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Google Launches Cloud Printer Service For Windows

Posted by Unknown on from the not-invented-here dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Google today announced it is bringing its Cloud Print project to Windows. The company has launched both a driver and a service, both of which are available for download now from Google Tools. For those who don't know, Google Cloud Print connects Cloud Print-aware applications (across the Web, desktop, and mobile) to any printer. It integrates with the mobile versions of Gmail and Google Docs, and is also listed as a printer option in the Print Preview page of Chrome." One of the things that annoys me about Android: having to print through the Cloud (tm) when I have an Internet Printing Protocol CUPS server on the same network as my phone connected to a printer ten feet from me. It wouldn't be so bad if the Google Cloud Print libraries weren't proprietary and did something like IPP proxying instead of using a similarly proprietary API.

6 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. Remember when ... by BitZtream · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Google supported existing open APIs instead of pulling a Microsoft and inventing their own for everything and dropping support for open APIs?

    Whats next to be replaced by some Google specific protocol for Google users? SMTP?

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    1. Re:Remember when ... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Whats next to be replaced by some Google specific protocol for Google users? SMTP?

      Don't be dramatic. Google is not going to replace SMTP.

      They're just going to require your email recipients first be added to one of your Google+ circles.

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  2. Re:Congrats, Unknown Lamer... by 0123456 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You're 1 of 2 people who can get CUPS a) setup and b) working well enough to not just spew ink with a real printer.

    Says the person who apparently hasn't used Linux since 1993.

    Back on topic, presumably Google won't support CUPS, because the NSA wants a copy of everything we print as well as everything we email.

  3. Re:Congrats, Unknown Lamer... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Only because Apple made it work properly and added a GUI instead of text files that bomb with a misplaced comma or tab.

    Wow - you really haven't used linux in the last decade or so, have you?

    Find a computer with an install of any of the major linux distributions, fire up a web browser, and point it to http://localhost:631/
     

    Are you serious? How on earth would a normal person figure out that printing is on port 631? I use Linux eight hours a day at work, and for programming I wouldn't use anything else, but even I use a mac when I need things to work. A web server running on a port I would never find is not a reasonable place for a UI most users need to discover.

  4. Re:Ads in the middle of your print jobs by Demonantis · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They will just cancel it a few years down the road when they realize they can't monetize it. After destroying the competition. Leaving everyone who liked it angry and wondering what the hell they are going to do. Sorry I'm still mad about Reader.

  5. Re:Congrats, Unknown Lamer... by TheRaven64 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How on earth would a normal person figure out that printing is on port 631?

    One of two ways:

    • RTFM.
    • Click on the helpful link to http://localhost:631/ that is named 'Printer Setup' and put on your desktop or in a menu by your desktop environment of choice.

    Seriously, your complaint makes as much sense as asking 'How on earth would a normal person figure out that you browse the web by running iexplore.exe?'

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