Help, print jobs not printing.

[jlancton]

I am working on a Dell server running SCO Unix 5.0. There is a parallel printer connected directly to the server. The printer broke, and was down/disconnected for approx 2 wks. When the printer was repaired and re-connected, nothing printed. I checked the queue and cancelled all the old jobs, but still nothing will print. LPSTAT shows the print job and process id, but nothing happens. I tried stopping and starting the lp service, through sysadmsh, still nothing. I don't know enough Unix to go any further with troubleshooting, and was hoping someone could point me where else to look. I know on the Wintel side, sometimes the actual file in the queue dir gets stuck and you can manually delete that to get things going again, don't know if or where to find such in Unix.

 

[edfair]

Verify parallel operation with a win/dos machine.
Disable/enable the printer. Look at the hw report during boot or at the end of /usr/adm/messages to see if anything reports bad.
Parallel could have fried, but more likely has been disabled somehow.
lpstat should show enabled and accepting. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[jlancton]

Thanks for the fast reply. Cable/printer tested on Win machine and printed fine. No errors listed in messages, parallel port shows up in hw config. I did the enable, accept, etc but still get same result. lpstat shows enabled since <date> but doesn't say 'accepting'. Is that significant?

-Jeff

 

[edfair]

Should note that it is accepting. Have never found one not accepting that would work, but also have never seen one that would take the print job without it working too. May be a reporting error.
Try cat /etc/default/tar > /dev/lp0 to see if this short file will print. as root of course and the assumption is that the lp is unit 0. If it does, then lpservice problem, not hardware.
How about taking the machine down, and rebooting to DOS with a floppy. then dir > prn. This is about a 3 minute check.
When you cancelled the print jobs, did you cancel , or remove the files. Jobs are actually 2 files and leaving 1 might confuse the service. cancel gets both in normal operation. Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[jlancton]

Will try the DOS test after closing, but did the cat ... got nothing on printer, in fact, didn't get prompt back, just blinking cursor. Machine isn't hung, I can type, just doesn't do anything, and no prompt...

 

[jlancton]

Okay, logged in remotely and killed the cat process, got the prompt back on the server. ran lpd stop, lpshut, lpd start, lpsched. LPstat shows printer accepting requests. Still no printing. Pending DOS test, I'm thinking fried port. Hopefully Dell won't hassle sending a board.

Thanks for all your help, I really appreciate it.

-Jeff

 

[edfair]

Rather than M/B replacement, kill it in bios , and add an ISA parallel card.
And why log in remotely? You have 12 screens on the console. [ALT]+[Fx] Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[jlancton]

DOS test failed too.

If it was out of warraty I would've gone the isa card route, but they had 4 hr response, so m/b will be here tomorrow along with tech to do the job. As for the logging in remotely, that was the only way I knew of; my experience is primarily Wintel.

Once again, thanks so much for your help, I really appreciate it. It confirmed the h/w problem with the port, and based on the troubleshooting I had already done plus what you recommended, Dell agreed it was h/w and dispatched the part.

Thanks again,

-Jeff