[JDEV] Jabber Printing Services

[Marcus Rugger]

On Wed, 29 Mar 2000, Jacob O'Reilly wrote:

> I believe what you are suggesting is a great use of the technology.  I'd
> like to see something like that.  I see Jabber as a useful service such that
> COM is on Windows.  It can connect disparate processes/platforms.
> 
> I'd like to work on something like this.
> 

We will certainly have our work cut out for us!  First of which involves
me coming up to speed with Jabber so that I can start talking specifics
rather than gross generalizations.

We also have to consider what developing standards such as the Internet
Printing Protocol (IPP), being developed by the Printer Working Group
(www.pwg.org), means to us.  It may be that a Jabber solution is not
needed.  But I doubt it.  Standards developed by groups like the PWG tend
to be massively complicated (though I am not an expert on IPP).  Complex
standards/protocols tend to only find partial compliance out in the field.

Also, the PWG is charged with solving enterprise level printing
issues.  One thing that seems to be getting ignored is home and small
business users.  These people can't afford and don't have network
administrators and they are not going to go to week long classes so that
they can learn how to adminstrate IPP on their home or small business
networks.  All they want to do is print.

So that would define the primary goal of a Jabber solution, at least as I
see it.  It has to be quite easy for end users, transparent even.  But at
the same time, not lose scalability.

It also has to be easy for application developers and printer vendors to
implement or it will not be adopted.  Especially being it would be new and
untested technology.  Large companies like HP or Lexmark are very
conservative when it comes to implementing new technologies.  They're not
going to spend resources on implementing a technology if there's a risk
that it's going to come back and bite them.  It doesn't matter if it's our
fault on the way we implemented it, to their customers it'll look like
their fault.

Do these sound like reasonable goals to you?  I know they're easier said
than done.  I mean, what the heck does transparent but scalable even
mean? <grin>  Just a couple of buzz words that we need to define.

Marcus