OT:UNIX printer question

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Wed, Jan 19, 2005 at 03:18:41PM -0500, Jean-Pierre A. Radley wrote:
> Courtney propounded (on Wed, Jan 19, 2005 at 02:35:43PM -0500):
> | Guys AND Gals
> | 
> | We just a runaway job that was printing page after page...I canceled some
> | jobs thru UNIX with the cancel command (after doing lpstat) and realized
> | that the best way was to use scoadmin.  After going thru all the jobs (i
> | removed the paper so I wouldnt waste it), there was one job still in
> | queue...I turned printer on and off and put back the paper...now the problem
> | is there are jobs waiting behind this one job but I cannot remove it...tried
> | with the cancel command and got this
> | 
> | UX:cancel: WARNING: Request "enroll-92012" is done.
> |             TO FIX: It is too late to do anything with it
> | 
> 
> Try to stop then restart the lp spooler.
> 
> Did you try brute force, e.g., rm /usr/spool/lp/temp/92012* ?

There are two customary culprits in this sort of "I can't stop the printer"
problem:

1) The physical buffer either on or next to the printer.

   If your printer has internal buffering, and you're using it on a *nix box,
   and it has a setup menu switch to disable that buffering: turn it off.  It
   will make your life *much* easier.  Oki's usually have a 32KB/One Line
   switch.  If the printer is on a print server of some kind, *it* will
   usually have some buffer.

2) The kernel buffers on the output device.

   Depending on your OS and kernel, I've seen as much as 10 pages buffered up
   inside the kernel where there is absolutely no possible way to clear it
   except bouncing the printer several times or bouncing the machine -- in
   *this* case, of course, perversely enough, having enough buffer on the
   printer is a *feature* rather than the bug it usually is.  You pays your
   50-cent piece, and you takes your cherce.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
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      If you can read this... thank a system adminstrator.  Or two.  --me