Comment 5 for bug 368977

I believe the problem has to do with file permissions. It seems like you can set the configuration as an ordinary user and have it persist even through logout and re-login, but rebooting the machine destroys the saved configuration. For the moment I've "fixed" the problem by using kmenuedit to require root permissions for the "Printer Configuration" app. That approach created configuration files that persisted through rebooting.

In addition a small announcement box flashes up on the screen when you first save as an ordinary user, but it appears for only an instant so I can't tell what it says. I'm guessing it's reporting an error. I also get errors like these upon launch in .xsession-errors:

kcmshell(3619) KServiceFactory::findServiceByDesktopPath: "findServiceByDesktopPath: kcm-scpk.desktop not found"

(kcm-scpk is the Python script that executes when you run Printer Configuration.)

I've only recently come to Ubuntu from RedHat/Fedora and was surprised not to be required to have root privileges when configuring printers. As an ordinary user I should only be able to write to $HOME and /tmp. I don't see any new files in those places when I run the Printer Configuration utility under my ordinary username.

I'm going to file a bug under system-config-printer-kde since I think the problem concerns how the KDE application works that may not occur with GNOME Ubuntu.