[avahi] Newbie question

[Trent Lloyd]

Hi Ravi,
On 10/08/2008, at 4:18 AM, Ravi Desai wrote:

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> Hello,
> ~    I've just found out about avahi and am interested in learning  
> more.
> The main question I have is; how is it supposed to be used?
> For example, if I have a network printer set up using ipp, how do I  
> get
> this recognized in CUPS on another computer? Or, how do I use avahi to
> ssh/sftp into another computer? Or to browse a webpage on another
> computer (either something like webmin or one of the other websites  
> that
> show up in the 'Wide area' section of avahi-discover)?
>
> ~    I apologize for the ultimate newbieness of the question, but
> haven't been able to find a straightforward answer by googling or
> looking at avahi.org

Generally speaking, Avahi is used more directly by developers of  
applications and desktop software to integrate this functionality.

While some ability to use Avahi directly (by creating static service  
advertisements, and using the command line tools to browse for  
services, as well as some of our more complete examples) - it is best  
actually used inside the context of other programs that already added  
Avahi support.

There is a list of such applications here:
http://avahi.org/wiki/Avah4users#SoftwareMakinguseofAvahi


For advertising your printer, there is some patches available now in  
CUPS for Bonjour which can be used with our bonjour (dns_sd)  
compatibility wrapper.  It is also possible to do this manually but  
that is quite difficult.

For browsing web-sites, there is support in epiphany on GNOME, and  
there is the "Service Discovery Applet", as well as the "avahi- 
bookmarks" tool/example included with Avahi.

Generally - you are best using some directly supported programs.



Support may or may not be included in your desktop of choice for any  
or all of the above.

Regards,
Trent