UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Problem Overview: We have a scheduler that prints report on any of the network printer.

Problem Statement: We need to find a UNIX command that picks up either A4, legal or letter size paper form the printer.

I found out a command but it's not working on our environment.
lpr -h -P <printer name> -# <no of pages to be printed> -o media=Letter test.txt

it gives the following error.
lpr: illegal option -- o

the command

lpr -h -P <printer name> -# <no of pages to be printed> test.txt

Prints the test.txt on an A4 paper.

Please reply help me

Try to run your command using the 'lp' command instead of 'lpr'.

It may work, it may not. This depends heavily on what version of UNIX you're running and what type of printer you're running with it. The media option may simply not exist on your system.

Thanks for your help but this does not solve the problem. The version we have is 5.8 Generic_117350-29 sun4u sparc SUNW,Sun-Fire-V440

Printers - run away and hide!

The lp command has options that can be specified via the -o option, but they are model dependent.

Some manufacturers supply printer interface scripts for UNIX, and some even work!

But I have found myself customising scripts with model-specific escape sequences on many a fraught occasion.

(The worst one was not too long ago when a number of offices replaced their printers with a different manufacturer, and the first we knew about it was when we started getting calls from the helpdesk saying that printouts were missing and/or re-spooling continuously!)