lp and large files

[Tracey]

N4000
11.X 64 bit
09/01 patches
Printer: HP 8100 series
HP/UX Jet Direct

I have recently started running into a problem with printing larger files. I spooled about 40 files totalling about 65 MB, 1 file which is about 3.5 MB by itself, will either not print, or more likely print half way and stop. I've had one person suggest that it may be my temp space size - currently my /tmp directory is 500 MB. My lp commands do NOT use the -c option, just simply lp -olandscape -oc -otl45

Needless to say the recipients of these reports (accounting department) is not amused. Any help is much appreciated.

Tracey

[Daimian Woznick]

Have you looked at the log files in /var/adm/lp?

[Tracey]

Yes, and no error messags appear in there during the timeframe the reports were printed.

[harry d brown jr]

Tracey,

Do you have a lot of available space on /var?

Are they any other users on the 8100 (printer)??

What kind of print file is it?

Does the 8100 have enough memory to hold the print job. If I remember correctly, I thought the 8100 series has a harddrive in it.

live free or die
harry

[Daimian Woznick]

Are you able to print this big of a file from another system on the network? The problem could also be the network or JetDirect box.

[Tracey]

/var has 1.5 GB left

These printers are only used for printing from the HP boxes, and the files are text files with a few ^L thrown in for page breaks. The specific printer that is currently having the problem would get no more than 30 MB of the files being printed. The remaining 35 MB of files woulbe be split amongst 2 other printers.

The printer I am told has 512 memory. The printers are however in another state so the files would be sent across our WAN (a whopping 256 K connection). According to our corporate keepers of the WAN, there has not been any bandwidth saturations at the times we have been printing (10PM-3AM)

[harry d brown jr]

a 3.5MB file should only take about 4 minutes to arrive at the other side on a 256KB(its) network.

Can you send the files, via ftp to a local server to the printer and have that printer spool the file?

Also, do you have a local 8100 series to test with?

live free or die
harry

[Sandip Ghosh · Accepted solution]

Tracey,

Try to increase idle Timeout on the printer side. Do a telnet into the printer and increase the time and try it out. Hope it will solve your problem.

Sandip

[Geoff Wild]

Have you started the spooler in verbose mode?

/usr/sbin/lpsched -v

This will send more info to the log file that may help you troubleshoot.

Can you print the large file to another printer? instead of over the Wan?

What's the output of hpnpadmin -v
(Where is your printer name)
Check the Idle Timeout - if it is only 90 secs, try increasing to 270.

To change the value of "idle-timeout" on the jetdirect card:-

- telnet
- at the ">" prompt press [return] TWICE
- type "/" to show current parameter settings
- note "Idle Timeout" value (eg 30 seconds)
- type "?"
- type "idle-timeout: 270 (to increase to 270 seconds).
- type "quit" to save and exit with these settings.

NOTE: The maximum number for the JetDirect card timeout is 1 hour (3600
seconds). Be careful if you use high values, you might block the port for other
users.


Rgds...Geoff

[Bill Hassell]

The spooler does not use /tmp at all. Instead, the spool files are queued in /var/spool/lp/request so this directory (it's mountpoint) will need the megs of space. In order to troubleshoot this, you'll need to log the connection. I am going to assume that this is a network printer (not a PC or Unix server at the remote end) and that you have hppi or jetadmin software installed. I am also going to assume that you have added the printer as a network printer and not a remote printer (SAM is cryptic about this difference).

The JetDirect software has the ability to log each print job so add a new option to your lp command:

-ohpnpflog

A logfile will be created in /opt/hpnpl/tmp/hpnpflog for each job (unfortunately, each previous logfile is overlaid by the current job). This is a detailed handsake of the entire printing process and may get very LARGE! The important information is at the end when the job fails. Use a symlink to control the location of this logfile if needed.

A WAN can be a *LOT* slower than the baud rate and 256k is really slow for today's connections. The data will get there just fine but there are probably significant line turnaround delays for status (done for every line of text) and the link may be occasionally timing out. To create a log file for each job, you'll probably have to run hpnpf directly and wrapper the printjob with the -o options alrwady coded into a script. Then you can create a separate logfile for each job.

[Tracey]

I've ftp'd it up to a local server and had it printed out by an NT guy up there - no problem.

We have a local 8100 and everything prints AOK.

Yep, it is a network printer, and it jetadmin is installed.

Yep the 2 - 128K pipes we have to our corporate LAN is very very slow considering all the information we shove accross it, but our corporate offices are telling us that it is not saturated, so they think we don't really need anymore.

I've upped the idle timeout as some have suggested. One message I found on google suggested I use the -c option when printing, but somehow I can't see how that would help?

[Sanjay_6]

Hi Tracey,

Maybe these links can help,

http://support1.itrc.hp.com/service/cki/docDisplay.do?docLocale=en_US&docId=200000024644828

http://support1.itrc.hp.com/service/cki/docDisplay.do?docLocale=en_US&docId=200000024602841

Hope this helps.

Regds

[Sandip Ghosh]

What type of queue you atr using on your router for that 128K line? We have seen if you use first in first out it will be faster. You can look for priority queue also as per your priority.

Sandip

[Brian Kinney]

Dear Tracey,

Sorry that I don't have a definitive answer, but here's some things to look at.

I'd take a long, hard look at that printer's capabilities. How much memory does it have? Is the JetDirect card up to date?

Are the files text or postscript? I've seen printers die because they didn't have enough RAM for a PS page, because the rotation occurred in the printer memory, not prior to delivery. Color conversion issues with drivers can also be a problem.

Can you print the file to any other printer without issues?

Good luck on this problem!