How do I clear a Print-queue in Ubuntu?

Question

I am an absolute beginner with Ubuntu and I appear to have a long queue of documents in my H.P. 840C printer.

Solution 1

The question was how to kill all jobs. The simple way to kill all jobs:

lprm -

The complicated linux old-school way is below:

Command line:

lpstat -o

to view outstanding print jobs.

cancel -a {printer}

to cancel ALL jobs or ...

cancel {printerjobid}

to cancel 1 job.

---

man page cancel

Solution 2

Either

1. Use the printer dialog: type "Printers" in the dash and navigate to the printer
2. Use the CUPS web interface: point your browser at http://localhost:631/jobs/ and proceed from there
3. Use the command line interface: use lpq to see jobs, lprm to remove. Refer to man lprm for more information.

Solution 3

Use

lpstat -W completed -o

to view list of completed jobs.
Use

lpstat -o

to view list of not-completed jobs.

And to delete job list,just use this command:

cancel -a -x

This will cancel all pending jobs, as well as deleting them.

Solution 4

Well, answers given here didn't work for me so here's what I did -

ps aux | grep printer
kill {printer job}

Solution 5

I tried using lpstat and lprm but was unable to figure out basic things like the job number and stuff. Instead, I used the command:

lpq

This produced:

zac@computer:~$ lpq
lpq: Error - no default destination available.

A quick Internet search and then I tried:

zac@computer:~$ lpq -a
Rank    Owner   Job     File(s)                     Total Size
1st     zac     85      TorahNT.odt                 59392 bytes

FINALLY I find the all important Job number: 85!

NOW I run lprm:

zac@computer:~$ lprm 85
zac@computer:~$

And to confirm I did this:

zac@computer:~$ lpq -a
no entries
zac@computer:~$ 

Finally, the printer queue is empty.

View more solutions

Comments

[Rinzwind]

hmm that is weird. are you sure you inserted a printer id?

[Y.Millner]

Didn't work for me. :(

[MichaelChirico]

Is there something like lprm * that will cancel all jobs? Or do we have to go piecemeal?

[João Silva]

Hi, this didn't work for me either. Deleting the printer and adding it again did the task, though.

[Andrei]

MAGIC : ) Guys who aren't having success, step 2 above? The readout from lpstat -o should look something like <yourusername_printername>. Just type that verbatim into {printer} in step 2. Worked fine in Ubuntu 15.04. Tnx Rinzwind :)

[Rinzwind]

@Manuel you are welcome :)

[zwets]

@MichaelChirico man lprm | grep "cancel all jobs"

[Gerhard Stein]

Funny, this works very well, but not when using gnome-printers gui. Too bad!

[Rinzwind]

@Gerstrong do you get a notice? Cuz this is totally outside of gnome-printers scope. Commandline always wins here ;)

[Gerhard Stein]

No, notice at all, no reaction. The jobs stays there. Command Line in contrast removes it.

[Rinzwind]

Likely you need sudo from the gui.

[vcarel]

This should be the accepted answer.

[Zanna]

Really nice clear answer - very helpful for people unfamiliar with the commands, thanks!