CUPS is exactly what Google is switching Chrome OS to, as a replacement for Cloud Print.
But the reason to have Google's (or someone's) servers involved is so that you don't need to be on the same network (e.g., you can print to your home printer, behind a firewall/NAT, while you're at a coffeeshop, also behind a firewall/NAT).
Buuuuut, is that really a valid use case? how many people do actually want to remotely print from another network to a printer, beside print shops without dedicated WiFi networks? How many people do actually want to use it as some sort of fax-machine replacement?
It's like sort of useful. In the old days, I would print my lab reports to the college printer from home (using smb based print spooling, which dates me, because smb over the internet was allowed then). You could also use cloudprint to send a document to a print shop before you got there; not the worst way to print things if you don't have a printer at home.
Most of the people I know who tried that in college seemed to always send the first copy to the wrong printer. So you print you report on the physics printer. Walk over. Nothing here. Walk back to dorm. Realize you printed in chem building. Print again in physics lab. Walk over again.
I do this all the time, when I'm at work and my wife needs some document printed. However, I usually just ssh into a box on my home network and run lpr myfile.pdf
CUPS / IPP is just an HTTP server. Apparently HTTPS (IPPS) is reasonably well-supported, and there is also support for IPP authentication, but I still wouldn't feel totally comfortable exposing the CUPS built-in web server directly to the public internet....
We previously had one of those ol Reliable Brother printers that would last for a decade. When we last moved, we left it behind and on the rare occasions we need to print something we email the doc to a FedEx email address and pick it up from the printer at FedEx office (you enter a unique hex code to retrieve after dipping your card for payment).
It seems like the use cases of printing to your home printer from anywhere is few and far between.
> Whatever happened to good old CUPS? Why did they have to introduce so many layers including Google's servers between the user and the printer?
As the support document states, as far as Chrome OS goes, the removal was made possible precisely because its CUPS support became good enough to supplant Cloud Print.
I am really curious how they will make CUPS printer management on Chrome OS happen. I guess they bet on wide support on printers supporting some protocol native.
