Printer Changes on Itanium?

[Kenneth Penland]

After migrating application programs written in Accell (Unify) from an HP-UX
V11.11 PA RISC chip based set operating system to a HP-UX V11.23 itanium chip
set based operating system, print jobs from a number of printers are coming
out but not with correct format like it used to prior to migration. Currently
one of the printers we are using is an HP Laser Jet 1800 DN.

Questions are:
1. Does the HP-UX Itanium chip support the Laser Jet 1800 DN model printer?
2. Are there any known configuration changes that must be made on the printer
for a Itanium chip based HP-UX operating system?
3. Any other suggestions?

Thanks for your assistance!

[Vince Pooley]

Your issue is more likely related to your upgrade from 11.11 to 11.23 rather than the change of architecture.
How did you migrate your printers?
Did you export them from your 11.11 system with something like 'lpmgr'?

[TTr]

We need more details here but it does not look like a printer problem. The only thing you can check is if the model script that was used to set up the printer queue for your printer in the new server is the same as the one in the old server.
You need to look into how the print-outs are generated and by what programs and how they are passed to the HP-UX printer queue. The printer queues are setup and processed the same way between risc and ia64 servers and their content is not altered.
It is most likely a formatting issue of the printed material with one of the applications. Some more details are needed.

[Kenneth Penland]

yes, we migrated the printer issue over by using lpmgr -S to save the info, then -R to restore on the new system.

[Vince Pooley]

I agree with TTr, you should start your investigations at the application level.

[Kenneth Penland]

problem I am runnning into with that is the application folks claim that "nothing has changed on their end". so I either need to change something on the OS side or provide them proof that something is different between the OS versions to where they will need to change their code.

[Vince Pooley]

I did the same upgrade path about a year ago and migrated the printers with lpmgr as you did but did not get any formatting differences on the new server's queues.

What has changed about the formatting?
For example, are the margins different? Is the text a different size or font?

Have you tested printing a text file on each system with lp to see if they're the same? Are the results the same on different printers?

I would take this approach to try to find any differences away from the application, if printouts from the application are the only prints affected then it would strongly suggest that the application or it's configuration has indeed changed.

[Michael Steele_2]

Hi

Why don't you use the HPPI? The HP-UX printer diagnostic and configuration utility?

Type in

hppi
Select dianostics
Have a file created before starting and use it for testing with? (* Your name, phone number, call me if you received this *)

Its all menu driven. Just type in the printer's name or select it from the drop down menu.

[TTr]

> the application folks claim that "nothing has changed on their end"

That may be true too but what I was asking is if the application that does the printing might behave differently in 11.23ia than it did before. You still need to tell us what exactly the application creates as far as a document, a form and how it submits it to the UNIX spooler. Do you configure the app with an "lp" command or do you configure it with a printer name alone. And what exactly is the issue with the printout? Sometimes applications use their own fonts and graphics etc, were those migrated from the old environment? Or new ones provided in the new environment? If that 's what happened maybe the document needs to be adjusted in the new OS.