System Administration Guide: Advanced Administration

How to Enable or Disable a Printer

  1. Log in as superuser, lp, or assume an equivalent role on the print server.

  2. Stop printing print requests.


    # disable [-c | -W] [-r "reason"] printer-name
    

    disable

    Cancels the current job, then disables the printer. The current job is saved to reprint when the printer is enabled.

    -c

    Cancels the current job, then disables the printer. The current job is not printed later. 

    -W

    Waits until the current job is finished before disabling the printer. 

    -r "reason"

    Provides users with a reason why the printer is disabled. The reason is stored and displayed whenever a user checks on the status of the printer with the lpstat -p command.

    printer-name

    Name of the printer that will stop printing print requests. 


    Note –

    You cannot enable or disable classes of printers. Only individual printers can be enabled or disabled.


  3. Start printing print requests.


    # enable printer-name
    
  4. Verify that the printer is enabled.


    $ lpstat -p printer-name
    

Examples—Enabling or Disabling a Printer

The following example shows how to stop the current job on the printer luna, save it to print later, and provide a reason why the printer has stopped printing print requests.


# disable -r "changing the form" luna

The following example shows how to start printing print requests on the printer luna.


# enable luna
printer "luna" enabled