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lpc(8)

NAME

     lpc -- line printer control program

SYNOPSIS

     lpc [command [argument ...]]

DESCRIPTION

     The lpc utility is used by the system administrator to control the opera-
     tion of the line printer system.  For each line printer configured in
     /etc/printcap, lpc may be used to:

	   o   disable or enable a printer,

	   o   disable or enable a printer's spooling queue,

	   o   rearrange the order of jobs in a spooling queue,

	   o   find the status of printers, and their associated spooling
	       queues and printer daemons,

	   o   change the status message for printer queues (the status mes-
	       sage may be seen by users as part of the output of the lpq(1)
	       utility).

     Without any arguments, lpc will prompt for commands from the standard
     input.  If arguments are supplied, lpc interprets the first argument as a
     command and the remaining arguments as parameters to the command.	The
     standard input may be redirected causing lpc to read commands from file.
     Commands may be abbreviated; the following is the list of recognized com-
     mands.

     ? [command ...]
     help [command ...]
	     Print a short description of each command specified in the argu-
	     ment list, or, if no argument is given, a list of the recognized
	     commands.

     abort {all | printer}
	     Terminate an active spooling daemon on the local host immediately
	     and then disable printing (preventing new daemons from being
	     started by lpr(1)) for the specified printers.

     bottomq printer [jobspec ...]
	     Take the specified jobs in the order specified and move them to
	     the bottom of the printer queue.  Each jobspec can match multiple
	     print jobs.  The full description of a jobspec is given below.

     clean {all | printer}
	     Remove any temporary files, data files, and control files that
	     cannot be printed (i.e., do not form a complete printer job) from
	     the specified printer queue(s) on the local machine.  This com-
	     mand will also look for core files in spool directory for each
	     printer queue, and list any that are found.  It will not remove
	     any core files.  See also the tclean command.

     disable {all | printer}
	     Turn the specified printer queues off.  This prevents new printer
	     sage.  The message doesn't need to be quoted, the remaining argu-
	     ments are treated like echo(1).  This is normally used to take a
	     printer down, and let other users find out why it is down (the
	     lpq(1) utility will indicate that the printer is down and will
	     print the status message).

     enable {all | printer}
	     Enable spooling on the local queue for the listed printers.  This
	     will allow lpr(1) to put new jobs in the spool queue.

     exit
     quit    Exit from lpc.

     restart {all | printer}
	     Attempt to start a new printer daemon.  This is useful when some
	     abnormal condition causes the daemon to die unexpectedly, leaving
	     jobs in the queue.  lpq(1) will report that there is no daemon
	     present when this condition occurs.  If the user is the super-
	     user, try to abort the current daemon first (i.e., kill and
	     restart a stuck daemon).

     setstatus {all | printer} -msg message ...
	     Set the status message for the specified printers.  The -msg
	     argument is required to separate the list of printers from the
	     text that will be the new status message.	This is normally used
	     to change the status message when the printer queue is no longer
	     active after printing has been disabled, and you want to change
	     what users will see in the output of the lpq(1) utility.

     start {all | printer}
	     Enable printing and start a spooling daemon for the listed print-
	     ers.

     status {all | printer}
	     Display the status of daemons and queues on the local machine.

     stop {all | printer}
	     Stop a spooling daemon after the current job completes and dis-
	     able printing.

     tclean {all | printer}
	     This will do a test-run of the clean command.  All the same
	     checking is done, but the command will only print out messages
	     saying what a similar clean command would do if the user typed it
	     in.  It will not remove any files.  Note that the clean command
	     is a privileged command, while the tclean command is not
	     restricted.

     topq printer [jobspec ...]
	     Take the specified jobs in the order specified and move them to
	     the top of the printer queue.  Each jobspec can match multiple
	     print jobs.  The full description of a jobspec is given below.

     up {all | printer}
	     Enable everything and start a new printer daemon.	Undoes the
	     effects of down.

     Commands such as topq and bottomq can take one or more jobspec to specify
     o	 a specific userid, which will match all jobs which were sent by that
	 user.	Eg: jones,

     o	 a host name, when prefixed by an `@', which will match all jobs in
	 the queue which were sent from the given host.  Eg: @freebsd.org,

     o	 a job range and a userid, separated by a `:', which will match all
	 jobs which both match the job range and were sent by the specified
	 user.	Eg: jones:17 or 21-32:jones,

     o	 a job range and/or a userid, followed by a host name, which will
	 match all jobs which match all the specified criteria.  Eg:
	 jones@freebsd.org or 21-32@freebsd.org or jones:17@freebsd.org.

     The values for userid and host name can also include pattern-matching
     characters, similar to the pattern matching done for filenames in most
     command shells.  Note that if you enter a topq or bottomq command as
     parameters on the initial lpc command, then the shell will expand any
     pattern-matching characters that it can (based on what files in finds in
     the current directory) before lpc processes the command.  In that case,
     any parameters which include pattern-matching characters should be
     enclosed in quotes, so that the shell will not try to expand them.

FILES

     /etc/printcap	 printer description file
     /var/spool/*	 spool directories
     /var/spool/*/lock	 lock file for queue control

SEE ALSO

     lpq(1), lpr(1), lprm(1), printcap(5), chkprintcap(8), lpd(8)

DIAGNOSTICS

     ?Ambiguous command  abbreviation matches more than one command

     ?Invalid command  no match was found

     ?Privileged command  you must be a member of group "operator" or root to
     execute this command

HISTORY

     The lpc utility appeared in 4.2BSD.

FreeBSD 5.4			 July 16, 2002			   FreeBSD 5.4

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