my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

brazzmonkey · 2009-01-27 22:07:55

Hello there,
I have an old HP LaserJet 4L at home. It used to work fine, but recently I noticed it would no longer work.
I tried to re-add it in CUPS (using web GUI), but I don't seem to hace the option to set up a parallel port printer.

I'm using latest kernel and latest CUPS from repos, lp and parport and parport_pc modules are loaded.

Any idea what's wrong?

kjon · 2009-01-27 23:06:35

What do you mean? When you say 'it used to work fine', do you mean that you upgraded cups and it stopped working?. Because if is that the case, you might want to run cups-genppdupdate and re-check if cups works. If it isn't that, I really don't know. Maybe is time to have a look at openprinting DB. Here @ http://www.openprinting.org/printer_list.cgi

Edit:

I checked openprinting site URL: http://www.openprinting.org/show_printe … aserJet_4L and it says that your printer is perfectly supported. You might want to install ljet4, or probably HPLIP.

Last edited by kjon (2009-01-27 23:09:55)

dschrute · 2009-01-28 02:22:19

I've seen some issues with Udev and permissions on parallel ports. Maybe CUPS doesn't have rights to access the port...

brazzmonkey · 2009-01-28 21:17:02

@kjon
yes, it used to work fine, CUPS have been updated in the meantime. I don't use my printer very often though, so this might be related to a newer CUPS or anything else. I do use HPLIP, this is not a driver issue, this is something related to parallel port detection, or (more likely?) permissions: my parallel port is active (I have a /dev/lp0 for instance), but CUPS doesn't offer the option of a parallel port connected printer.

@dschrute
how can I figure this out ?

dschrute · 2009-01-29 00:55:11

how can I figure this out ?

First check the permissions on the device - ls -l /dev/lp0 ( or whatever device it actually is ). the lp group needs to be owner. I'd also go back through all the steps in the wiki :
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/CUPS

kjon · 2009-01-29 01:23:42

that's right. If it is a permission issue, just ensure you belong to the proper groups (usually lp, for printing.)

brazzmonkey · 2009-01-29 09:22:05

Hopefully I'll have time to check that tonight.
Why would this setting have changed anyway ?

This printer is connected to a PC that's mainly used as a printing server. Printer is "published" so any local computer can see it (and use it...).

How should I configure permissions in this case ? Anyone who uses the printer isn't actually logged into the printing server...

kjon · 2009-01-29 11:58:23

probably it's due an udev upgrade. The lazy way to set permissions would be chmod 666 /dev/lp0 and check if your printer works. If it does, then create a tiny udev rule to make that change permanent.

/etc/udev/rules.d/goddamned_parallel_port.rules

KERNEL=="lp%n", MODE:="0660", GROUP:="lp"

I hope it helps.

p.s. If you don't want to reboot to apply the changes, you need to reload the rules. IIRC this is done through 'udevadm --command reload_rules' (or something like that).

Last edited by kjon (2009-01-29 11:59:51)

brazzmonkey · 2009-01-29 20:17:00

it does not seem to be permission-related : i Iget

# ls -l lp0
crw-rw---- 1 root lp 6, 0 Jan 29 21:07 lp0

# chmod 666 /dev/lp0
# ls -l lp0
crw-rw-rw- 1 root lp 6, 0 Jan 29 21:07 lp0

and CUPS remains parallel port unfriendly...

kjon · 2009-01-29 21:21:55

what about posting (on a pastebin, of course) your dmesg?. It's very weird, 'cause if you don't have any permission issues, and cups is HP friendly... I don't know what's going wrong.

Last edited by kjon (2009-01-29 21:23:33)

michaelks · 2009-01-29 22:03:00

I ran into some problems trying to make my epson 300 work. To begin with, i had 'cupsd' in the daemon section of /etc/rc.conf and for some reason, there it's supposed to be just 'cups' (but to run from command line, then it's cupsd). Once that was running, it would see my printer (localhost:631) but i couldn't print anything. So i did 'pacman -Ss cups' and installed everything that popped up. Then the printer worked. I suspect i was missing ghostscript, one of the dependencies that got installed.

kjon · 2009-01-30 00:07:15

The problem here is different. He can't install his printer due to cups is unable to find it. If it were a usb printer I might think is a firmware issue, but is parallel.

michaelks · 2009-01-30 00:39:04

Maybe this is stupid, but is the printer turned on ???

kjon · 2009-01-30 00:55:14

Ask him. My two printers are working properly here .

dschrute · 2009-01-30 01:23:35

I just did a little test...
I loaded the lp, parport and parport_pc modules per the wiki CUPS entry. I went to the CUPS Webadmin page, and went through the motions of adding a dummy printer. When at the section to choose the device /dev/lp0 was an available option ( even though nothing is attached to it ).
I then removed the modules via rmmod, and restarted the process to add a printer via the CUPS web admin. This time the LP device was *not* an option...

So I would try various combinations of loading/unloading the modules, and possibly restarting CUPS. Probably unload the modules first, stop CUPS, (re)load the modules, then restart CUPS.
Should only take a couple minutes and who knows...Maybe it's just the order things are getting started/loaded.

Last edited by dschrute (2009-01-30 01:24:54)

brazzmonkey · 2009-01-30 22:21:16

michaelks wrote:

Maybe this is stupid, but is the printer turned on ???

yes, it sure is.

dschrute wrote:

When at the section to choose the device /dev/lp0 was an available option ( even though nothing is attached to it ).

I guess you meant "available", not "unavailable"?
If I understand right, you mean parallel port is not an option in CUPS once you unload lp, parport , and parport_pc? That makes sense...
But I do have those modules loaded, so parallel should be available as an option in CUPS. I'll try to fiddle with those modules tomorrow though, in case it helps...

I'll post my dmesg as well.

Thanks for trying to help.

brazzmonkey · 2009-02-05 21:16:41

Here's some news. I did:

pacman -Rd cups libcups
rm -r /etc/cups
pacman -S cups libcups

Then I restarted CUPS and re-add my printer. LPT#1 was available as an option.

But then I tried to print a test page, but to no avail (I got a "printer busy, will retry in 30 seconds" message). I tried to modify my printer configuration using CUPS web interface, and I discovered that once again LPT#1 was unavaible.

This really is driving me crazy.

Last edited by brazzmonkey (2009-02-05 21:38:21)

brazzmonkey · 2009-02-05 22:29:58

Stupid of me...

My daughter must have played with the printer cable: it was _slightly_ disconnected on the printer side and I didn't noticed because it's hidden by some some sort of plastic lid.

Everything is in order now, except I feel somewhat ashamed...

Sorry guys. Thank you for having tried to help me.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-01-27 22:07:55

my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#2 2009-01-27 23:06:35

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#3 2009-01-28 02:22:19

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#4 2009-01-28 21:17:02

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#5 2009-01-29 00:55:11

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#6 2009-01-29 01:23:42

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#7 2009-01-29 09:22:05

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#8 2009-01-29 11:58:23

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#9 2009-01-29 20:17:00

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#10 2009-01-29 21:21:55

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#11 2009-01-29 22:03:00

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#12 2009-01-30 00:07:15

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#13 2009-01-30 00:39:04

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#14 2009-01-30 00:55:14

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#15 2009-01-30 01:23:35

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#16 2009-01-30 22:21:16

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#17 2009-02-05 21:16:41

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

#18 2009-02-05 22:29:58

Re: my legacy parallel port printer no longer works with CUPS

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