CUPS-PDF and Xubuntu Print Manager

Not long ago I posted how to print documents to a virtual PDF printer using CUPS.

That was for Dapper, but I wanted to install the PDF printer on Edgy using the new Print Manager GUI – system-config-printer, rather than the URL way.

If you haven’t got the cups-pdf package, get it from the Ubuntu universe repository using apt-get or aptitude,

sudo aptitude install cups-pdf

Once that package is installed, start up the Print Manager, and proceed to add a new printer.

When you get to the step of choosing the connection, you should now have the option of a ‘Virtual Printer’. If you select that is should also display cups-pdf:/ in the printer URI.

In the section regarding the PPD, I chose a Generic printer. (Similar to my previous post on CUPS-PDF printing, you could use the PPD supplied in the cups-pdf package)

In the section regarding the model and driver to use, I chose the PostScript Printer Model and PostScript Driver.

Once that’s setup you should be able to see the PDF Printer in the GUI, and in the Print dialogs of your applications.

Printing Manager in Xubuntu

Another post inspired by messing around with Xubuntu at work.

At home I have no printer connected to my PC, I can’t remember the last time I wanted to print anything out. At work though, I need to print out things all the time.

Xubuntu Edgy uses a Printer GUI from Fedora Core 6; system-config-printer to manage printers. I used it to setup a connection to a local printer on my PC. It’s pretty straightforward.

The application should be in the Applications -> Settings Menu -> Printing.

From there choose the New Printer button. In the next screen enter the name for the printer and optional human-readable name and location.

The next step is to choose the connection to the printer. My printer is connected by USB, so I chose USB #1. (I later tried to connect to another printer on our network using SAMBA without any luck yet.)

Next I had to choose the PostScript Printer Description (PPD) from the list of available options.

Last thing to setup is the model and driver for the printer.

After the print setup is complete, specific options for the printer can be changed; whether it is the default printer, paper size, print quality and so on.

PDF Printing in Xubuntu using CUPS

Printing to PDF in Windows is a royal pain at best.

I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to install the cups-pdf printer on Xubuntu.

First thing is to install the cups-pdf printer (it’s in the universe repository)

sudo apt-get cups-pdf

Next thing is to set the permissions of the cups-pdf printer to set user id. This allows the person/process that executes the file to have access to system resources, as if they were the owner of the file (which in this case is root).

sudo chmod +s /usr/lib/cups/backend/cups-pdf

The next part comes from the Xubuntu documentation section on printing…

First you need to open the User and Groups interface from the System menu, and add the user cupsys to the group shadow. Once done you can restart the cupsys daemon

sudo /etc/init.d/cupsys restart

Then open an internet browser to http://localhost:631/admin. You’ll need to enter in your username and sudo password. From there you can click the Administration tab, and you should be able to see the PDF-Printer, ready to be added.

Firstly the ‘make/manufacturer’ of the printer must be set: generic. Then you can move on to choose the ‘model/driver’ for the printer: Generic Postscript Printer Foomatic/Postscript.

(After reading the CUPS Documentation it seems that there is a .ppd file you can use to install a colour postscript printer, but the Generic one seems to be working fine at the moment).

So finally, you should have the printer displayed in the web browser, and be able to print from applications.

The PDF’s are saved (by default) in a folder in your home folder : /home/user/PDF

Results seems good to me …

Poor Cech