[indiana-discuss] A Couple of Newbie Questions

[Dave Miner]

Kevin Monceaux wrote:
> 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.
> 

I'm not aware of any specific problems, but I don't have any parallel 
printers, either.  I'd suggest asking the Printing community list, as 
the experts hang out there.

> 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?

I think you should be using the first choice, as ecpp0 is the device 
node I'd expect, but again, don't have a parallel printer to verify with.

Dave