looking for some general thoughts on the concept
osx and newer sambas send model data in the dnssd entires. this allows
osx to show fitting device icons based on the remote (and CRT icons for
services discovered through other means than dns-sd).
e.g. if you share something from your macbook your imac will show a
macbook/laptop icon instead of a generic computer screen.
meanwhile machines found over SMB1 (and I guess wsdiscovery) are shown
with CRT screens and a BSOD.
this prototype would essentially allow us to have a similar level of polish,
albeit a bit dependent on samba since samba would need to have a suitable model
set. for example tuxedo could set laptop-foobar in their smb.conf and a suitable
icon set on clients could show a laptop or even foobar specific icon instead of the
stock one.
so, if we know the model we'd set
network-server-model-$modelName
e.g.
network-server-model-laptop-foobar
and an icon theme would be able to provide regular icon fallbacks
to theme this.
network-server-model-laptop-foobar
as specific model icon (the foobar type laptop from $vendor)
network-server-model-laptop
as generic model icon if model isn't available
network-server
as generic server icon if the specific ones are not available
on the WSD side we could also give WSD discovered hosts a WSD icon *cough CRT screen* ;)
in point of fact, I am almost certain that I've seen something like _device-info,
albeit much less precise, in one of the device profile SOAP specs. IIRC
on the WSD side we can at least tell apart printers from actual computers, not sure
if that is worth the headache of having to deal with more soap though *shrug*