Articles - Common UNIX Printing System

Where Can I Get Drivers for My Printer?

By mike on Apr 23, 2008, 1 comment(s)
CUPS includes drivers for many printers. Open source printer drivers are available from other sites.

What Software Do I Need to Use CUPS?

By mike on Dec 21, 2007, 0 comment(s)
The standard CUPS software distribution includes most of the software necessary to support printing. If you have PostScript printers you'll need to PostScript Printer Description ("PPD") files that came with your printer.

What are the conditions to do binary distribution?

By mike on Dec 13, 2007, 0 comment(s)
If you just compile the DDK drivers as-is, you can redistribute the binaries just like any other GNU GPL'd software - just provide the option to get the source code if you don't bundle it with your distribution.

Trademarks

By mike on Jul 11, 2007, 0 comment(s)
Common UNIX Printing System, CUPS, and CUPS logo.

What Support Is Available?

By mike on Jul 11, 2007, 0 comment(s)
This FAQ provides links to the available CUPS support resources.

What Features are Planned for Future Releases?

By mike on Jul 11, 2007, 2 comment(s)
This FAQ provides a link to the CUPS roadmap page.

License Exceptions

By mike on Jul 11, 2007, 0 comment(s)
This FAQ describes the additional rights that are granted on top of the GPL2/LGPL2 in the CUPS license.

Who Owns CUPS?

By mike on Jul 11, 2007, 8 comment(s)
Apple Inc. owns CUPS as of February 2007.

How do I move a job to a different queue/printer?

By sleske on May 04, 2007, 0 comment(s)
Move a job to a different queue/printer using lpmove or the Web interface. This builds on the directive CUPS-Move-Job.

Safari can’t connect to the server.

By tammy on Apr 25, 2007, 1 comment(s)
What to do when you can't connect to server on a MAC system.

Why is Java is unable to print to my CUPS 1.2 printers ?

By philrace on Dec 13, 2006, 2 comment(s)
Explain why Java versions 1.5 and 1.6 can't see CUPS 1.2 printers.

How Is CUPS Licensed?

By mike on Oct 22, 2006, 1 comment(s)
The Common UNIX Printing SystemTM, ("CUPSTM"), is provided under the GNU General Public License ("GPL") and GNU Library General Public License ("LGPL"), Version 2, with exceptions for Apple operating systems and the OpenSSL t.

Why Am I Getting The Error: client-error-not possible?

By steve on Feb 01, 2006, 11 comment(s)
Possible causes of client-error-not-possible

The Order Directive and BrowseOrder Directive Explained

By steve on Aug 24, 2005, 0 comment(s)
How do these directives work with the Allow and Deny directives?

Why Am I Getting Client-Error-Not-Found

By steve on Jun 17, 2005, 3 comment(s)
This is the error message which CUPS gives you when you specified a non-existing file to print or a non-existing printer.

What Advantages Does IPP Offer Over LPD or JetDirect?

By mike on May 31, 2005, 0 comment(s)
Both the LPD and JetDirect/AppSocket protocols can be used over the Internet today, however neither of these protocols provides authentication services, access control, and all of the document management and formatting (including printer-specific ..

What Password Do I Use At The Web Interface?

By steve on May 27, 2005, 12 comment(s)
Normally, if you are performing an administrative operation such as adding a printer, you need to provide the root or other authorized administrator username and password.

Can I Print PDF Files With CUPS?

By steve on May 27, 2005, 0 comment(s)
YES!!

SUSE: What Password Do I Use At The Web Interface?

By steve on May 27, 2005, 9 comment(s)
SuSE defaults to using Digest passwords and "RunAsUser yes", which means you have to use the lppasswd command to add accounts and passwords.

What Version Of CUPS Do I Have?

By steve on May 20, 2005, 2 comment(s)
rpm -qa | grep cups

MacOS 10.3.x: What Password Do I Need to Use in the Web Interface?

By mike on May 20, 2005, 7 comment(s)
Normally, if you are performing an administrative operation such as adding a printer, you need to provide the root or other authorized adminsitrator username and password.

How Can I Get CUPS To Print My PDF File To Fill The Entire Page?

By steve on May 10, 2005, 0 comment(s)
Use the -o fitplot option

What Options Are Available When Printing A PDF File In CUPS?

By steve on May 10, 2005, 0 comment(s)
Chapter 3 "Standard Printer Options" of the CUPS Software Users Manual explains in detail all the options available to you.

How Can I Track Down Printing Problems?

By mike on May 10, 2005, 0 comment(s)
If you encounter printing problems, the first thing you should do is set the LogLevel parameter in /etc/cups/cupsd.conf to "debug" and restart the cupsd process, usually with one of the following commands:

What Resources Are Available?

By mike on Feb 23, 2005, 0 comment(s)
There are many resources on the Internet that are at your disposal. This article lists many of them.

Why Have All This Documentation?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
We are striving to make CUPS supportable by all vendors. Documentation is a "must" for software as complex as a printing system. Having complete documentation and portable code will go a long way towards making CUPS a standard for all UNIX vendors...

Can I Contribute Code/Drivers to CUPS?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
Certainly.

Is CUPS Year 2000 Compliant?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
All date and time information is stored internally as a 32-bit UNIX® time value which will roll over early in 2038. When date information is displayed or logged, a 4-digit year is generated using the standard UNIX date and time functions.

What Does CUPS Provide?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
CUPS provides:

Why Are the CUPS LPR Commands Not SETUID Root?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The LPD protocol forces clients to reserve a privileged port to send print files. Since privileged ports require root access, the lpr, lpq, lprm, and lpc programs are setuid root.

What Is CUPS?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
CUPS provides a portable printing layer for UNIX®-based operating systems. It has been developed by <A HREF="http://www.easysw.com">Easy Software Products</A> to promote a standard printing solution for all UNIX vendors and users. CUPS provide...

What is the Internet Printing Protocol?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The <A HREF="http://www.pwg.org/">Internet Printing Protocol</A> is an exciting new network protocol that provides a common set of network printing services. One of the many potential applications of IPP is Internet Facsimile services - you can pr...

How Do I Use SAMBA With CUPS?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
You'll need at least SAMBA 2.0.6; earlier versions of SAMBA did not fully support CUPS.

How Can I Limit Access to Systems on My LAN?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
CUPS is configured out-of-the-box to allow print jobs from any host and limit administration tasks to the local system.

Why Do I Get "Unable to convert file 0" Messages?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
This message is most often logged in the error_log file if you attempt to print a file to a non-PostScript printer when you do not have <A HREF="ghostscript.html">ESP Ghostscript</A> installed.

Why Are the Margins Wrong for My Printer?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The sample drivers included with CUPS use "safe" margins to work with as many HP and EPSON printers as possible.

How Do I Update the Margins in My PPD File?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
First, read Adobe's PPD specification. You need to know how PPD files are organized. You want to look at the ImageableArea section of the page size stuff, which defines a bounding box for the area of the page that can be printed on, e.g.:

What Features Does CUPS 1.1 Add?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
CUPS 1.1 adds:

How Can I Print a Banner Page?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The "job-sheets" option in CUPS 1.1 allows you to specify a banner page for printing. Look in the <VAR>/usr/share/cups/banners</VAR> directory for the available banner files.

How Can I Create My Own Banner Pages?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
To create your own banner page, simply copy the file that you want as a banner to the <VAR>/usr/share/cups/banners</VAR> directory and change the file permissions on the file so that all users can read it. Then restart the scheduler as outlined in...

What File Formats are Supported?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The basic CUPS distribution supports the following file formats on all printers:

How Do I Read The cNNNNN Files in /var/spool/cups?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
Short answer: Don't do this, use the Get-Jobs (<tt>IPP_GET_JOBS</tt>) or Get-Job-Attributes (<tt>IPP_GET_JOB_ATTRIBUTES</tt>) operations with the <tt>cupsDoRequest()</tt> function to get the information instead.

What Is the Format For the cNNNNN Files in /var/spool/cups?

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
The cNNNNN files are binary files in the IPP message format. Essentially, each file is a copy of the original Create-Job or Print-Job request with additional job attributes added by the scheduler. You can read the files using the ippReadFile() fun...

My Program Uses cupsRasterReadPixels() And Won't Compile!

By mike on Jul 23, 2004, 0 comment(s)
You need to link against the <tt>cupsimage</tt> library, typically using the following compiler options:

Are the PPD files produced by the PPD compiler automatically GPL'd?

By mike on Mar 15, 2004, 0 comment(s)
No. Just as with the GCC software, the output from the PPD compiler is not automaticaly GPL'd. You can provide the generated PPD files under any terms you like (including, of course, the GPL) via the Copyright directive in your driver informatio...

I want to distribute the DDK drivers with my Linux distribution, what do I need to do?

By mike on Mar 15, 2004, 0 comment(s)
You can distribute the DDK drivers just like any other GPL'd software - the example RPM spec and EPM list files can be used as a packaging template.