The first important point to consider here is the fact that we will be configuring Samba to act as a print server for our Active Directory Network. So, we will configure Samba as a print server for the network, but at the backend, we have the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) software that uses the Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) to support printing to local and network printers [22]. Thus, we can look at this as Samba acting as a print server that uses CUPS as the backend spooling and printer management system. Or, we can look at this as a print server that provides CUPS print services to a Microsoft Network through Samba. Either way, this is a rock solid combination!

Another important fact to understand is that there are other printer management software (for example, LPD or LPRng), and Samba can be configured with those systems. As this is a practical book and CUPS is the standard and most prevalent software in many GNU/Linux...