printing from shell to print center?

[corvus]

Is there a command-line way to print to the printers that are defined in Print Center?

In other words, does lpr (or equivalent command) hook into the core OS X printing mechanism?

thanks.

[Novajo]

It seems to me your only option is to make an AppleScript that prints a single file and make an alias in your shell to call the script with the file you are trying to print. You could use something along the lines of:

tell application "Finder"
set theFile to "/something/somewhere"
print (POSIX file theFile) as alias
end tell

and maybe piping it to osascript. I think you have to go through the finder and the related application. Therefore, if anyway you have to open an application, you might as well do it in AppleScript.

[corvus]

Thanks for the reply.

When you say shell alias, I assume you mean a csh type alias, like you might put in a user's .cshrc file. Is that right?

And regarding your AppleScript, parts of this line puzzle me:

print (POSIX file theFile) as alias

I get everything up to the 'as alias' part. What does it mean to print somefile as alias?

I'll give this solution a try when I can. Don't have OS X at my disposal right now.

[Novajo]

Yes, put the alias in .tcshrc

I believe it is:

print (this)

where "this" is ((POSIX file "/whatever") as alias).


Printing the file in the finder is the same as opening the application and printing.

I am not sure though. Anyway, if that does not work, remove alias. Take a look at the Finder AppleScript dictionary in Open Dictionary... of Script Editor.

[bobsedge]

Check out /usr/sbin/Print

It works for me....

[corvus]

Thanks bobsedge.

I wasn't able to get /usr/sbin/Print to work for me. Here's what I've tried:

% echo "Hello" > /tmp/test.txt
% /usr/sbin/Print -PLW8500EX /tmp/test.txt
[ 1 pages * 1 copy ] left in /private/tmp/502/Temporary Items/test.txt.ps
ERROR: Unable to print.
%

LW8500EX is my printer's name as it shows up in Print Center and

So that's it. Not a very descriptive error message, and nothing related shows up in any /var/log/* file.

However /var/spool/printing/ServerLog has a bit more detail in it, but nothing that tells me what the problem is:

<key>com.apple.printing.ErrorCode</key>
<integer>-50</integer>
<key>com.apple.printing.ErrorText</key>
<string>Invalid parameter</string>
<key>com.apple.printing.EventCode</key>
<integer>4001</integer>
<key>com.apple.printing.EventText</key>
<string>Error occurred</string>


Anyone got any ideas? I may post this over in the Apple forums now that I have more details.

Thanks!

[bobsedge]

I had only tried printing PS files. If I try to print text files I get the same result as you.

Also, I tried

"""
cp /private/tmp/502/Temporary Items/test.txt.ps .
Print test.txt.ps
"""

And this worked. Odd, huh?

Maybe Print doesn't like the space in "Temporary Items"?

Let me know if you figure this out....

[corvus]

I can't print postscript files either, regardless of the path I give to Print (i.e. fully qualified path or not).

I'm about to replace linux on my powerbook with OS X, so once I finish that, I'll test the Print command again.

Thanks for trying things out on your end for me. I did post on apple's forums in the Print Center message board so if something conclusive comes up, I'll relay it back to this forum.

Take care.

[Dr-NiKoN]

I don't see how this is a better solution than lpr. Using this Applescript you can't choose what printer to print from.

Another option might be to wright a shellscript that parses ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.print.PrintCenter.plist, not sure if this is possible though.

nikon

[ngb]

Using the -P option it should be possible to specify the printer, and using the -M option it should be possible to to specify the file type--postscript, text or other.

type 'man Print'

Nate