Re: [cups] Guidance on troubleshooting printing to USB-connected brother laser printer

On Tue, Sep 29, 2020 at 11:49 AM Johannes Meixner <[email protected]> wrote:

>
> Hello,
>
> On 2020-09-28 17:35, Banibrata Dutta wrote:
> > On Mon, Sep 28, 2020 at 6:49 PM Brian Potkin wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> Both Firefox and Evince convert this 4-page PDF into another PDF
> >> before
> >> sending to the printing system. You can choose to troubleshoot using
> >> this PDF (it will be one of the d* files) or the original 4-page PDF
> >> or
> >> both.
> >>
> >> You will have a PPD for the printer in /etc/cups/ppd.
> >
> > Is there a way to know the right PPD file definitely ?
>
> The PPD that you currently use for your printer in the /etc/cups/ppd
> directory is named as your print queue for your printer is named.
> This is the PPD that needs to be tested via cupsfilter how the
> generic filtering (except the printer specific filtering) works.
>
> >> Execute
> >>
> >>  sudo cupsfilter -p PPD_in_/etc/cups/ppd -m
> >> application/vnd.cups-postscript your4-pagePDF > out.ps 2>log
> >>
> >> This tests the non-vendor part of the filtering system. View out.ps.
> >
> > View out.ps to check everything is visually in order ?
>

Done. The PPD is called  /etc/cups/ppd/Brother-HL-L2320D-series.ppd.
The out.ps looks fine. Also it confirms what I was hoping to be true, i.e.
the out.ps all pages are same size, some of the odd-sized (squarish) pages
have been trimmed down widthwise to fit into the A4 sized frame, but
barring that, it looks like something close to the PDF.

Cf. the section
> "Test if what the application had submitted to CUPS seems to be correct"
> in
> https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:How_to_Report_a_Printing_Issue
> how to use Ghostscript to view a PostScript or PDF file
> plus getting Ghostscript (error) messages in case of issues.
>

From the above link my first observation is that CUPS doesn't seem to be
removing the c* and d* files from print spool dir. For example here is what
I see:
root@shivalik:/var/spool/cups# ls -l
total 2604
-rw------- 1 root lp    1126 Sep 29 18:57 c00024
-rw------- 1 root lp    1126 Sep 29 21:40 c00025
-rw-r----- 1 root lp 1326607 Sep 29 18:57 d00024-001
-rw-r----- 1 root lp 1326607 Sep 29 21:39 d00025-001
even though the CUPS web-management dashboard (localhost:631) job status
for the printer shows both jobs as "completed". I don't seem to even need
to CUPS disable !

Having copied one of the d* files to tmp, I see this:
root@shivalik:/var/spool/cups# file /tmp/print-job-data.save
/tmp/print-job-data.save: PostScript document text conforming DSC level
3.0, Level 2

Launching Ghostscript, the Windows with 1 page shows up properly, and I see
this in terminal:
root@shivalik:/var/spool/cups# gs -r50 -sPAPERSIZE=a4 -dFIXEDMEDIA
/tmp/print-job-data.save
GPL Ghostscript 9.50 (2019-10-15)
Copyright (C) 2019 Artifex Software, Inc.  All rights reserved.
This software is supplied under the GNU AGPLv3 and comes with NO WARRANTY:
see the file COPYING for details.
Loading NimbusRoman-Regular font from
/usr/share/ghostscript/9.50/Resource/Font/NimbusRoman-Regular... 4379960
2871268 6472768 5156952 1 done.
>>showpage, press <return> to continue<<

and also,

root@shivalik:/var/spool/cups# gs -r50 -dNOPAUSE -dBATCH -sDEVICE=nullpage
/tmp/print-job-data.save
GPL Ghostscript 9.50 (2019-10-15)
Copyright (C) 2019 Artifex Software, Inc.  All rights reserved.
This software is supplied under the GNU AGPLv3 and comes with NO WARRANTY:
see the file COPYING for details.
Loading NimbusRoman-Regular font from
/usr/share/ghostscript/9.50/Resource/Font/NimbusRoman-Regular... 4397968
2884912 3358176 2038398 1 done.

From the above, doesn't look like (to my eyes) that there is any issue with
the generated .ps file. What should be my next steps ?

When the print is fired, I see visual activity in the printer i.e. the
'Ready LED' which was glowing steady bit dimly-lit until now, becoming
bright and start flashing.
As per printer manufacturer (or perhaps another post I read), this is
indication of exchange of data/control with host computer. However, the
drum & rollers don't whirr up (as they do in the case that printer seems to
accept a print job and print something).

> However, I do have one more basic question. If every page of the PDF
> > are of
> > different size (perhaps even non-standard page sizes), is CUPS filter
> > able
> > to convert them all into desired page-size (such as - say A4 or Letter)
> > ?
>
> You will see that by viewing out.ps what the outcome is
> in your particular case.
>
> Additionally you may have a look at the section
> "It always helps to simulate printout on a virtual generic PostScript
> printer"
> in
> https://en.opensuse.org/SDB:How_to_Report_a_Printing_Issue
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