DebianThis forum is for the discussion of Debian Linux.
Notices
Welcome to LinuxQuestions.org, a friendly and active Linux Community.
You are currently viewing LQ as a guest. By joining our community you will have the ability to post topics, receive our newsletter, use the advanced search, subscribe to threads and access many other special features. Registration is quick, simple and absolutely free. Join our community today!
Note that registered members see fewer ads, and ContentLink is completely disabled once you log in.
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us. If you need to reset your password, click here.
Having a problem logging in? Please visit this page to clear all LQ-related cookies.
Get a virtual cloud desktop with the Linux distro that you want in less than five minutes with Shells! With over 10 pre-installed distros to choose from, the worry-free installation life is here! Whether you are a digital nomad or just looking for flexibility, Shells can put your Linux machine on the device that you want to use.
Exclusive for LQ members, get up to 45% off per month. Click here for more info.
These are two unrelated questions but I didn't want to start two threads and waste the space on the board:
Background: KDE 3.5, Debian "mostly stable" with some unstable mixed in. Kernel 2.6.14. CUPS version 1.1.23-12 (not upgraded). This question is more out of curiosity than anything: On this particular system, to my surprise, my printer is detected automatically when I go to the KDE printers tab in the control center (I don't have the appropriate driver yet, but that's another issue). However, on another system which is basically the same except that it still has KDE 3.3, and fewer packages upgraded, In the control center when I try to switch it to CUPS it tells me it can not connect to the server. Weird. I'm not sure what's different.
Another thing I've been curious about for a while: how can system bloat be resolved? I currently have 988 packages installed, up from around 700 when I first installed. It seems as though when something is installed with all the dependencies, it can be removed later but the dependencies remain. I'm not a fan of re-installing at all, so I was wondering if there is some way to do a thorough clean-up of everything that is unneeded, if for no other reason than to reduce the number of packages installed so they are easier to browse. Any thoughts?
It seems as though when something is installed with all the dependencies, it can be removed later but the dependencies remain.
Few people seem to get this - congratulations!
On the one hand, unless you are hurting for hard drive space, having these floating around will not slog down your system. They will just take up space - and perhaps conflict with other libs contributing to "dependency hell" due to conflicting libs versions.
The only way to avoid this is to use a distro that does not check dependencies for you .....
Slackware !!!
Even then, unless you are keeping careful tabs on what gets installed, you will not know what to remove. At least with Slack, if you need to install a dependency, you installed it yourself so you know you did it.
Also, since slackware does not split the source into appliction and developement packages, this whole mess is less of an issue.
These are two unrelated questions but I didn't want to start two threads and waste the space on the board:
Background: KDE 3.5, Debian "mostly stable" with some unstable mixed in. Kernel 2.6.14. CUPS version 1.1.23-12 (not upgraded). This question is more out of curiosity than anything: On this particular system, to my surprise, my printer is detected automatically when I go to the KDE printers tab in the control center (I don't have the appropriate driver yet, but that's another issue). However, on another system which is basically the same except that it still has KDE 3.3, and fewer packages upgraded, In the control center when I try to switch it to CUPS it tells me it can not connect to the server. Weird. I'm not sure what's different.
That seems like cups may not actually be running try http://localhost:631 and see if you get the CUPS Administration page if you do then setup the printer with this then try in the Control Center. You may want to try something like this ( dpkg -l | grep cups) on both machines just to make sure you have close to the same packages installed.
Quote:
Another thing I've been curious about for a while: how can system bloat be resolved? I currently have 988 packages installed, up from around 700 when I first installed. It seems as though when something is installed with all the dependencies, it can be removed later but the dependencies remain. I'm not a fan of re-installing at all, so I was wondering if there is some way to do a thorough clean-up of everything that is unneeded, if for no other reason than to reduce the number of packages installed so they are easier to browse. Any thoughts?
Sounds like a job for deborphan you may want to install then run it and you may want to look at using aptitude it automatically removes packages without dependencies.
Sounds like a job for deborphan you may want to install then run it and you may want to look at using aptitude it automatically removes packages without dependencies.
I havent really used aptitude, does synaptic also remove the packages without dependencies?
You're right, CUPS wasn't even running! So that's working now with a Epson Stylus Color 600 printer, although nothing prints unless I set it on "raw printer", and then, of course, it only prints text. I tried using "postscript printer" but it said that the postscript driver could not be found!
You have to install additional printer driver package, I have a HP desejet, and installed hpijs which has a specific driver for my printer model, don't know exactly about Epson though, maybe gimp-print?
Regarding dependency cleaning-up, debfoster is really a handy tool.
You're right, CUPS wasn't even running! So that's working now with a Epson Stylus Color 600 printer, although nothing prints unless I set it on "raw printer", and then, of course, it only prints text. I tried using "postscript printer" but it said that the postscript driver could not be found!
I had a 640 and it worked great according to your printers page at Linuxprinting it should as well. What do you have installed for CUPS packages use the command I posted above and could we see the output of lsmod | grep lp? You should see something like this.
Yes, lsmod gives me output like that. But it still won't print. It seems odd because my printer is listed and it claims to print successfully, but nothing ever comes out. The printer does work in DOS and Windows (I actually haven't used it in Windows for a while, though, but it works fine in DOS).
Yes, lsmod gives me output like that. But it still won't print. It seems odd because my printer is listed and it claims to print successfully, but nothing ever comes out. The printer does work in DOS and Windows (I actually haven't used it in Windows for a while, though, but it works fine in DOS).
Strange indeed then other than checking the BIOS settings and making sure you have the newest CUPS related packages installed I think I am out of ideas. What does it says in your dmesg about it you should see similar to these lines.
Code:
parport: PnPBIOS parport detected.
parport0: PC-style at 0x378, irq 7 [PCSPP,TRISTATE]
parport0: Printer, Hewlett-Packard HP LaserJet 6L
lp0: using parport0 (interrupt-driven)
Yup, dmesg looks good. I tried EPP and SPP for my parallel port. Should I try ECP?
I don't know if I should download another driver, as has been suggested already, or if there's a problem with the cable or the printer itself. I'll try it in Windows again to see if it's still working there I guess.
LinuxQuestions.org is looking for people interested in writing
Editorials, Articles, Reviews, and more. If you'd like to contribute
content, let us know.