Re: [tlug] "Interesting" printing issue.

[Godwin Stewart <gstewart@example.com>]

On Fri, 6 Aug 2004 20:50:43 +0900, Edward Wright <edw@example.com> wrote:

> I have a very similar setup - the only significant difference that I see
> is that I am running the filter on the server rather that the client - I
> don't see why that should make any difference, though.

I had thought of that, but I also have a very compelling reason to maintain
the processing client-side. The server is a P-II/266 with 128MB of RAM. The
clients are a P-III/550 and a P-III/500 with 384MB and 512MB of RAM
respectively. Guess which machines are better at ripping PostScript data :)

> > For every print job, lpd mails off not one, but THREE identical mails...
>
> I DON'T know what that means :) but it sounds like the job is trying to
> print 3 times (the default) and sending an email each time. Does lpd think
> it's printing from STDIN (a pipe?) rather than the file in the spool dir?

If the error message is anything to go by, then yes, it does think it's
printing from STDIN. Then again, this may be technically correct since the
spool is on the client, and lpr on the client machine is passing processed
data to lpd on the server. And yet, lpd on the server is still buffering the
processed data somewhere before stuffing it through /dev/lp0.

> Does the same thing happen if you print locally on the server?
> Does it make any difference if you use a subdirectory of
> /var/spool/lpd as a spool for lp? (e.g. /var/spool/lpd/lp)

I'll try these and report back.

> You've probably tried these, but just in case:
> 
> make sure all files & directories are correctly setup on
> 	both client and server (run "checkpc -f" a couple of times)

It's "LPR" running on the server, not "LPRng". There is no checkpc. I am
about to go through the permissions etc manually, though.

> HUP lpd after any config changes

Yep. Been caught out by that before :)

"# lpc reread" or "# lpc restart all" depending on the version does the job
too.

> read the status files in the spool directories on both client and server
> 	for clues

BTDTGTTS :)

-- 
G. Stewart   --   gstewart@example.com -- gstewart@example.com
Registered Linux user #284683 (Slackware 9.0, Linux 2.6.7-em8300)
--------------------------------------------------------------
Don't be irreplaceable. If you can't be replaced, you
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