If Your Printer does not Print

If your printer does not print documents, you can try diagnosing and solving the problem using the following recommendations.

  1. Check if the printer is installed in your system.

    Run Configurator and switch to Printers tab in Printers configuration window to look at the list of available printers. Make sure that your printer is displayed there. If not, please, invoke Add new printer wizard to setup your device.

  2. Check if printer or MFP device connected to parallel port is switched on

    On some modern Linux distributions device connected to parallel port can not be identified "on the fly" when it is switched on. Switch printer or MFP device on before Linux boot.

  3. Check if the printer is started.

    Open Printers configuration and select your device in the printers list. Look at the description in Selected printer pane. If its status contains "(stopped)" string, please, press the Start button. After that normal operation of the printer should be restored. The "stopped" status might be activated when some problems in printing occurred. For instance, this could be an attempt to print document when MFP port is claimed by a scanning application.

  4. Check if MFP port is not busy.

    Since functional components of MFP (printer and scanner) share the same I/O interface (MFP port), the situation of simultaneous access of different "consumer" application to the same MFP port is possible. To avoid possible conflicts, only one of them at a time is allowed to gain control over the device. The other "consumer" will encounter "device busy" response. You should open MFP ports configuration and select the port assigned to your printer. In the Selected port pane you can see if the port is occupied by some other application. If this is the case, you should wait for completion of the current job or should press Release port button, if you are sure that the present owner is not functioning properly.

  5. Check if your application doesn't use special print options such as "-oraw"

    If "-oraw" is specified as command line parameter for printing command, then remove it to print properly. For the Gimp application select "Print" item in the image context menu, then click "Setup Printer" button and edit command line of the printing command.

  6. I can't print when I installed both Linux Print Package (LPP) and Unified Linux Driver on the same machine simultaneously

    Since both Linux Printer Package and Unified Linux Driver make a symbolic link to "lpr" printing command, which is commonly used on Unix clones, it is not recommended to use both package on the same machine. If you still want to use both packages simultaneously, please install the LPP first. If you want to uninstall only one of them, please uninstall both packages and install that one you want to use again.

  7. I encounter error "Cannot open MFP port device file" when printing a document

    Please, avoid changing print job parameters (via SLPR utility, for example) while a print job is in progress. Known versions of CUPS server break the print job whenever print options are changed and then try to restart the job from the beginning. Since Unified Linux Driver locks MFP port while printing, the abrupt termination of the driver keeps the port locked and therefore unavailable for subsequent print jobs. If this situation occured, please, try to release the MFP port.

  8. I can't find file that was specified as file port for printer.

    Please, be aware that current CUPS versions don't allow using the file port by default. In order to install a printer on the file port you need to set FileDevice Yes key in /etc/cups/cupsd.conf configuration file and then restart CUPS server.

  9. I can't print on IPP printer in Suse Linux 9.2.

    Please, be aware that CUPS version distributed with SuSE Linux 9.2 (cups-1.1.21) has a problem with IPP printing. You should use socket printing instead of IPP or install later version of CUPS (cups-1.1.22 or higher).

  10. I cannot print full document when I use color printer on 64-bit Linux OS.

    This problem can be found when you are using earlier version of Ghostscript than 8.52 on 64-bit OS. The problem is reported to bugs.ghostscript.com as 'Ghostscript Bug 688252' and is resolved in AFPL Ghostscript v. 8.52 and above. Users of 64-bit Linux distributions should download latest version of AFPL Ghostscript and install it from source.

  11. Check if your parallel port is switched to ECP mode.

    Make sure whether ECP mode is selected for parallel port of your computer. To do this, please, reboot your computer and open BIOS settings. Printing will not work via parallel port if ECP mode is not set.

  12. Check if SE-Linux is disabled.

    Make sure that SE-Linux (Security Enhanced Linux subsystem) is disabled. If not, disable SE-Linux and reinstall Unified Linux Driver.

  13. Collated, duplexed copies of documents with an odd number of pages are printed incorrectly.

    This problem can be found when you are using earlier version of CUPS than 1.1.20 on printers that did not do their own collated copies. The problem is reported as STR #389 and is resolved in CUPS version 1.1.20. You should install later version of CUPS (cups-1.1.20 or higher).

  14. Pretty print doesn't work.

    Please, be aware that CUPS versions distributed with Fedora Core 6 (cups-1.2.4) and with Fedora Core 7 (cups-1.2.10) have a problem with pretty printing. CUPS component responsible for conversion of text documents into printable format (texttopaps filter) doesn't support prettyprint option. This problem was mentioned in bug comments on Fedora Core Bugs Database. You can type man paps to see the complete list of options the filter supports.

    This problem can also be found on some locales because of bug in texttops filter (CUPS component responsible for conversion of text document into printable format). According to the bug description you should install later version of CUPS (cups-1.2.0 or higher).

  15. I can't print job with end banner.

    Please, be aware that CUPS version distributed with Fedora Core 9 (cups-1.3.7-1.fc9) has a problem with printing end banner. It was reported to Fedora Core Bugs Database and was resolved in cups-1.3.7-8.fc9. You should install later version of CUPS (cups-1.3.7-8.fc9 or higher).

  16. Autoconfiguration feature does not work just after driver installation.

    If you run Fedora 9 Linux and your printer supports autoconfiguration feature, please reboot the computer after driver installation to put autoconfiguration feature into effect.

  17. I can't print multiple copies from Help Viewer of Unified Linux Driver.

    Help Viewer is based on Qt library and uses its printer support functionality for printing help contents. It's known that Qt library of version 4.4.x has a problem with multiple copies printing. This problem was reported to Qt Task Tracker (bug id - 230372) and was resolved in version 4.5.0. If your system contains Qt version 4.4.x, please, install newer Qt library (4.5.0 or higher)

  18. I can't print on a Windows shared printer.

    Please, be aware that SAMBA client distributed with Fedora Core 9 (samba-client-3.2.0-1.pre3.9.fc9) has a problem with printing. It was reported to Fedora Core Bugs Database and was resolved in samba-client-3.2.0-1.rc1.14.fc9. You should install later version of SAMBA client (samba-client-3.2.0-1.rc1.14.fc9 or higher).

  19. Can not turn off printer Duplex function in Ubuntu 9.10.

    Please, be aware that CUPS version distributed with Ubuntu 9.10 (cups-1.4.1-5ubuntu1) has a problem in cpdftocps filter. It is a well-known issue, which was fixed in version 1.4.1-5ubuntu2.2 of Ubuntu CUPS package. You should install fixed CUPS package (cups-1.4.1-5ubuntu2.2 or higher). Security updates repository (karmic-security) already contains fixed package version.

  20. Text doesn't fit into the page (characters are very wide) in Ubuntu 9.10.

    Please, be aware that CUPS version distributed with Ubuntu 9.10 (cups-1.4.1-5ubuntu1) has a problem with text printing. It is a well-known issue, which was fixed in version 1.4.1-5ubuntu2.2 of Ubuntu CUPS package. You should install fixed CUPS package (cups-1.4.1-5ubuntu2.2 or higher). Security updates repository (karmic-security) already contains fixed package version.

  21. I can't print on IPP printer.

    If your printer or MFP is one of the following models:

    you cannot use IPP protocol for network printing because of a known incompatibility of the models with IPP implementation in CUPS. Please, use socket or LPD ports instead to connect to these models.

 

See also:

Configurator

Add new printer