Does the Removal of raw queues in Cups 3.x mean lp -o raw won't work anymore too?

[Daniel-Abrecht]

I want to replace our existing printserver, which consists of over 4000 Raw Queues using the JetDirect Protocol, with a CUPS Printserver.
Most print jobs come from SAP, with the printer driver being part of SAP. I do not have control over that part.

Now, I suppose I will have to convert them to using IPP. Although, there may be many, including label printers, which don't support this, but that's not what I want to ask here about.

I just want to know, will I still be able to print those Documents after CUPS 3.x comes out? Can I just specify lp -o raw or something like that and it's going to keep working? Or will I no longer be able to print those documents in any way?

[michaelrsweet]

Raw printing will continue to work (although you probably won't be using "-o raw" anymore) for formats the printers natively support. The key is that ALL printers support standard formats through CUPS/printer applications in addition to their "native" formats (PCL, PostScript, ZPL, etc.) - no more "passthrough" queues that require special applications and/or that can set your printer on fire (well, not always that but more vendor/native formats provide commands that can really mess with your printer...)

Printer applications exist today to support the bulk of the non-IPP printers out there - LPrint for label printers, hp-printer-app for PCL printers, etc. You can start using those today to migrate things before CUPS 3.0 is out, and you might even find using those printer applications alone can be enough for your SAP printing needs.