Re: Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB?

Results of further investigation:

In my original posting, I omitted the detailed listing of @INC because I figured that it would just be the usual directories. That assumption was wrong. For some reason, foomatic-configure was only picking up the directories associated with my Perl 5.8.5 installation located under /usr/local/bin; it was not picking up any directories under my older, RedHat-supplied 5.6.0 installation under /usr/bin. What was perplexing about this was that foomatic-configure was coded with #!/usr/bin/perl -- so if anything, I would have expected it to lack the 5.8.5 directories.

What's further puzzling about this is that when I called locate Defaults.pm, I was directed to a directory where both Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB could be found!

I dumped the entire content of @INC into a BEGIN in foomatic-configure. This time, printconf-gui ran! (And it didn't seem to matter whether I was working from 5.6.0 or 5.8.5; I tried both.) I proceeded to edit the options for the Epson Stylus Color 740, but when I got to the final tab, "Driver Options," the program failed, throwing the following error message:

/usr/local/bin/perl: error while loading shared libraries: /usr/lib/pe
+rl5/site_perl/5.6.0/i386-linux/auto/XML/Parser/Expat/Expat.so: undefi
+ned symbol: Perl_safemalloc
[download]

I got the same error (with the exception of the path) working from both 5.6.0 and 5.8.5. The result: The Epson is still not showing up in the Print menu in progams like Mozilla, and I still can't get anything printed.

Warning: Rant follows:

I originally installed this Linux (as a dual boot on a Windows box) solely for the purpose of having a *nix-like environment with which to develop my Perl work. It served that purpose, but it has failed the much more basic task of printing. This has really soured me on spending much more time playing with Linux (such as installing an updated version, as some posters have suggested). After all, at least with my iBook, I get printing along with my *nix development environment.

Jim Keenan

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Re^2: [OT] Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by jdalbec (Deacon) on Jan 23, 2005 at 22:32 UTC
You should upgrade to Red Hat 7.3 at least and check out the Fedora-Legacy project (http://www.fedoralegacy.org/) for security updates. I've found that CUPS works better than LPRng and printconf-gui. If you install and enable CUPS you can (and should) configure your printers from its web interface (http://localhost:631/). You don't need printconf-gui at all. I have cups, cups-drivers, cups-drivers-hpijs (I have an HP LaserJet), cups-libs, foomatic, ghostscript, Omni, and Omni-foomatic installed. It sounds like you'll also need gimp-print-cups. You'll need to run "/sbin/chkconfig lpd off" and "/sbin/chkconfig cups on", then either reboot or run "/sbin/service lpd stop" and "/sbin/service cups start". Then you should be able to configure your printer from a web browser on the local machine. (It may take CUPS a little while to start up, especially the first time, so be patient.) If you want to keep LPRng installed, you'll need to run "/usr/sbin/alternatives --config print" to select the CUPS versions of the printing commands (like "lpr") instead of the LPRng versions. Otherwise you'll need to run "rpm -e LPRng" to remove LPRng from your system.	[reply]
Re^3: [OT] Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by jkeenan1 (Deacon) on Jan 24, 2005 at 01:11 UTC
jdalbec wrote: If you install and enable CUPS you can (and should) configure your printers from its web interface (http://localhost:631/). You don't need printconf-gui at all. .... You'll need to run "/sbin/chkconfig lpd off" and "/sbin/chkconfig cups on", then either reboot or run "/sbin/service lpd stop" and "/sbin/service cups start". Then you should be able to configure your printer from a web browser on the local machine. Tried this. Failed. CUPS reports that I have successfully modified the printer. I then go to print a test page. Nothing happens. Checking the jobs queue, I see that the job is marked completed -- but only by having been cancelled. Note: I haven't (consciously, at least) installed LPRng. So I don't know what it is. Jim Keenan	[reply]
Re^4: [OT] Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by jdalbec (Deacon) on Jan 25, 2005 at 02:39 UTC
LPRng is the default printing system in Red Hat 7.3 and (IIRC) 7.1 so I would think it's also the default printing system in 7.2. Did you install the Red Hat CUPS rpms or did you install CUPS from source? Do you see anything in `/var/log/cups/{access,error,page}_log`? If the job was cancelled it sounds like a permissions issue. Check the configuration files in `/etc/cups`. Did you log into the web interface as `root`? If this doesn't help try the http://www.cups.org/ newsgroups.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by Tanktalus (Canon) on Jan 23, 2005 at 23:41 UTC
Jim, I'm not associated with Epson (or RH). I'm not even what one would call a "happy customer" of either (Epson doesn't care - I'm on my third Epson printer, never having owned any other make; I use RH for various reasons, but I would rather be running Gentoo). That said, my system used to be RH 7.3 and Epson Stylus Color 740 - the print quality was sufficient, but not extraordinary. Top quality couldn't be acheived, although I didn't spend lots of time trying to figure it out. It's now RHEL3U3 with Epson Stylus CX5400 (3-in-1), and the print quality is great. I don't attribute the change to the upgrade of the printer. Well, not much of it. I think that the ESC 740 is newer than RH7.2. So it might be worth your time to upgrade the OS - at least to RH9. Even then, comparing to the iBook may be unfair - I think RH9 is significantly older, so the level of code in supporting the devices may not be as advanced as if you were comparing more contemporary OS levels. It is not unfair, however, to compare Linux vs iBook just because Epson provides Mac drivers. That is a true and honest cost of going with Linux.	[reply]
Re^3: Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by jkeenan1 (Deacon) on Jan 24, 2005 at 01:15 UTC
Tanktalus wrote: I think that the ESC 740 is newer than RH7.2. I know that that cannot be the case, because I've had this ESC 740 since I bought the computer in Sept 1999. Another posting dates RH 7.2 to Oct 2001. jimk	[reply]
Re^2: [OT] Where can I find Foomatic::Defaults and Foomatic::DB? by Aristotle (Chancellor) on Jan 23, 2005 at 22:51 UTC
You shouldn't be too surprised after you insisted to stick with such an old distro. Printing to anything other than a natively Postscript-capable device has always been just short of a nightmare on traditional Unix systems. I understand that this is an area where huge strides have been made in the recent past, though I'm not sure where things stand now. But they can only be better than in a several years old distro. Makeshifts last the longest.	[reply]