Comment 57 for bug 213081

My problem is probably the same:

- Large files are not printed ('small' files are) on network attached printer; CUPS reports broken pipe and puts job on 'held' status

Software versions:

- Ubuntu 8.10
- Cups 1.3.9-2ubuntu9.1

Printer:

- Xerox Phaser 6130

The attached Wireshark trace shows clearly what is going wrong. This is what happens:

- Cups opens a session to the printer on tcp/9100.
- Cups starts processing ... processing ... processing ...
- After 15 seconds, the printer ends the session due to timeout (FIN sent); this is orderly acknowledged by the computer.
- Meanwhile, Cups is still continuing to process the job.
- Finally, processing is ready.
- Now, Cups starts transmitting the print data - as if the session were still there. Naturally, this fails, with the reported result.
- After some time, Cups repeats the process, with (of course) the same result. (If it only would have saved the output of its efforts...)

(I've left out some other strange actions: trying to reach the printer on a completely different port (via udp), trying to access the printer via snmp.)

Cups should begin a session with the printer when it is ready to send the data, not as the first action before starting to process the data!

Bypasses:

- My printer (Xerox 6130) allows setting the session timeout up to 1000 seconds, i.e., about 18 minutes; this will mostly be sufficient to avoid the problem.
- Print to Postscript file and send this manually to the printer, without interference of Cups. Of course, this is not a solution for end users and only sensible if the problem doesn't occur too often.

- Menno