CUPS vs. apsfilter--newbie setup problems

[Andrew L. Gould]

On Friday 19 September 2003 10:39 am, Jesse Sheidlower wrote:
> I'm trying to get my 4.8-running laptop hooked up to
> some printers, and I'm having trouble getting it configured
> with either CUPS or apsfilter (as someone here had recommended).
> I've tried to look over the docs, and search through here, but
> am still stumped for what I'm supposed to be doing.
>
> I'm also not clear on why these systems don't interoperate, or,
> rather, why an entry in /etc/printcap generated from apsfilter
> doesn't show up in CUPS. It would be nice if you could use
> these together.
>
> First, I was able to configure printing on a local USB printer
> with each system, though apsfilter has a vastly greater number
> of drivers available. Is there a way to get CUPS to read these
> drivers, or to separately install ones that it can handle?
>
> I'm not able to get either one to work with a networked printer.
> With CUPS, I can get it to the point where I can print a test
> page, by choosing the device "AppSocket/HP Jet Direct" (though
> it's not a Jet Direct printer, just a regular TCP/IP interface) and
> using a device URI of socket://1.2.3.4:9100/ , but I
> can't get anything else to print on this printer. I wasn't able
> to get it to print even a test page by using any lpd combination
> I could come up with.
>
> With apsfilter, I can't get it set up at all; anything I try
> gives "lpr: unable to print file: client-error-not-found"
> when I try to do a test page.
>
> Assuming I ever do manage to get this configured, is there a
> way to choose printers from within apps? In Mozilla, even with
> several (dummy) printers entered, the only option for "Printer"
> is PostScript/Default, and from, say, Emacs, there's just the
> various print options. Do I have to choose this from the
> command line outside of the apps?
>
> Thanks very much.
>
> Jesse Sheidlower

This may sound like a dumb question, but did you start the printing service 
'lpd'?  The default installation of FreeBSD does not start this service.