Print multiple content forms with lpadmin

Overview

Setting up a print server that can handle multiple forms of content doesn't seem like a difficult task-it's actually not difficult, just consider Third-party software. When you decide to do it with only lpadmin, the difficulty comes. UNIX Systems management expert Errol Fouquet and Robert Krumm Use this article to guide you through a validated method of setting up a print server that can successfully process plain text, PostScript, printable binary (PCL, RTL) and other content forms of the file.

When a UNIX system administrator contracts with an employer, the employer requires that one of the services that they provide to the customer be technical support for printing and drawing. A special customer, his print environment is quite complex, consisting of eight 36-inch HP plotters, a 24-inch HP plotter, about 20 hp DeskJet 1600c plotters, and about 20 hp 3si/4si/5si printers. All devices run LPD and have PostScript drivers that are accessed as network printers using the TCP/IP protocol. The printer network card has half of HP JetDirect and Xcd Xjet cards.

We run Zeh Graphic Systems's zps drawing software on a sun Ultra Enterprise 450 to support several applications that output multiple graphics formats. We also support the LPD commands issued from several other applications, as well as the printing of users originating from Netscape applications, and the print commands issued by the user at the command line. In our environment, print customers are almost all sun's servers and workstations, with a number of nearly 200. We also have a Windows NT server that runs Citrix WinFrame and is also a print customer.

Applications that Zeh software drawings use the Ultra 450 as a buffer pool, except that all other print requests are delivered directly from the customer to the network printer. Functionally, this works well enough to print all the forms of content we need, including text, PostScript, and printable binaries (PCL and RTL). The problem is that this setting brings a management nightmare. Large and unacceptable binary files, such as GIF or JPEG, often waste a lot of paper, and we don't have a simple and effective way to determine where the print requests are issued. All we know is that one workstation or server in the building is sending harmful work tasks to the printer. Unfortunately, the title page is not an option because users don't want to waste paper (irony, haha?). ）。

We've tried to write a shell script that scans all the machines in the building and reports the behavior to a particular printer. With this information, we can execute the cancel command. But this method is unusually slow and inefficient.

The customer's own technical strategy shows that the solution is to write a dozen  for the UNIX environment. Jin 鞒 , the old-waved -------the ┫ Songhu of Qiaoqi a duo, , 罱 , 蒘 print paranet (Noman network Management Network operations Management) evaluation also believes that a print server program should be developed to meet customer needs.

We know that a print server is the right choice. If we can set it up, all print requests can be managed from a single machine, which can greatly simplify the process. But it's very difficult and it's hard for us to accept.

Try one: Trial and error

Initially, we wanted to establish a standard Solaris print buffer. We specified a test machine as a test print server, named nolsn099 (Ultra 1, which runs Solaris 2.6), and started several tests. The printer that was started to test is an HP 1600c, called no1316p in the NIS/DNS environment.

For each server setting, the client uses the command line lpadmin-p no1316p-s nolsn099!no1316p settings to access the printer/plotter.

Server Setup 1:

Lpadmin-p no1316p-o protocol=bsd,dest=no1316p-t PS \

-I postscript-v/dev/null-i/usr/lib/lp/model/netstandard

Results: The client can print PostScript and binary files, but the text file will have stair effects.

Server Setup 2:

Lpadmin-p no1316p-o protocol=bsd,dest=no1316p-t unknown \

-I any-v/dev/null-i/usr/lib/lp/model/netstandard

As a result, the client can print a text file, but PostScript and binary files are printed as garbage.