I'm new at the entire spectrum of printing in Unix, and especially when--as I understand it--the printers are on a Windows server. At work we have a variety of printers and printing from Windows, or from Unix via lp or lpr works fine.

The initial problem: Our users will be printing up to 20 copies of 200+ page postscript files. I'm told that sending all of these at once occasionally makes the printers unhappy, causing them to output a dump.

My approach: The printing runs through a script on Unix; therefore, I can use commands (lpq, lpstat) to check the queues/status and add some delay.

The new problem: lpq does not see the printers and lpstat tells me they are in an "unknown state." I assume this is because the printers are hosted from a Windows server? If so, is it possible to check their queues and/or cancel their jobs from Unix? Is this a configuration issue, or simply my lack of knowledge?

Much appreciated.

You may find that CUPS gives you much more control.

Common Unix Printing System - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia