Why do we need Digital Factory and Cura?

[twlum 1]

I have been using UM3s since 2018 and I liked how Cura worked, I liked the groups, I liked seeing all the printers in on spot with all the jobs printing and those waiting to be printed. Now it seems like half of that has been farmed out to Digital Factory and Cura has been cut off at the knees. What am I missing? I am reading they are all in on cloud printing but Cura is on my machine, I'm in the office next to the printers, why am I feeling like I'm having to switch between Cura and Digital Factory for information on the printers sitting in front of me? What am I not seeing?

[jsw 15]

I see them as two separate applications.

 

Cura is the slicer, a stand-alone application that runs on a PC, and Digital Factory is the web-based application that runs on the printer.

[twlum 1]

But it seems like Cura wants to pull in certain Digital Factory settings. It is also duplicating each normally connected printer as a "cloud" printer as well so my list essentially has a full set of duplicates. Some features (camera) are available on the cloud if the "cloud version" is selected, yet you can't tell which on is a "normal connected" printer and which one is a "cloud" printer until you select it and then see the tiny blue and white icon at the corner of the name.

 

I think I will be dropping Digital Factory asap.