Strange, seems to open ok for me.  maybe there's a missing dependency somewhere.

what does running manually:

kcmshell4 system-config-printer-kde

or 

kdesu kcmshell4 system-config-printer-kde

do? (work ok?  same error?  something else?)

while we're at it,

$ rpm -q system-config-printer-kde system-config-printer-libs PyKDE4 PyQt4


please.

This error typically shows up when one of the Python modules imported in system-config-printer-kde is missing.

kcmshell4 system-config-printer-kde

Same window and the following output in the terminal (run as regular user):

kcmshell(2095)/kdecore (KSycoca) KSycocaPrivate::openDatabase: Trying to open ksycoca from "/var/tmp/kdecache-yarly/ksycoca4"
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCMultiDialog) KCMultiDialog::addModule: "Printer Configuration"
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCModuleProxy) KCModuleProxyPrivate::loadModule: Module not already loaded, loading module  "Printer Configuration"  from library  "kpythonpluginfactory"  using symbol  "kpythonpluginfactory"
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::KPythonPluginFactory: KPythonPluginFactory::KPythonPluginFactory()
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::initialize: Initializing Python interpreter.
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::initialize: Succesfully initialized Python interpreter.
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: KPythonPluginFactory::create iface:  KCModule
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: keyword to be used for finding the plugin code:  "system-config-printer-kde/system-config-printer-kde.py"
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: Path to plugin code is:  "/usr/share/kde4/apps/system-config-printer-kde/system-config-printer-kde.py"
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin): Error while running factory function for Python plugin:  "system-config-printer-kde/system-config-printer-kde.py" 
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<string>", line 18, in kpythonpluginfactory_bridge
  File "/usr/share/kde4/apps/system-config-printer-kde/system-config-printer-kde.py", line 4397, in CreatePlugin
    kcm = u.makeui(component_data, widget_parent)
  File "/usr/share/kde4/apps/system-config-printer-kde/system-config-printer-kde.py", line 172, in makeui
    encryption=encryption)
  File "/usr/share/kde4/apps/system-config-printer-kde/authconn.py", line 168, in __init__
    self._connect ()
  File "/usr/share/kde4/apps/system-config-printer-kde/authconn.py", line 200, in _connect
    encryption=self._encryption)
RuntimeError: failed to connect to server
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: KPythonPluginFactory::create iface:  KCModule
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: keyword to be used for finding the plugin code:  ""
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin) KPythonPluginFactory::create: Path to plugin code is:  "/home/yarly/.kde/share/apps/"
kcmshell(2095)/python (plugin): Failed to import module 
kcmshell(2095)/kcontrol KCModuleLoader::loadModule: This module has no valid entry symbol at all. The reason could be that it's still using K_EXPORT_COMPONENT_FACTORY with a custom X-KDE-FactoryName which is not supported anymore 
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCMultiDialog) KCMultiDialog::addModule: adding KCM  "Printer Configuration"  at the top level
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCMultiDialog) KCMultiDialogPrivate::_k_slotCurrentPageChanged:
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCMultiDialog) KCMultiDialogPrivate::_k_clientChanged:
kcmshell(2095)/kutils (KCMultiDialog) KCMultiDialogPrivate::_k_clientChanged:


Now

rpm -q system-config-printer-kde system-config-printer-libs PyKDE4 PyQt4

system-config-printer-kde-4.7.3-1.fc16.x86_64
system-config-printer-libs-1.3.7-2.fc16.x86_64
PyKDE4-4.7.3-1.fc16.1.x86_64
PyQt4-4.8.6-1.fc16.x86_64

So the printer config GUI should work in theory, but in practice it doesn't.

Any news on this? I have some free time these days, so can aid in debugging this issue further.

Is the cups service running?

This is not clear. As in, the CUPS package is installed (the package is called "cups"), there are SysV service entries in /etc/ (such as K10cups), BUT when I do

systemctl --type=service --all

there is no CUPS in the listing. There is no CUPS process in the list of the running processes either. Hope this answers your question.

Are there any further debugging steps possible? I'd like to help in fixing this issue.

ok, no running cups makes it hard to configure a printer ... for cups.

try,  (as root):
systemctl start cups.service

Does that make it work?

OK. I've found it, kinda.

With the CUPS service started, the configuration window appears just fine. Without the CUPS service running, there is this error.

I think this should be filed against KDE now? Because it looks like undefined behavior of the Printer KCM.

You can't print without CUPS. There's no bug here.

There is a bug. This window displays an error of unknown kind ("Factory? Module? Provides? not all users are coders, and I'm a coder but I don;t know Python), whereas it should say "No CUPS running. Make sure CUPS is launched and try again".

This is clearly not a Fedora bug but an upstream one. So you are right in that you've have closed it, but I'll change the resolution to "Upstream" and file this bug against KDE.