[lsb-discuss] [Printing-architecture] LSB 4.0 and printing

[Wichmann, Mats D]

Johannes Meixner wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> On Mar 27 07:49 Wichmann, Mats D wrote (shortened):
>> ... distributions tend to certify to the "whole LSB" ...
>> This is always a reasonable question to ask for every
>> new feature:  is it appropriate for everyone ("core")
>> or should it be in an extended module that maybe doesn't
>> apply to all systems.  And then, if you partition things
>> that way, what does it mean to applications who want
>> to depend on it?
> 
> Perhaps a silly "RTFM" question but I like to understand
> what the above exactly means:
> 
> I assume when a whole distribution is certified to
> the "whole LSB", this means that the distribution
> provides packages to make an installed system
> compatible to the "whole LSB".
> 
> But I assume that this does not mean that any installed system
> of this distribution must be compatible to the "whole LSB".

Right.  In fact some current distro providers do
install LSB support by default and some don't, but
in either case selections at install time could
alter that situation.

> E.g. a user can install only what is needed for a plain
> mail server or a plain web server and omit all printing
> and scanning stuff so that his installed server system
> is not compatible to the "whole LSB".
> 
> But when he likes to install a third-party LSB compatible
> application which requires for example printing or
> scanning stuff, then this is easily possible because
> his distribution is compatible to the "whole LSB".
> Of course he needs to install additional packages
> from his distribution (just what his third-party
> application requires).
> 
> Am I right?

That's the way it's set up to work.  Right at the moment
there's just a single package manager dependency called
"lsb" that, if met, indicates all the necessary packages
are in place on the system. Typically, that dependency
is provided by a distro "virtual" package that simply
depends on everything required for LSB support.