(Solved) I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Quick to answer questions about finding your way around Linux Mint as a new user.
Forum rules
There are no such things as "stupid" questions. However if you think your question is a bit stupid, then this is the right place for you to post it. Stick to easy to-the-point questions that you feel people can answer fast. For long and complicated questions use the other forums in the support section.
Before you post read how to get help. Topics in this forum are automatically closed 6 months after creation.
Locked
gibbsre

(Solved) I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by gibbsre »

I had to reinstall my system from a disk I burned as an ISO. Now I cant print. It says no printer installed. When I go through the HP toolbox to try and reinstall it, all goes well until the end, and I get the error message ( cups not running, restart cups and proceed). My question is first, how did cups stop, and how do I restart it ?
It was all working before when I burned the ISO I created. Synaptic shows all elements of the HP system installed so I am to say the least confused.
I am not a command line person, so it may take some explaining to get me over this bump in the road, but all help is appreciated. It is probably something really simple, but even those things sometimes seem confusing to a novice. I have 4 other systems on this pc, and the printer works fine on all the others. Fedora 10, Ubuntu 8.10, Mepis 8, and Kubuntu 8.10, as well as, of course, Mint 6

Thanks all
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
altair4
Level 20
Level 20
Posts: 11427
Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:27 am

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by altair4 »

Open Terminal
Type sudo service cups restart
Please add a [SOLVED] at the end of your original subject header if your question has been answered and solved.
gibbsre

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by gibbsre »

altair4 wrote:Open Terminal
Type sudo service cups restart
Thanks so much. I'll give it a go when I get home to the offending pc. I figured it would be some command that would do it, but try as I could, I could not find it any where. I googled for a hour last night until my eyes were on fire. Thank goodness for all the nice folks on the Mint forum with knowledge, and the willingness to share it. :D
gibbsre

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by gibbsre »

altair4 wrote:Open Terminal
Type sudo service cups restart
Well I am home now and I tried it, this is what I got. Any suggestions as to what this means ?

Thanks again

ron@rons-desktop ~ $ sudo service cups restart
[sudo] password for ron:
* Restarting Common Unix Printing System: cupsd cupsd: Child exited with status 1! [fail]

Edit: I tried to open "default printer" and an error notice comes up stating "CUPS server error" " the CUPS scheduler is not running".
Just trying to give as much info as I can.

Thanks
altair4
Level 20
Level 20
Posts: 11427
Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:27 am

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by altair4 »

Let's try to look at the cups error log to see what the problem is:

Open Terminal
Type gksudo nautilus
Goto /var/log/cups/error_log
Double click that file to open up gedit and see if there are any error messages and post the results.

BTW, printing has always been the Achilles heel of linux and unix before that so don't think you're "stupid". :wink:
Please add a [SOLVED] at the end of your original subject header if your question has been answered and solved.
altair4
Level 20
Level 20
Posts: 11427
Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:27 am

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by altair4 »

Given the time differences between us I decided to look at my notes ( I keep notes on these sorts of things ) to see if this has ever happened to me before and it has. I got the same error:
Restarting Common Unix Printing System: cupsd cupsd: Child exited with status 1! [fail]
Now that could mean almost anything but in looking at /var/log/cups/error_log it listed the following error:
"/etc/cups/ssl/server.crt" is a bad symlink - No such file or directory

If you have this exact error I may have a solution:
Open Terminal
Type sudo apt-get install --reinstall ssl-cert
Answer yes when it asks you if you want to continue then after the reinstall:
Type sudo service cups restart

See if that works. There is one other thing to try if you have the same "bad symlink" error with server.crt but it's a little more risky.
Please add a [SOLVED] at the end of your original subject header if your question has been answered and solved.
gibbsre

Re: I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by gibbsre »

altair4 wrote:Given the time differences between us I decided to look at my notes ( I keep notes on these sorts of things ) to see if this has ever happened to me before and it has. I got the same error:
Restarting Common Unix Printing System: cupsd cupsd: Child exited with status 1! [fail]
Now that could mean almost anything but in looking at /var/log/cups/error_log it listed the following error:
"/etc/cups/ssl/server.crt" is a bad symlink - No such file or directory

If you have this exact error I may have a solution:
Open Terminal
Type sudo apt-get install --reinstall ssl-cert
Answer yes when it asks you if you want to continue then after the reinstall:
Type sudo service cups restart

See if that works. There is one other thing to try if you have the same "bad symlink" error with server.crt but it's a little more risky.
Thanks again for trying to help me out, but I got impatient to use my printer in Mint ( I had a document stored there) and so I backed up all my home directory to another partition, burned a clean copy of Mint 6.0 and reinstalled it on the same partition where it was before. Everything is working fine again now. I suspect it had something to do with using the remastersys created ISO disk I had used for the reinstall before. Anyway, I am saving this post in case I ever have this particular problem again, and I really do appreciate your interest, and response to an old guy (62) trying to learn, late in life, as much as he can about pc's in general, and Linux in particular. I have used as many as 15 different desktop distros in the last 8 months, and I like Mint the best for it's ease of transition from Windows. I don't have windows on any of my pc's ( 4 ) any longer.
I am using a couple of distros that aren't quite as easy, just to try things out, and learn as much as I can. I don't think I will ever be a command line commando, but every little thing I learn makes me even more determined to be as effeceint as I can be, with my level of intelligence, and ability. Nice folks like yourself willing to help us ( the less experienced ) will go a long way in helping make Linux even more viable in the market place of those seeking to break free of the Gates death grip on computing. Well, I didn't intend to go into a long winded rant, but let me say once again, Thank You !!
sutton

Re: (Solved) I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by sutton »

This solution worked for me too!
Fred

Re: (Solved) I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by Fred »

gibbsre,

I have been across this thread a number of times. There is one thing that grates on me. The topic. Having read your posts I would be willing to bet you are not stupid by any stretch. I am in your age group, several years older in fact, and most of us didn't get this old being stupid or by accident. :-)

Don't put yourself down, It gives all us old folks a bad name. :-)

I knew altair4 would lead you in the right direction. He is very good. The advice he gives is always worth listening to.

Welcome!

Fred
gibbsre

Re: (Solved) I know I am stupid, but.......I have printer issues

Post by gibbsre »

Fred wrote:gibbsre,

I have been across this thread a number of times. There is one thing that grates on me. The topic. Having read your posts I would be willing to bet you are not stupid by any stretch. I am in your age group, several years older in fact, and most of us didn't get this old being stupid or by accident. :-)

Don't put yourself down, It gives all us old folks a bad name. :-)

I knew altair4 would lead you in the right direction. He is very good. The advice he gives is always worth listening to.

Welcome!

Fred
Thanks for the words of support. I guess I have suffered from low self esteem issues for a lot of my life, and to some degree still do.
Most of the folks on these forums treat newbies with respect, and understanding, but I have been berated so many times for not knowing what to do, and "going under the hood" as it were, that I am sometimes a little stand offish ( if that is even a word ), about asking for help. I feel it is like I told someone on another forum, we cant all be master mechanics, but we all have to drive to get somewhere. I am trying as much as I can to learn Linux, with the time I can invest in to it, but it is sometimes way over my head. Some make it easy as did altair4, and others speak to deep in to the realm of "Linux speak" for me to grasp. I have to agree though, putting ones self down isn't the best thing to do, and I will try to avoid doing that particular activity in the future. Thanks, Ron
Locked

Return to “Beginner Questions”