{"slug": "cups", "name": "CUPS", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 16, "warners": 3, "score": 4.268, "rising": -0.64, "first": "2025-11-30", "latest": "2026-09-09", "why": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 6, "compare": 1, "warn": 3}, "spark": [1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 2, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/openprinting/cups", "official_url": "https://openprinting.github.io/cups/", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["CUPS"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 793942192, "item_id": 49621387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49621387", "by": "tapia", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups.", "excerpt": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups. A while ago I did a cups backend for my Fujitsu Quaderno A4 [1]. It is super useful to be able to just open any document, in any program that supports printing, and then just \"print\" it to my device. [1] https://github.com/cristobaltapia/dpt-rp1-cups", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "custom print backends", "switched_from": "", "story": "How to build a printer"}, {"id": 772367712, "item_id": 48272982, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48272982", "by": "Bender", "date": "2026-05-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "good experiences with Brother laserjet printers and CUPS over wifi with my Linux laptops", "excerpt": "I've had decent experiences with most Dell, Lenovo and Asus laptops but I also do not use some features like fingerprint readers and even though it seems to work on my Asus I dont really use the touch screen. While you did not ask about printers I have had good experiences with Brother laserjet printers and CUPS over wifi with my Linux laptops. The Lenovo's I used had a weird firmware issue unrelated to Linux. At tim", "context": "Linux laptop user", "use_case": "printing from Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Laptops with good Linux support and good build quality?"}, {"id": 762925184, "item_id": 47682824, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47682824", "by": "NegativeLatency", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "and CUPS for years, it\u2019s great", "excerpt": "Been doing something similar with a Samsung printer and CUPS for years, it\u2019s great Found this helpful for generating some of the config files: https://github.com/tjfontaine/airprint-generate", "context": "", "use_case": "network printer server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762062450, "item_id": 47628903, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47628903", "by": "dec0dedab0de", "date": "2026-04-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It blew my mind with how easy it was", "excerpt": "It's been like two decades since I used windows on a computer I own, but I always had a way harder time getting hardware to work with windows than I have with linux. I still shudder when I remember trying to track down drivers from different vendors, while avoiding the malware they shipped with it versus letting it just work. edit: I just remembered when I first used CUPS to configure a printer in 2003. It blew my mi", "context": "", "use_case": "Printer configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Decisions that eroded trust in Azure \u2013 by a former Azure Core engineer"}, {"id": 747965040, "item_id": 46747815, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46747815", "by": "jffry", "date": "2026-01-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I can print to the CUPS server even if the  printer is off", "excerpt": "I've done the same thing - making a USB-only printer available on my LAN - following this guide: https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-print-server/ One nice thing is I can print to the CUPS server even if the printer is off", "context": "", "use_case": "Network print server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Raspberry Pi Drag Race: Pi 1 to Pi 5 \u2013 Performance Comparison"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 793586592, "item_id": 49599162, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49599162", "by": "LtWorf", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Last I heard from CUPS they fired the only guy who was working on it?", "excerpt": "Last I heard from CUPS they fired the only guy who was working on it? last thing i found https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/03/26/apples-dormant-cups/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Asahi Linux on M3"}, {"id": 776898512, "item_id": 48556157, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48556157", "by": "Someone", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "actively maintaining it for years", "excerpt": "They haven\u2019t been actively maintaining it for years. https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/03/26/apples-dormant-cups/: \u201cIt looks like nothing has happened with Apple\u2019s code since a security fix in 2022, and the repo comment makes it sound like Apple is intentionally leaving its support stuck at an old version: Apple CUPS is the version of CUPS that is shipped with macOS and iOS. For the current version of CUPS that is used on", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple's CUPS repo was archived"}, {"id": 758721184, "item_id": 47420074, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47420074", "by": "bigbuppo", "date": "2026-03-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "cups wouldn't be a good choice since there's a little more back-and-forth than just blasting out data to the printer", "excerpt": "The main slip printers I use are the Addmaster 7100 and 7200... they're the same printer but use different cartridges. You can find them cheap on ebay, or at least you could. They speak their own little dialect that as far as I know isn't supported by cups as shipped. Even then, cups wouldn't be a good choice since there's a little more back-and-forth than just blasting out data to the printer. Same goes for other pr", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Thermal Receipt Printers \u2013 Markdown and Web UI"}]}], "who": [{"by": "tapia", "context": "Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49621387", "date": "2026-09-09"}, {"by": "Bender", "context": "Linux laptop user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48272982", "date": "2026-05-25"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["print server", "printer server", "custom print backends", "printing from linux", "network printer server", "printer configuration"], "compared": [{"slug": "sane", "name": "SANE", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "google-chrome", "name": "Google Chrome", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [{"id": 771474688, "item_id": 48217168, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48217168", "by": "ValdikSS", "date": "2026-05-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "as a CUPS/SANE/printer/scanner drivers contributor", "excerpt": "It's a great concept, but you haven't open-sourced the previous code, as the license requires, and you're yet again apologizing in this project as well, without any code. Pretty sure you have my code in both projects. I contribute first and foremost to make printers and scanners to work reliably, but also keeping in mind the idea that I could at least try to apply legal actions for companies which violate the license", "context": "contributor to CUPS and SANE", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Reviving old scanners with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762928608, "item_id": 47683038, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47683038", "by": "ValdikSS", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "CUPS and all related projects are supported by volunteers, including myself", "excerpt": "You might think that such an important and long-standing feature as printing would undoubtedly be backed up by a large company. This was true until 2019, when it was backed by Apple. Currently, however, CUPS and all related projects are supported by volunteers, including myself. Apple abandoned CUPS years ago, and recently have archived the repo on github: https://github.com/apple/cups All the current development run", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 745269776, "item_id": 46579361, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46579361", "by": "ValdikSS", "date": "2026-01-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "there's still such an unbelievable amount of basic bugs and low-hanging-fruit optimizations", "excerpt": "Spent about 2 years improving printing and scanning stack of Linux: CUPS, SANE, AirSane, as well as some legacy drivers, and also x86 proprietary driver emulation on ARM with Box86. Even that \"modern\" printing stack in Linux is 20+ years old, there's still such an unbelievable amount of basic bugs and low-hanging-fruit optimizations, that it's kinda sad. Not to mention that it still maintains ALL its legacy compatibi", "context": "", "use_case": "printing system", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (January 2026)"}], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47677885", "title": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP", "mentions": 7}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49617255", "title": "How to build a printer", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586698", "title": "Asahi Linux on M3", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48555895", "title": "Apple's CUPS repo was archived", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48272741", "title": "Ask HN: Laptops with good Linux support and good build quality?", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48177467", "title": "Reviving old scanners with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-03": {"warn": 1}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 2, "neutral": 5, "compare": 1}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {"warn": 1}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {"warn": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 793942192, "item_id": 49621387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49621387", "by": "tapia", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups.", "excerpt": "In Linux it's pretty easy to create such things with cups. A while ago I did a cups backend for my Fujitsu Quaderno A4 [1]. It is super useful to be able to just open any document, in any program that supports printing, and then just \"print\" it to my device. [1] https://github.com/cristobaltapia/dpt-rp1-cups", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "custom print backends", "switched_from": "", "story": "How to build a printer"}, {"id": 793586592, "item_id": 49599162, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49599162", "by": "LtWorf", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Last I heard from CUPS they fired the only guy who was working on it?", "excerpt": "Last I heard from CUPS they fired the only guy who was working on it? last thing i found https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/03/26/apples-dormant-cups/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Asahi Linux on M3"}, {"id": 776898512, "item_id": 48556157, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48556157", "by": "Someone", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "actively maintaining it for years", "excerpt": "They haven\u2019t been actively maintaining it for years. https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/03/26/apples-dormant-cups/: \u201cIt looks like nothing has happened with Apple\u2019s code since a security fix in 2022, and the repo comment makes it sound like Apple is intentionally leaving its support stuck at an old version: Apple CUPS is the version of CUPS that is shipped with macOS and iOS. For the current version of CUPS that is used on", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple's CUPS repo was archived"}, {"id": 772367712, "item_id": 48272982, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48272982", "by": "Bender", "date": "2026-05-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "good experiences with Brother laserjet printers and CUPS over wifi with my Linux laptops", "excerpt": "I've had decent experiences with most Dell, Lenovo and Asus laptops but I also do not use some features like fingerprint readers and even though it seems to work on my Asus I dont really use the touch screen. While you did not ask about printers I have had good experiences with Brother laserjet printers and CUPS over wifi with my Linux laptops. The Lenovo's I used had a weird firmware issue unrelated to Linux. At tim", "context": "Linux laptop user", "use_case": "printing from Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: Laptops with good Linux support and good build quality?"}, {"id": 764374176, "item_id": 47773386, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47773386", "by": "Tor3", "date": "2026-04-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I've used the Rpi3 as a CUPS server in a couple of sites, for a few printers.", "excerpt": "I've used them for mostly dedicated tasks, at least the Rpi3 and older. I've used the Rpi3 as a CUPS server in a couple of sites, for a few printers. Been running for many years now 24/7 with no issues. As I could buy those SBCs for the original low price and the installation was a total no-brainer, I would never consider using any kind of mini PC for that. I have a couple of RPI4 with 8GB and 4GB RAM respectively, t", "context": "", "use_case": "Print server", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Orange Pi 6 Plus"}, {"id": 763036624, "item_id": 47689789, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47689789", "by": "tosti", "date": "2026-04-08", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "bridge the ipp server of cups over webrtc", "excerpt": "You could bridge the ipp server of cups over webrtc to a native listener that talks to the usb port. Webrtc to localhost might raise some red flags, but could be a neat alternative to the chrome requirement. Use at the very least some hmac key pairing to ensure others can't easily piggyback on the listener. I just saved you a few bucks.", "context": "", "use_case": "printer server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762925184, "item_id": 47682824, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47682824", "by": "NegativeLatency", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "and CUPS for years, it\u2019s great", "excerpt": "Been doing something similar with a Samsung printer and CUPS for years, it\u2019s great Found this helpful for generating some of the config files: https://github.com/tjfontaine/airprint-generate", "context": "", "use_case": "network printer server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762904610, "item_id": 47681538, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47681538", "by": "simoncion", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "compare", "quote": "use the network sharing features of SANE and CUPS", "excerpt": "Oh neat. v86 is mentioned in the FOSDEM 2025 slides [0] for another wasm port of QEMU. Interesting that what appears to be v86's inability to run x86 executables didn't fuck you. I wonder why the decision wasn't made to use the network sharing features of SANE and CUPS, instead of requiring one to use Chrome due to the WebUSB dependency. Seems to me that you'd have a way more general solution if you could usefully de", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762901040, "item_id": 47681315, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47681315", "by": "HeyMeco", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Works on my arm64 sbc as a cups printer", "excerpt": "ML-1740 is supported by the driver available here: https://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/index.html Works on my arm64 sbc as a cups printer for another samsung printer", "context": "", "use_case": "Printer server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762876032, "item_id": 47679752, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47679752", "by": "mrighele", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "CUPS doesn't have driver for the MX-80 but it has a number of generic Epson drivers", "excerpt": "For a printer like an Epson MX80 an esp32 should be enough to share the printer on a raw TCP interface (AppSocket I think the protocol is named) on port 9100. It is supported by Windows and CUPS. Very easy implementation as it essentially it just forwards the data to the printer. Since it's a raw interface you need the proper driver, but luckily Epson provides a Windows 10 driver for the Epson MX-80 (!) [1] CUPS does", "context": "", "use_case": "Print server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762872160, "item_id": 47679510, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47679510", "by": "merb", "date": "2026-04-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Most cups changes nowadays happen in", "excerpt": "No. Most cups changes nowadays happen in https://github.com/openprinting/cups?tab=readme-ov-file See here for the details: https://openprinting.github.io/achievements/#cups-upstream-home-is-openprinting-now", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rescuing old printers with an in-browser Linux VM bridged to WebUSB over USB/IP"}, {"id": 762062450, "item_id": 47628903, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47628903", "by": "dec0dedab0de", "date": "2026-04-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It blew my mind with how easy it was", "excerpt": "It's been like two decades since I used windows on a computer I own, but I always had a way harder time getting hardware to work with windows than I have with linux. I still shudder when I remember trying to track down drivers from different vendors, while avoiding the malware they shipped with it versus letting it just work. edit: I just remembered when I first used CUPS to configure a printer in 2003. It blew my mi", "context": "", "use_case": "Printer configuration", "switched_from": "", "story": "Decisions that eroded trust in Azure \u2013 by a former Azure Core engineer"}, {"id": 758721184, "item_id": 47420074, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47420074", "by": "bigbuppo", "date": "2026-03-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "cups wouldn't be a good choice since there's a little more back-and-forth than just blasting out data to the printer", "excerpt": "The main slip printers I use are the Addmaster 7100 and 7200... they're the same printer but use different cartridges. You can find them cheap on ebay, or at least you could. They speak their own little dialect that as far as I know isn't supported by cups as shipped. Even then, cups wouldn't be a good choice since there's a little more back-and-forth than just blasting out data to the printer. Same goes for other pr", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Thermal Receipt Printers \u2013 Markdown and Web UI"}, {"id": 750343680, "item_id": 46896480, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46896480", "by": "sschueller", "date": "2026-02-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "print via BLE instead of CUPS", "excerpt": "I am in the same boat but I recently found I could also use these tool so reverse engineer stuff as well. For example I purchased this label printer from china and was unsatisfied with the printing quality under Linux. So I \"coded\" a go script to print via BLE instead of CUPS [1]. To do this I de-compiled the android app that comes with the printer and instead of spending hours going through it I just told an Agentic", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Claude Code for Infrastructure"}, {"id": 747965040, "item_id": 46747815, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46747815", "by": "jffry", "date": "2026-01-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I can print to the CUPS server even if the  printer is off", "excerpt": "I've done the same thing - making a USB-only printer available on my LAN - following this guide: https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-print-server/ One nice thing is I can print to the CUPS server even if the printer is off", "context": "", "use_case": "Network print server", "switched_from": "", "story": "Raspberry Pi Drag Race: Pi 1 to Pi 5 \u2013 Performance Comparison"}, {"id": 737571168, "item_id": 46098198, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46098198", "by": "don-code", "date": "2025-11-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "CUPS and SANE both support it out of the box", "excerpt": "I likewise have a circa 1997 LaserJet that I refuse to give up. Both the printer and scanner still function flawlessly, every time I need them to - something that few printers today seem capable of. I switched to 64-bit Windows in 2006. The printer supports PCL drivers, but there are no 64-bit drivers for the scanner. Luckily, I was able to keep it going by running 32-bit Windows in a VM, and passing the parallel por", "context": "", "use_case": "printer support", "switched_from": "", "story": "Atlas Shrugged (2024)"}]}