lpr

[Sam Clippinger]

On Mon, 6 Dec 1999, Lowell "Nancy Premer" wrote:
> Folks,
>     At school, I'm trying to set up a local printer on a
> 486 that we got from a gov't donation. Running RH5.2, I
> used printtool to write the printcap file, and only /dev
> /lp1 was detected. Now when I send a test page from print-
> tool, he says "can't write file /dev/lp1; file busy". Back
>  at the command line, I send a job to lpr and get "lpr:
> connect:no such file or directory.jobs queued but cannot 
> start daemon." Immediately after this message, lpq yields 
> "lp is ready and printing". In /dev, lp0,1,&2 are present;
> in var/spool/lpd/lp, lp.lock says 517.
>     Any ideas?

lpd's behavior is largely dictated by the contents of the /etc/printcap file,
the /etc/hosts.equiv file and the /var/spool/lpd directory.  If you could
post the contents of your /etc/printcap file, that would help tremendously.

>From the error you are describing, it sounds (to me) as though lpd is
attempting to print to /dev/lp1, but nothing is listening there.  If you
only have one parallel port, your printer is probably on /dev/lp0 and printtool
guessed wrong.  Try running the following command:
        echo TESTING > /dev/lp0
That doesn't include a formfeed, so if you're using a dotmatrix or an inkjet
printer, you should hear it fire up and print one line.  If you're using a
laser printer, you'll need to force a formfeed from its panel.  Regardless of
which type you're using, if it prints "TESTING", the port number is the culprit.
Edit your /etc/printcap file and change the line that reads:
        :lp=/dev/lp1:so that it reads:
        :lp=/dev/lp0:Be very, VERY careful not to change any of the formatting of the file or lpd
will choke.  Empty your printer queue of all of your test documents, restart
lpd and try printing again.

If the above doesn't help, please post your /etc/printcap file and maybe some
other solution will present itself. :)

                                -sam

 Sam Clippinger               For PGP public key (KEY ID: 431C5529), see
samc at silence.org          http://www.micro.com/~samc or http://pgp.ai.mit.edu
=============randomly selected quote===no relevance to the above=============
	"It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, simply 
because there is an infinite amount of space for them to be in.  However, 
not every one of them is inhabited.  Therefore, there must be a finite 
number of inhabited worlds.  Any finite number divided by infinity is as 
near to nothing as makes no odds, so the average population of all the 
planets in the Universe can be said to be zero.  From this it follows 
that the population of the whole Universe is also zero, and that any 
people you may meet from time to time are merely the products of a 
deranged imagination."
             - Douglas Adams, "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe"