LinuxQuestions.org - printer not working properly

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printer not working properly

Hi,
during my mandriva install, my printer, an epson c66, was recognised by mandriva. In the control centre it is also listed and when the 'print a test pager' button is clicked in the control centre, several test pages are printed no problem.
however, when i actually try to use the printer through open office or to print emails etc, nothing happens whatsoever. i've only just realised that the printer isnt working through any of these programs!!! i've checked the printer settings in open office and it is listed as the default printer! any ideas what is going on anyone?????

thanks
tim

I think I used to have one of those! Linux support for Epson is good, which is to say that Epson supports Linux.

Are you using KDE or Gnome? Did you set up the printer in the kprinter dialog? That's the easiest way, even if you're not using KDE (you do, however need to have KDE installed). The computer will recognize the printer without any way to actually communicate with it, i.e., a driver set up to handle it.

Check out www.linuxprinting.org, you can look up your printer and then follow the general directions for setting it up.

Joel

Hi,
Thanks for the reply. I went to the website and the suggested package was gutenprint-5.0.0.tar.bz2

Do you, or anyone else know, how to install a file with a .bz2 suffix. I tried to use the tar -zxvf install, but I was given an error that this was the wrong type of install for this file.

Thanks,
tim

First check to see if your system already has gutenprint: Mandriva probably has it. Use kpackage or whatever package management system to check if its already installed.

Another way is to go to the command line and type

Code:

slocate gutenprint

Code:

slocate foomatic

While you're at it look up the manpage for slocate, this is a very useful command.

Next, the best resources for decompressing files would be the man pages associated with the file formats: man bzip2 and man tar will get you the man pages.

when I'm decompressing bz2 files or gz files, i use the following

Code:

gunzip -c this_file.tar.gz | tar tvf - #the -c decompresses to standard output, which is accepted by the pipe, and the t in the tar command merely prints the list of files in the tar archive; this is to make sure that there's a directory tree instead of just files; if you decompress bare files you will have to go around and delete them

gunzip -c this_file.tar.gz | tar xvf - #does the job

just replace gunzip with "bunzip2" if you have bz2 file. If the concept of a pipe is new to you, the gunzip decompresses the file and sends the data to tar; then you're left with the tar archive, then tar unpacks it. Then go into the directory created by unpacking the tar file and look for files called either README or INSTALL or both and read them. They will tell you what to do.

If you have trouble understanding what those files are telling you, then go get yourself a copy of Running Linux from O'Reilly; even a used copy will explain so much that you will become a super-user in no time.

Joel