[indiana-discuss] A Couple of Newbie Questions

[Kevin Monceaux]

Dave,

On Mon, 14 Jul 2008, Dave Miner wrote:

> You have your choice of the old LP system, or CUPS.  The default is
> still LP, you need to use the print-service command to switch between them.
>
> There's printer auto-detection for the LP system: if your printer were
> USB it would have been automatically detected and you'd have been
> prompted with a dialog at login to add it.  Since it's parallel, the
> auto-detection doesn't happen, and you will need to use the Print
> Manager GUI (System->Administration->Print Manager) or the lpadmin
> command to set it up.
>
> Or use print-service -s cups to switch to CUPS and then use what you're
> used to.

Are there any known problems with printing to parallel printers?  I 
haven't had any luck with either LP or CUPS.  With LP, I set up the 
printer and tried sending a print job to it.  The printer printed the 
banner page.  Then, it's status lights indicated that it had received some 
data, but not the end of the job.  I eventually hit the button that tells 
it to print whatever is in it's buffer.  It printed about the top half 
inch or so of the page I sent to it, and that was it.  Subsequent attempts 
to send jobs to it wouldn't print anything.  I switched to CUPS, and got 
basically the same results.  I printed a test page from CUPS.  The top 
inch or so of the test page printed, after I hit the button to force it to 
print, and nothing else.  On subsequent attempts the CUPS web admin 
interface shows "Printer busy; will retry in 30 seconds..."  I've even 
tried completely resetting the printer and stopping/starting it via the 
CUPS interface to no avail.  This same printer printed find via CUPS from 
both Linux and FreeBSD.

One other Solaris/CUPS related question.  When I get to the device 
selection page in the CUPS web interface, it lists for parallel ports:

Sun IEEE-1284 Parallel Port #1
Sun IEEE-1284 Parallel Port #1(CANNON)
Sun IEEE-1284 Parallel Port #1(EPSON)
PC Parallel Port #2
PC Parallel Port #2(CANNON)
PC Parallel Port #2(EPSON)

My PC only has one parallel port.  If use the Sun IEEE-1284 Parallel Port 
#1, the CUPS Printers page shows the device as parallel:/dev/ecpp0.  If I 
try the PC Parallel Port #2, it shows parallel:/dev/lp1.  Which one should 
I use?



Kevin
http://www.RawFedDogs.net
http://www.WacoAgilityGroup.org
Bruceville, TX

Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
Longum iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla!!!