Network printer found but cannot print

Question

I'm running Ubuntu 11.04 on my laptop and try to use a network printer.

Adding the printer to Ubuntu works without problems but when I try to print something the print job stays in the queue and nothing happens. Then I realized that the printer is not enabled. But enabling leads to an error message saying:

There was a problem sending document 'Test Page' (job 6) to the printer.

When clicking the "Diagnose" button and clicking through the Printing Troubleshooter it says I should enable the printer what I'm already trying to do. So I'm stuck.

Any ideas what I can do?

UPDATE: Here the output of the error_log that gets written when trying to print a test page.

E [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] No %%BoundingBox: comment in header!
E [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Unable to locate printer 'BRN001BA93A3D6F'!
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] The following messages were recorded from 15:23:19 to 15:23:19
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Adding start banner page "none".
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Adding end banner page "none".
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] File of type application/postscript queued by "florian".
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] hold_until=0
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Queued on "Brother-MFC-8880DN" by "florian".
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] job-sheets=none,none
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[0]="Brother-MFC-8880DN"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[1]="8"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[2]="florian"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[3]="Test Page"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[4]="1"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[5]="PageSize=Letter job-uuid=urn:uuid:cb5143f4-2b18-398d-5ce8-bb41f8ff3539 job-originating-host-name=localhost time-at-creation=1322058199 time-at-processing=1322058199 AP_D_InputSlot="
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] argv[6]="/var/spool/cups/d00008-001"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[0]="CUPS_CACHEDIR=/var/cache/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[1]="CUPS_DATADIR=/usr/share/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[2]="CUPS_DOCROOT=/usr/share/cups/doc-root"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[3]="CUPS_FONTPATH=/usr/share/cups/fonts"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[4]="CUPS_REQUESTROOT=/var/spool/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[5]="CUPS_SERVERBIN=/usr/lib/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[6]="CUPS_SERVERROOT=/etc/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[7]="CUPS_STATEDIR=/var/run/cups"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[8]="HOME=/var/spool/cups/tmp"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[9]="PATH=/usr/lib/cups/filter:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/usr/bin"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[10]="SERVER_ADMIN=root@pickwick"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[11]="SOFTWARE=CUPS/1.4.6"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[12]="TMPDIR=/var/spool/cups/tmp"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[13]="USER=root"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[14]="CUPS_SERVER=/var/run/cups/cups.sock"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[15]="CUPS_ENCRYPTION=IfRequested"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[16]="IPP_PORT=631"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[17]="CHARSET=utf-8"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[18]="LANG=en_US.UTF-8"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[19]="PPD=/etc/cups/ppd/Brother-MFC-8880DN.ppd"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[20]="RIP_MAX_CACHE=auto"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[21]="CONTENT_TYPE=application/postscript"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[22]="DEVICE_URI=lpd://BRN001BA93A3D6F/BINARY_P1"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[23]="PRINTER_INFO=Brother MFC-8880DN"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[24]="PRINTER_LOCATION=BRN001BA93A3D6F"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[25]="PRINTER=Brother-MFC-8880DN"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[26]="CUPS_FILETYPE=document"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] envp[27]="FINAL_CONTENT_TYPE=application/vnd.cups-postscript"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Started filter /usr/lib/cups/filter/pstops (PID 22189)
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Started backend /usr/lib/cups/backend/lpd (PID 22190)
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] STATE: +connecting-to-device
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Looking up "BRN001BA93A3D6F"...
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Page = 612x792; 12,12 to 600,780
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] slow_collate=0, slow_duplex=0, slow_order=0
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Before copy_comments - %!PS-Adobe-3.0
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] %!PS-Adobe-3.0
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] %%Title: PPR Test Page
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] %%Pages: 1
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] %%DocumentNeededResources: font Helvetica
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] %%EndComments
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Set job-printer-state-message to "No %%BoundingBox: comment in header!", current level=ERROR
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Before copy_prolog - %%BeginProlog
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Before copy_setup - %%BeginSetup
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Before page loop - %%Page: 1 1
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Copying page 1...
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] PAGE: 1 1
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] pagew = 587.9, pagel = 767.9
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] bboxx = 0, bboxy = 0, bboxw = 612, bboxl = 792
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] PageLeft = 12.0, PageRight = 599.9
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] PageTop = 780.0, PageBottom = 12.1
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] PageWidth = 612.0, PageLength = 792.0
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Backend returned status 4 (stop printer)
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] Printer stopped due to backend errors; please consult the error_log file for details.
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] End of messages
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] printer-state=5(stopped)
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] printer-state-message="Unable to locate printer 'BRN001BA93A3D6F'!"
D [23/Nov/2011:15:23:19 +0100] [Job 8] printer-state-reasons=paused

Solution 1

OK I got the printer working. After reading @fossfreedom's comment I looked again at the add printer applet.

The last time I tried to add the printer I searched for it by clicking "Find Network Printer" under "Network Printer" and selected the printer in the list of available printers in the network.

This time I also clicked "Find Network Printer" but I also entered the printer's IP and clicked "Find" which shows another entry in the list "JetDirect ...". I selected this printer and finished the installation wizard.

It worked!

Solution 2

You always need to have nss-mdns (libnss-mdns, depending on distribution) installed and you need to have mdns in the hosts line in /etc/nsswitch.conf to print via DNS service discovery. I guess it's too late for the original poster but I googled this page when looking for the solution.

hosts:       files mdns_minimal dns mdns

You also need to have avahi-daemon running to provide the backend for multicast DNS.

Solution 3

You can try unpausing the printer (this happens to me with network printers in Ubuntu occasionally).

Try opening the CUPS web interface at http://localhost:631 and selecting the Printers tab. There click on the printer's name and select the resume printer option from the Maintenance drop-down menu.

Source: this Ubuntu forums post.

Comments

[Admin]

So much thanks, Flo. I bought the brother DCP-J140w and I had the same problems on Ubuntu 12.04. Just take "AppSocket/HP JetDirect" option on the printing Wizard and write the IP printer and printer runs. Carlos.

[Pavel Šimerda]

Please see my answer to see how to avoid having to enter the IP as well as avoid problems when the IP changes.

[Pistos]

In my case, when I used the "found" printer, I also got "Unable to locate printer [printer ID]". I instead had to manually specify ipp://ipaddressofprinter/ipp. Then it just worked.

[Pistos]

Note that if you put a trailing slash like this, it may not work (depends on the printer model, I think): ipp://ipaddressofprinter/ipp/

[Jumabek Alihanov]

Through the help of this answer I got it worked too, however, I chose "docu print*" instead of "JetDirect"

[nibot]

This worked for me.