USB printer and native BSD printing system
Warren Block
wblock at wonkity.com
Sun Mar 19 00:58:52 UTC 2006
On Sat, 18 Mar 2006, Jose Luis Alarcon Sanchez wrote:
> I have an USB printer at /dev/ulpt0, dmesg say:
>
> ulpt0: Lexmark 730 Series, rev 2.00/1.00, addr 2, iclass 7/1
> ulpt0: using bi-directional mode
I can't find any useful information on that printer online. Maybe it's
very old? Many printers can't understand ASCII data, and it may be one
of them.
> CUPS is not installed and i am trying make printer work with the native
> BSD printing system. This is what have my /etc/printcap file:
>
> lp|local printer:\
> :sh:\
> :lp=/dev/ulpt0:sd=/var/spool/lpd:lf=/var/log/lpd-errs:
>
> And this is 'ls -l /var/spool/lpd'
>
> -rw-rw-r-- 1 root daemon 37 Mar 14 19:55 lock
> -rw-rw-r-- 1 root daemon 25 Mar 14 19:55 status
>
> I don't get printer work. Command 'lp file.txt' don't return any output,
> 'cat file.txt > /dev/ulpt0' don't return any output. Command
> 'cat /var/spool/lpd/status' output is:
>
> lp is ready and printing
>
> and this can indicate the configuration is well done. lpd is run...
>
> I am thinking about if the cause of this problem can be the native BSD
> printing system can't manage USB printers, so my concrete question to
> the list is: Can be used the BSD lpd with USB printers?.
Yes it can. The problem is most likely that the printer can't print
plain ASCII data. Sometimes these printers are called "host-based",
"GDI", or "Winprinters". If it is one of those printers, you need to
find a program that can send the data in a form the printer understands.
http://www.linuxprinting.org doesn't list the Lexmark 730, but it may
use the same codes as one of the other Lexmark printers.
-Warren Block * Rapid City, South Dakota USA
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