Shell Programming and Scripting

I am working on an Linux based application where I am using lp -onobanner -s -d$RPTDEST command to print the file on desired printer. Variable $RPTDEST could be different each time even for the same user. I need to implent the check if last print command was succesful or not, so that application can show an confirmation messasage to user with (problem description if possible).
I am not sure how to check the print status of perticular printer, can any one please help?

Thanks in advance....

Hello dpmore,

you can also check the log files to see the success or failures of the command.
for e.g.

Code:

tail -f /var/log/lp.log

The name of the file may be same or different. Please check it. This will show the contents of the file in real time. whatever is written to the file is displayed in real time.

Gaurav, thanks for the reply but I really need to do that as a part of shell script or C code. Reason behind this is, we do check the logs every time manualy and now we need to implement the popup for user to with status of his printing job.


Thanks...

Have you tried testing what the value of $? holds? Immediately after your print statement, you could add an if statement similar to this:

Code:

lp -onobanner -s -d$RPTDEST
if [ $? -eq 0 ]  # If the last result equals 0, then it was successful
then
  echo "The command was successful"
else
  echo "It didn't work"
fi