Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!aplcen!jhunix!barrett
From: barrett@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU (Dan Barrett)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.ultrix
Subject: LAT patches have messed up my Imagen printer -- help?
Message-ID: <7834@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU>
Date: 26 Mar 91 21:18:04 GMT
Organization: The Johns Hopkins University - HCF
Lines: 49


	Our DECsystem 5400 (Ultrix 4.0, Rev. 179) started crashing
mysteriously one day.  We traced the problem to LAT (/etc/lcp in rc.local),
and DEC had a kernel patch for the problem:

>The kernel modules in file lat.24SEP90.tar correct the following problems:
>...
>  2)	PANICS
>	The following panics have been fixed:
>
>	"unaligned access" - caused by receipt of a large status message

This fixed the crashing, but has hosed our Imagen printer.  It has been
connected to a DECserver 200 terminal server for many months in its current
configuration, working perfectly.  As soon as we installed the LAT patches
on our 5400, the Imagen refused to print binary files (such as TeX DVI
files).  The symptoms are that the files enter the printer but do not come
out.  If you send an ordinary text file to the printer, it "pushes out" the
pages of the old binary file printout (totally garbled).

	In addition, print jobs sometimes just hang, saying "no daemon
present" or "waiting for imagen to connect" (lpq messages).

	Ultrix Software Support tried to help us for a while, but finally
said (oh, those famous words), "Sorry, the Imagen is not a supported
printer" and that was the end of the help.

	So now, the best printer in our department doesn't work anymore.

(1)	Can anyone help?  So far, we have already tried using different
	ttys for the printer, and moving the "op" and "ts" printcap items
	onto the /etc/lcp command line.  No dice.

	I am toying with the idea of setting up a remote print queue on
	a different machine for the Imagen.  But this is a last resort,
	since our "other machines" are unreliable.

(2)	Has anyone else gotten these LAT patches and had a similar problem?

(3)	Will DEC ever consider my problem as an Ultrix LAT problem, or is
	this unlikely ever to be "fixed" in later versions of Ultrix?

                                                        Dan

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