Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

wetterau · Joined: 13 Jul 2005 Posts: 28

Puppy improving all the time. Great system. I used cups on 2.12 with no problem. 2.13 won't work with an HP2200 laserjet, even though the driver is listed. Have tried several times with the same result. I can print from a terminal to /dev/lp0, but geany or abiword dies with the message: unable to find dither matrix file. Does this ring any bells? I hate to install cups if there is a simple solution (something I'm screwing up). Thanks

lonsdale · Joined: 13 Jun 2006 Posts: 11 Location: Toronto

I upgraded from Puppy Linux 2.12 to 2.13 last night. My HP LaserJet 4L printer has worked well under 2.12. But it didn't work under 2.13.

So I checked the details of the last print job and found that similiar message described by the previous poster. I had a feeling that the PDQ printer management's default settings has been replaced during the automatic upgrading process.

So I added a new printer to the PDQ printer management and set it as a new default printer like before. But I got the same message, too.

However, keep up the good work on Puppy Linux, everyone! Very Happy

kirk · Joined: 11 Nov 2005 Posts: 1033 Location: florida

See Barry's blog from Dec, 29 :

http://www.puppyos.net/news/

If Barry doesn't see this in a few days, send him a PM. I'm sure he can post the files somewhere, maybe as a petget package. This might be another use for the z_drv file.

wetterau · Joined: 13 Jul 2005 Posts: 28

Solved, I think. I downloaded cups, the latest from pakt, which worked with Abiword right away but not with Geany. I then discovered the string in both programs that sends files to the printer (edit preferences). I changed "lpr" to "lp" and that worked. Probably I did this long ago and forgot. The 2.13 iso did not like my 2.12 pup_save file; I had to start over with a new one. Either there were old settings for these printer call strings in the pup_save file that didn't get updated, or Abiword & Geany in 2.13 were new versions that use "lpr" Dunno.

stever59 · Joined: 05 Jan 2007 Posts: 3

I have a similar problem with not being able to find the dither matrix file.

I did a HDD install of 2.13(final) to a clean partition. I used the printer wizard to install a Brother HL-1435 as a HL-1440 on a local USB port. Printing from SeaMonkey produces no output, although the printer woke up. The message log shows an error finding the dither-matrix file.

I confirmed that the file is on the drive where it was added for the 2.13 final release.

Only general principle I'd rather get Gutenprint working without installing CUPS instead.

Any suggestions? I'm computer literate but new to Puppy.

BarryK · Posted: Tue 09 Jan 2007, 01:56 Post_subject:

Can you guys put these files into Puppy, see if that fixes it.
The background on this is in my News Blog.

Uncompress first:
# gunzip dither-matrix-1x1.xml.gz
# gunzip dither-matrix-4x1.xml.gz

Then copy them to /usr/share/gutenprint/5.0.0/xml/
(you can of course download direct to there and uncompress in-place).

If that fixes it, I would like to know which one is responsible.

wetterau · Joined: 13 Jul 2005 Posts: 28

Barry, thanks for your reply. I checked in the directory that you sited and found 3 dither-matrix files there already! 1x1, 2x1, and 4x1. Printing is now working for me, but only after I installed cups. I don't know whether cups put those files in there or not. I can't recreate the problem unless, perhaps, I remove cups and begin all over again. Is anyone else seeing this problem?

stever59 · Joined: 05 Jan 2007 Posts: 3

My /usr/share/gutenprint/5.0.0/xml/ only had dither-matrix-2x1.xml in it. When I added dither-matrix-1x1.xml per Barry's instructions the xpdq error stopped happening. Printing this forum page from SeaMonkey woke up the printer and the Data transfer light flashed, but I got no pages out of the printer (yes, there is paper loaded Smile

). I changed the interface options in xpdq to "Send EOF" and tried again, but still no printout.

Adding dither-matrix-4x1.xml made no further difference.

Renaming dither-matrix-1x1.xml to hide-1x1 caused the xpdq "ERROR: Gutenprint: Cannot find dither matrix file! Aborting" error to reappear in the xpdq log. Restoring dither-matrix-1x1.xml made the message disappear again. But still no successful printout.

I opened /boot/grub/menu.lst (an ASCII text file) in Geany and tried to print that. I got a blank page out. I changed the interface options back to "Don't send EOF" and reprinted. No pages now (not even a blank one). I tried a couple more times and got 1 blank page for every 2 print attempts.

Printing testdoc.doc from Abiword also got a blank page.
Changing Xpdq driver options from "Print shades of grey" to "Print black and white only" got 1 blank page in 2 tries from Geany.

I tried installing a couple of other drivers and just got printer alarms.

That's all I have time for right now. Any ideas? Thanks for the progress so far.

lonsdale · Joined: 13 Jun 2006 Posts: 11 Location: Toronto

As per your instructions, I installed the two XML files. Then I tested my printer which is HP LaserJet 4L. And it worked! It looks like that you'll have to keep those two files for the next version of Puppy Linux. Better alert that guy with the LitePup 2.13 version. I'm going to put those two files onto my other older PC. Great job, Barry!

BarryK · Posted: Fri 12 Jan 2007, 06:41 Post_subject:

stever59, did the printer seem to be printing? I mean, did it just eject the pages or did it seem to be going through the motions of actual printing?

stever59 · Joined: 05 Jan 2007 Posts: 3

It appears to print, but nothing happens, or I get a single blank page.
The "Data" LED on the printer blinks as it usually does when receiving data, and the printer makes promising noises.

I tried printing the output to a file from SeaMonkey, and got 440.4 Kb of text that looks like Postscript.

It works fine under Firefox on WinXP.

gibbo · Joined: 21 Jan 2007 Posts: 5

I'm new to puppy linux and I've just installed v2.13 for the first time. Very impressed by how easy and quick it was to install but ran into the same problem as above when trying to print to a Brother HL-1250 laser printer. Eventually looked at the Xpdq error log and found the "Cannot find dither matrix file" error.
I've now tried adding the extra dither-matrix-4x1.xml and dither-matrix-1x1.xml to /usr/share/gutenprint/5.0.0/xml/ ( a dither-matrix-2xl.xml file was already there ) with the following results:
no extra files: Printer data light flashes briefly and the motor wakes up - but no output.
add 4x1 file only: no change.
add 1x1 file only: printer works OK
add both files: printer works OK
Anyone know what these files are for? Does a given printer just need one of them?
Many thanks to BarryK for solving this problem.