Setting Up Printers That are Associated With PPD Files
You can set up a printer and associate that printer with a
PPD file by using either Solaris Print Manager or LP print commands.
When adding or modifying a printer in Solaris Print Manager, the default option
is to use PPD files. The Use PPD files attribute is located
in the Print Manager drop-down menu of Solaris Print Manager. This default option enables
you to select the printer make, model, and driver when you add
new printer or modify an existing printer. To deselect this attribute, remove the checkmark
from the check box. For more information about how to specify PPD files
when a adding a printer, see Administering Printers That Are Associated With PPD Files (Task Map).
To specify a PPD file when adding or modifying a printer by
using LP print commands, use the lpadmin command with the -n option. For more information,
see How to Specify a PPD File When Adding a New Printer by using LP Print Commands.
Using PPD Files When Setting Up a Printer in Solaris Print Manager
Solaris Print Manager includes a Use PPD files option that is the
default when you create a new print queue or modify an existing print
queue. If you do not want to specify a PPD file, you can
override this option by removing the checkmark from the check box. To switch
back to using PPD files, recheck the Use PPD files check box.
Note that if you create a new print queue or modify an
existing print queue with PPD files in Solaris Print Manger, you cannot assign
the printer type or file content type printer definitions. However, If you do
not use PPD files when creating a print queue, you can assign these
printer definitions by deselecting the Use PPD files attribute in the Solaris Print
Manager drop-down menu.
To create a print queue with PPD files, you are required to
provide the following information:
Printer make
Printer model
Printer driver
The definitions for printer make, model, and printer driver are available in Solaris
Print Manager when you create a print queue with the Use PPD
files option selected. Note that this option is the default.
Note - You do not need to create a print queue that uses PPD
files. Also, PPD files are not required for printers that already contain the
RIP feature. You can continue to use Solaris Print Manager to configure
these printers you did previously. To do so, before adding the printer, remove
the checkmark from the Use PPD files check box.
For a detailed description of the printer make, printer model, and printer driver
printer definitions, see Setting Printer Definitions.
Specifying a PPD File When Setting Up a Printer by Using LP Print Commands
Use the -n option with the lpadmin command to specify a PPD file
when creating a new print queue or modifying an existing print queue.
For example, to add the print queue, foobar, to a Lexmark printer, you
would type:
# lpadmin -p foobar -v device -I postscript -m standard_foomatic \ -n /path/Lexmark-Optra_E312-Postscript.ppd.gz
When using the lpadmin -n command to specify a PPD file, you must
provide the full path to the PPD file.
Note - If you use the lpadmin -n command to add a PPD file, and
the repository that you specify in the PPD file path does not exist
on the system, a copy of the PPD file is stored in
the user label directory, within the user repository. This directory is located at
/var/lp/ppd/user/manufacturer/ppd-file. The Solaris Print Manager cache is then updated to reflect the printer
information from the recently added PPD file. For more information, see Chapter 9, Administering Printers by Using the PPD File Management Utility (Tasks).
How to Specify a PPD File When Adding a New Printer by using LP Print Commands
When you use the lpadmin command with the -n option to specify a
PPD file, you are required to provide the full path to the
PPD file. If you choose to use a PPD file that is located
in a different directory, you must specify the full path to that file.
- Become superuser or assume an equivalent role.
Roles contain authorizations and privileged commands. For more information about roles, see Configuring RBAC (Task Map) in System Administration Guide: Security Services.
- To specify a PPD file, use the lpadmin command with the following options:
# lpadmin -p foo -n /home/user/stuff/ppd-file -m \ standard_foomatic -I postscript -v /device
- -p
Specifies the printer name
- -n
Specifies to use a PPD file
- -m
Specifies the interface script for utilizing PPD files
- -v
Specifies the port device that the printer will use
Example 4-11 Specifying a PPD File When Setting Up a Printer
For example, to specify the xyz.ppd file that is located in the user's
home directory, you would type the following command:
# lpadmin -p foo -n /home/user/stuff/xyz.ppd -m \ standard_foomatic -I postscript -v /device
