Unable to get printer cfg file to install

[Terrence]

I'm trying to install a lj P3005 printer and the .cfg file in the /opt/hpnpl/admin/printers won't create. I've tried it from both hppi and by manually downloading the file and sh-ing it.

In both cases the reference in the PrinterList file shows up (:405:), but the .cfg file (405.cfg) never does.

I can't even choose the old standby lj 4 driver (after removing the reference in PrinterList of course) because hppi seems to want the right driver.

Ideas?

[Bill Hassell]

The .cfg file is used to pre-configure some options in the interface script and provide some directions for hppi. I wouldn't bother with hppi at all as it is cumbersome to use. Just use addqueue and override the printer ID with one of the net_ljx000 printers. Although each hppi models script has a lot of options, 99% of all printer installs never need the very obscure differences between the PCL5/PCL6 printers. Something like this:

addqueue -q myp3005 -h 12.34.56.78 -i 266

To see the printer ID numbers and corresponding interface scripts, use addqueue -l. Almost no one ever reads the man pages for JetDirect (hppi) printer scripts, much less use more than 3-4 of the -o options.

[Terrence]

Bill is of course correct, however he clearly does not conform to the anal retentive unix admin philosophy where one has to use the exact right driver where possible.

In our case, I'm wondering about color printing. So many of our new lj's are color these days, and it raises the question of can we get color output if the print driver isn't the correct one.

[OldSchool]

Terence,

The "installer" appears to be broken at line 67-68, where it shows something like:

cp ./${r
PID}.cfg

what you might try is:
uncompressing the net_lj3005.sh.Z

uudecode by hand the four pieces (405.cfg, installer, net_lj3005.1 and net_lj3005).

fix the installer and run by hand??????

[Bill Hassell]

HP-UX knows nothing about color or PCL or Postscript or any of that stuff. There are no printer drivers in HP-UX (that's reserved for PeeCees). The interface script is quite simple (even if it takes 5000 lines to do it). It simply prepends and postpends a few escape sequences. There is zero processing of the data unless it is plain ASCII in which case the LF at the end of each line gets a 'free' CR to keep the printer happy. Otherwise, text, graphics, colors, fonts, send it all...the script don't care. Of course, HP-UX doesn't offer any native methods to create all those tidbits.