printing from UNIX to AS400

[gah]

I am trying to send a report from a UNIX box to an AS400 output queue using rlp. I am getting the report on the AS400 output queue but it has garbage at the end. Does anybody know how to send reports to an AS400?

 

[bi]

Is there a reason why you are printing through the AS400? If you have a printer on a network, it isn't too much trouble to be able to print directly from your AIX to the printer.

 

[gah]

Our cooperate office is running the AS400 and the printer is not set up as a network printer (it's attached via twinax cable to the AS400) and our President wants these reports on Blue Bar paper.

 

[bi]

Oh. Naturally. Life would be a lot easier if it were a networked printer.

Well, you know the AS400 has its own language (EBCDIC) so I'm wondering if that is why you are getting the garbage. There are some converters in the bos filesets that might be able to help you. Or, the AS400 may have to be configured to change your ASCII spool file to EBCDIC so it can be printed without garbage. Do you have an AS400 sys admin you can work with there.

 

[gheist]

well a garbage for AS/400 can be created using a dd command eg.
% dd if=greatASCIIreport of=garbageforASfourHUNDRED conv=ebcdic

or conv=ascii for inverse (it does not help with postscript or pcl - they will need to create a passthrough print queue)

 

[gah]

Yes I do, have an AS400 sys adm., and we don't know just what exactly needs to be changed. I am converting the data to EBCDIC before I send it to the AS400.

 

[gheist]

it depends on printer you are using:

(a) lineprinter - you should convert to appropriate EBCDIC or ASCII only once

(b) postscript/pcl/epson/whatever
you chould create an appropriate printout and not convert it further nor add any banners or trailing reports or whatever

 

[avadh]

Hello,
Try setting up nfs on both AIX and AS/400 and then try it.