printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

fflarex · 2009-03-06 06:28:37

Okay, so I have an HP Photosmart C4180 printer which I cannot for the life of me get to work on my new desktop. The exact same config works on my laptop. One of several things will invariably go wrong. It might:

1. Print only a small initial section of the page, leave the rest blank.
2. Print gibberish.
3. Give an error like "/usr/lib/cups/filter/foomatic-rip failed" and then not recognize the printer at all.
4. Queue the print job indefinitely without any errors, never printing. When this happens it will either say it is still processing or that it is actually printing (though it is not).

The one thing it will never do is print correctly. Also, I can't get it to work in Windows either (again, same Windows setup works on my laptop, although that installation has long since been deleted). I can't figure out why the hardware in my desktop would be an issue. This is a USB printer, and all my other USB devices work perfectly.

I have no idea what to do now. I've googled to no end. I've fiddled with it, recompiled all the related packages, read documentation and deleted my config to start over. I've looked for errors but the only messages I get are no help, although I am admittedly not very good at figuring out which logs to look at or how to get the most useful debug info out of a program.

Even if you don't think you can solve the issue, I'd appreciate any points in the right direction. Please?

Last edited by fflarex (2009-03-06 06:30:03)

brazzmonkey · 2009-03-06 13:10:57

I suppose you use the HPIJS driver, right ?

igster · 2009-03-06 13:34:03

Sounds like you've probably already looked but the CUPS article in the wiki led me through setting up a printer without any problems. http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/CUPS

The first section describes how to troubleshoot CUPS and printing problems.

I've also found a few other posts and links that may help.

http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/mo … eries.html

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=419163

Hope this helps!

fflarex · 2009-03-06 14:25:34

@brazzmonkey: Yes, I am using hpijs.

@igster: Thanks for the links, but unfortunately they didn't really help. I've already gone through the wiki and HP's website, and that thread from the Ubuntu forums seems like a different problem.

basov · 2009-03-06 14:37:36

Had a printing problem myself last week

seems the latest foomatic update caused it to break.
Don't really know what happend though.

reverting back to the previous version of foomatic worked for me.

Nezmer · 2009-03-06 15:01:32

I had this problem (printing the first 4 lines only) . I downgraded the whole printing stack (ffomatic-*,cups,ghostscript...) and It didn't work .

It turned out , even using the --nosave option in pacman didn't clean the /etc/cups directory .
I solved It by 'rm -r /etc/cups' and configuring from scratch . I think pacman should mark the whole /etc/cups dir as backup(Is that possible) or add a post-removal script to clean it .

MilosC · 2009-03-06 20:42:31

I had the same problem, and guess what was wrong? A missing library, that I discovered using ldd command. I'll try to remember what was the name of that library.

skottish · 2009-03-06 20:47:57

Are you using testing? If so there is problem between coreutils 7.1 and libcups. You can downgrade coreutils and printing will come back, or you can rebuild libcups against coreutils. That option does not work properly in all situations. For instance, I can print out of GTK2 just fine, but I can't print out of vim or enscript. My system is fully up to date with testing and I rebuilt libcups. If this is your situation, please vote for this bug:

http://bugs.archlinux.org/task/13623

MilosC · 2009-03-06 20:48:30

Yes, I remembered. Execute command

ldd /usr/bin/hpijs

and check if something is missing. In my case that was package net-snmp.

Last edited by MilosC (2009-03-06 20:49:25)

skottish · 2009-03-06 20:52:40

MilosC wrote:

Yes, I remembered. Execute command
ldd /usr/bin/hpijs
and check if something is missing. In my case that was package net-snmp.

net-snmp was added as a dependency of hplip because of the problem that users were having. Most people with up to date systems should have that package installed.

fflarex · 2009-03-06 21:00:14

I am not missing any libraries according to ldd, nor am I using the testing repo. Also, this is a new installation so I don't have any previous packages cached to revert to. I am going to try deleting my configs again and starting over.

Last edited by fflarex (2009-03-06 21:00:33)

Fingel · 2009-03-06 21:43:58

Had this exact same problem with an HP printer. Baffled me a bit too. You need to install:
net-snmp

Here is the bug report: http://bugs.archlinux.org/task/13294

Hope that fixes it for you.

Nezmer · 2009-03-06 23:50:15

The net-snmp issue is already fixed in the latest packages . It caused CUPS not to work at all unlike the symptoms described in this thread .

I think running CUPS with a clean /etc/cups/ should work .

Last edited by Nezmer (2009-03-06 23:54:57)

fflarex · 2009-03-10 06:03:53

Sorry, I was away from my computer for a few days so I couldn't keep working on this. But I'm back now and the problem's still here. There was another update recently of foomatic, but nothing changed for me. I deleted /etc/cups to start my config over, but that didn't help either. I'm really running short on ideas here...

bernarcher · 2009-03-10 12:58:56

Any insight from the logs in /var/log/cups?
Perhaps post some tail entries of the error.log there, those lines belonging to recent print setup and print attempts.

Last edited by bernarcher (2009-03-10 13:01:35)

ls6678 · 2009-03-16 19:49:38

Hi.

I have a HP Photosmart C6180 All-in-One and downloaded hplip through pacman. Since hplip didn't have de .PPD file needed for my All-on-One I downloaded it from this link: http://www.openprinting.org/show_printe … mart_C6100

The thing is that I have the error "Printer queue setup failed" and asks me to restart CUPS and to try again but it keeps me giving the same error over and over again.

And when it tries to print the test page the terminal returns this errors to:
lpr: Connection refused
error: Print command failed with exit code 256!

Arch Linux

#1 2009-03-06 06:28:37

printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#2 2009-03-06 13:10:57

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#3 2009-03-06 13:34:03

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#4 2009-03-06 14:25:34

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#5 2009-03-06 14:37:36

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#6 2009-03-06 15:01:32

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#7 2009-03-06 20:42:31

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#8 2009-03-06 20:47:57

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#9 2009-03-06 20:48:30

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#10 2009-03-06 20:52:40

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#11 2009-03-06 21:00:14

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#12 2009-03-06 21:43:58

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#13 2009-03-06 23:50:15

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#14 2009-03-10 06:03:53

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#15 2009-03-10 12:58:56

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

#16 2009-03-16 19:49:38

Re: printing doesn't work for some inexplicable reason, completely baffled

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