Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!shadooby!eecae!netnews.upenn.edu!rutgers!hjuxa!mal
From: mal@hjuxa.UUCP (LEACH)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Determining if a printer is available
Message-ID: <1422@hjuxa.UUCP>
Date: 29 Mar 89 18:15:46 GMT
References: <42@datcon.UUCP>
Organization: Digital Equipment Corp, Manalapan NJ
Lines: 18

From article <42@datcon.UUCP>, by sar@datcon.UUCP (Simon A Reap):

> But beware: as far as I can see, even hacking as assembler, there's no
> way to differentiate between an on-line paper-full printer all ready to
> roll out your pearls, and a printer that's just powered OFF :-) (sure
> saves paper that way!)  BTW, we're talking standard PC here (and a
> million and one clones) and yer actual Epson FX80.  The BIOS calls give
> identical results for the two printer states, the printer status
> registers are the same - what else can I try?

Gee; this came up about the same time I came up withi a similar question.
Is there anyway to determine if the print queue is empty?

The only way I can think of is to exec print.com redirecting it's output, then
searching through the resulting file.  But talk about FUGLY!!
-- 
Michael A. Leach   uucp:    {decvax,clyde,rutgers,decuac}!hjuxa!mal
		   email:   hjuxa!mal@decuac.dec.com  OR  leach@unxa.dec.com