millions of CUPS users until you came along and, on dubious reasoning,
demanded a run of  "sed -e 's|/|^|g'" throughout the source tree.

(FWIW, even if your suggestion would slightly improve the situation for
*some* CUPS users, it would break existing installations for millions of
existing users.)

You better let loose sed on your own dvips sources and recompile. Or
use a wrapper script that works around the CUPS printer instance slashes
for the functionalities you need.

[...]

> Only in a particular context.  It is not a problem in a file name.  In
> a dozen years of using bash I've never encountered it.

Please take note of the fact that Bash is not the only shell out there. And
Linux not the only Un*x. And CUPS is not just for Linux Bash users. Any
argument asking for changes in CUPS sources with the justification "But
Bash likes it that way!" is flawed.

> Granted I am a
> pretty unsophisticated user who has done almost no shell scripting.
>
> > "/" is the only character that is commonly used to indicate a
> > hierarchy in UNIX.  ":" is a close second and is used by several
>
> You beg the question by insisting on seeing it as hierarchy.  That is
> a choice.  Get this: a printer instance is not a hierarchy.

I really take great fun of the way how a self-confessed "pretty
unsophisticated user who has done almost no shell scripting" is also
pretty assertive (let's use a rather polite word here) in trying to teach a
Unix guru who wrote dozens of sophisticated programs in many different
languages and environments (Bash not the only one; but also C, C++,
PHP, PostScript, OpenGL, Gtk, FLTK) on and for dozens of platforms
(including MS Windows and Mac OS X, not only Linux/Un*x) about
things he is doing wrong.   :-)

You made my day. My colleagues in this room are wondering why I had
the joy of a 2 minutes lasting laughing attack.  :-)))

Cheers,
Kurt