Firefox flash plugin prints color image in black&white because generated PostScript does not conform to DSC

[David Agudo]

Binary package hint: cupsys

I am using a fresh install of Ubuntu 7.04 (feysty fawn), with the default CUPS configuration for an Epson Stylus D88 Plus (gutenprint driver).

When I print a postcript file with coloured images (lpr file.ps), it gets printed in black&white and graphics are of very low quality.

If I get that same postcript file, I convert it to pdf (ps2pdf file.ps) and then print the resulting pdf file (lpr file.pdf), it gets correctly printed in colour.

[Pascal De Vuyst (pascal-devuyst)]

Thanks for your bug report.
Please attach the output of the printingbug info script, it can be found here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PrintingBugInfoScript.
Can you also give the output of the following command:
$ lpoptions -p <printer> -l
And attach your /etc/cups/ppd/<printer>.ppd

[David Agudo (dagudoj)]

Thanks for your effort Pascal.

[Pascal De Vuyst (pascal-devuyst)]

Your printing options seem to be OK.
Do you have the problem only with the PostScript file you provided or with other PostScript files that have color too?

[David Agudo (dagudoj)]

Really, the exact problem is as follows (I just simplified it for the sake of clarity):

- I open firefox and go to the following URL: http://callejero.lanetro.com/apps/lanetro/mapas.asp?pais=es&idvia=4935&num=0&muni=Madrid&mapa=tas1e65%2Dmadrid&prov=Madrid

- As you can see, the page presents a map with flashplayer. If I then print the map (using the icon at the lower right corner), the map is printed in black&white. At first I thought it could be related to the flash player.

- To identify the problem, I just got a copy of the printed file from /var/spool/cups (file.ps) and tried to print it again with different settings, but it is always printed in black&white. The file.ps file seems to be correct, no application complains about it.

But following your advice, I have tried to convert it to pdf and back again to ps (ps2pdf + pdf2ps)... the reconverted file is printed in colour correctly! (I attach this new file). So I guess that you are right, it must be something related to the file.

I don't have any other coloured ps file, and all pdf converted to ps with pdf2ps are printed correctly.

Now the question is... is there something weird in file.ps that affects CUPS or the gutenprint driver, but not Evince or ps2pdf?

[Pascal De Vuyst (pascal-devuyst)]

CUPS requires that Postscript files conform to the Adobe PostScript Document Structuring Conventions.
It looks like the PostScript generated by firefox is not DSC compliant:

$ cupstestdsc file.ps
file.ps: FAIL
    Missing or bad %%Pages: comment!
        REF: Page 43, %%Pages:
    Missing or bad %%Page: comments!
        REF: Page 53, %%Page:
    Warning: no %%EndComments comment in file!

$ cupstestdsc fileconverted.ps
fileconverted.ps: PASS

Rejecting cupsys task, adding firefox task.

[David Agudo (dagudoj)]

The postscript file has not been generated directly by Firefox, it has been generated by a flash plugin embedded in firefox, and to make thing worst, it is the one from Adobe (flashplugin-nonfree 9.0.31.0.2ubuntu1 in firefox 2.0.0.3+1-0ubuntu2).

So I fear the Firefox people will not be able to do anything... Unless somebody have any idea on how to solve this, perhaps we should close the bug.

[Pascal De Vuyst (pascal-devuyst)]

Rejecting firefox task, adding flashplugin-nonfree task.

[Thomas Hotz (thotz-deactivatedaccount)]

Does this still happen with flash version 11.2?

[David Agudo (dagudoj)]

It is working properly in Ubuntu 12.04 x64, flash plugin 11,3,31,331.

Checked here (print icon on the right):

http://prs.metromadrid.es/metro/mapametrofull.asp

[Thomas Hotz (thotz-deactivatedaccount)]

Marking as fixed ok! Thank you!