Comment 43 for bug 973270

The problem is an incompatibility of CUPS' IPP backend with the printer. As the recent fixes on CUPS did not cover this problem, we have reopened the CUPS task.

One can work around the problem by connecting to the printer with another protocol than IPP, preferably JetDirect/AppSocket which is much simpler than IPP and so less prone to incompatibilities.

Therefore we have introduced the SRU on system-config-printer, to let JetDirect/AppSocket be used as default when a new print queue is created.

Everyone who still has this problem after installing both cups and system-config-printer from -proposed (note that cups is already in the official updates), please check the following:

1. Do you really have the newest packages versions?

- Run the command

dpkg -l | grep cups

in a terminal window and check whether you have lines like this:

...
ii cups 1.5.3-0ubuntu1 Common UNIX Printing System(tm) - server
...
ii cups-filters 1.0.18-0ubuntu0.1 OpenPrinting CUPS Filters
...

If you are in doubt, post the full output of the command.

Run also

dpkg -l | grep system-config-printer

All output lines should have the version number 1.3.8+20120201-0ubuntu8.1. If in doubt, post the output here.

2. Make sure that you remove your print queue and recreate it with system-config-printer. If you have a Unity desktop (icons at the left, no task line at the bottom) you get system-config-printer by clicking onm the icon in the upper right corner of the screen and choosing "Printers" in the menu or by clicking the printer icon in the system settings. If you have another desktop, run the following command in a terminal window:

system-config-printer &

- Here you remove a print queue by right clicking the icon which represents it and choosing "Delete" in the pop-up menu. Confirm the deletion in the confirmation dialog to make it actually taking place.

- After that click the "Add" button in the upper left and go through the steps of the printer setup dialog.

- At first you have to wait around 15 seconds for the network scan, until the spinning icon at the lower left disappears.

- Open the "Network Printer" section and choose your printer model. Now you have to wait some seconds until the right half of the dialog gets filled (especially if you have a fax-capable HP printer).

- Have a look at "Description" in the upper right. Please tell us what is written there.

- Please also tell us what is selected in the "Connection" list at the lower right.

- If IPP is selected ("IPP network printer via DNS-SD", "IPP network printer", "IPP", "Internet Printing Protocol", ...), please tell us all entries which are in your "Connection" list.

- If IPP is selected select something else now, preferably "AppSocket/JetDirect network printer via DNS-SD" or "AppSocket/JetDirect". If these are not available try something with "LPD", if also this is not available try something with "SMB". If you have to do this and have found a suitable entry, there is still a bug in system-config-printer. Are you sure that you have the correct version of system-config-printer (see section 1 of this comment).

- If all choices in the list are IPP choices, your printer is supporting only IPP in its current configuration. Most printers allow activating additional protocols. Please enter the IP address of your printer into the URL line of your web browser. Then you get an interface to configure your printer. Activate "AppSocket/JetDirect", if this is not available, try "LPD", and if this is also not available, "SMB" (Windows printer). Click "Cancel" in the printer setup dialog of system-config-printer and repeat the steps of adding a printer. If this does not help, either if there are no possibilities to activate additional protocols in the printer or if system-config-printer does not list them after opening the setup wizard again, you have an IPP-only device and the SRUs up to now are not solving the problem for this class of devices.

- Finish the printer setup wizard by clicking "Forward" until arriving at the end. You can adjust the print queue name if you like a different one.

Please post here if you are in doubt with any of these steps. Post screenshots of the steps in system-config-printer or of your printer's web configuration interface if needed, and especially if you are not sure what of the shown information we need.

3. If these instructions do not help you to get the problem solved, please run the following command in a terminal window and post its output here:

lpinfo -v

If it does not exit after 30 seconds, press Ctrl+C to stop it.

Run also the command

sudo nmap <IP of your printer>

and post the output here.