rastertoqpdl segfaults or produces black printouts

Forwarded upstream as

http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=2101834&group_id=175815&atid=874746

Can you generate a Backtrace as described on

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingProgramCrash

and also post the file(s) which you have tried to print?

I'm sorry that the information provided so far ist too thin.

It seems that, if the print-job's media size differs from the printer's default media-size, rastertoqpdl segfaults.
My printer is set to A4 media, while all KDE programs use "Letter" by default. This probably has caused the crashes I observed earlier.
However, even if rastertoqpdl doesn't crash, the printouts still are completely black.

I've attached a small LaTeX document and the resulting input.ps/input.pdf files to demonstrate the problem. The document size is set to A4 media.
# ML-2510_(Ubuntu) is using Splix (rastertoqpdl):
# no crash/ black printout; see bug267903.tar.gz/target_media_a4/*
lp -d "ML-2510_(Ubuntu)" -o media=a4 input.ps

# segfault; see bug267903.tar.gz/target_media_letter/*
lp -d "ML-2510_(Ubuntu)" -o media=letter input.ps

As already mentioned, the Samsung-driver works fine in both cases. Unfortunatelly, I don't know how to efficiently debug a CUPS filter. I noticed, however, that everything seems to get piped through /usr/lib/cups/filter/pdftoraster before it is fed to rastertoqpdl. Therefore I've created a small wrapper script around pdftoraster which records command-line arguments, environment variables and the output from the "real" pdftoraster, which is then used as input to a "stand-alone" (i.e. not started by CUPS) rastertoqpdl with gdb or valgrind attached. If there is a better way to do this, please let me know.

The following debugging packages are installed:
cups-dbg libc6-dbg libcomerr2-dbg libgcc1-dbg libgcrypt11-dbg libgnutls26-dbg libgpg-error0-dbgsym libjpeg62-dbgsym libkeyutils1-dbgsym libkrb53-dbgsym libpng12-0-dbgsym libstdc++6-4.3-dbg libtasn1-3-dbg libtiff4-dbgsym splix-dbgsym zlib1g-dbg
Yet, gdb still complains about missing debugging symbols. I hope the backtraces help to isolate the problem nevertheless.

Please feel free to ask, if you need further information.

Thank you for all this info. I have informed the upstream author.

Can you do the following test, where the Ubuntu package is replaced by the distribution-indepenmdent LSB package:

dpkg -P splix
wget http://openprinting.org/download/printdriver/debian/dists/lsb3.2/main/binary-amd64/splix_2.0.0-0.rc2.0lsb3.2_amd64.deb
sudo apt-get install lsb
sudo dpkg -i splix_2.0.0-0.rc2.0lsb3.2_amd64.deb

Now remove your print queue and create a new one. Can you print now?

I've installed the LSB package; unfortunately, nothing has changed. Printing in Letter format causes a segfault while A4 produces a black page.
I've repeated the steps described in my last post and attached the results.

The black page is probably the same issue as described in bug 269691

Can you replace the file

/usr/lib/cups/filter/pdftoraster

by the file attached there (http://launchpadlibrarian.net/17900845/pdftoraster) and try again?

Does this solve the problem of the black page? Does it even resolve the problem of the crashing rastertoqpdl?

The supplied version of pdftoraster solves both problems: no black pages and rastertoqpdl doesn't crash. Thank you.
And sorry for getting you on the wrong track with rastertoqpdl.

CUPS filter workaround solves this for the beta, moving milestone ...

I have a similar printer problem, the HP Foomatic drivers worked fine in Hardy but not in Intrepid
2.6.27-4-generic #1 SMP Wed Sep 24 01:30:51 UTC 2008 i686 GNU/Linux
HP 3600n Color laser Printer on LAN

HP Color Laserjet 3600 Foomatic/pxljr[en]
Does not print out test sheet properly omits Oubuntu header text and 100% Red, Yellow, Magenta colour blocks.

HP Color Laserjet 3600 Foomatic/hpijs[en]
Does not print out test sheet properly, omits Oubuntu header text (all colour blocks print ok)

BOTH:
When printing front page of news.bbc.co.uk prints out text but shows pics as black filled rectangles
Print Preview shows as expected.
Pagination and layout otherwise ok

bwallum, do you have a completely up-to-date Intrepid, especially with CUPS 1.3.8-11ubuntu1, pxljr 1.1-0ubuntu3, and HPLIP 2.8.7-0ubuntu3?

"do you have a completely up-to-date Intrepid, especially with CUPS 1.3.8-11ubuntu1, pxljr 1.1-0ubuntu3, and HPLIP 2.8.7-0ubuntu3?"

Yes (as reported by Synaptic) and I have just updated the whole system.

bwallum , both problems which you have reported are independent of this bug report. Please report new bugs in such a case.

The problem of the test page without Ubuntu logo and frames I have solved now. This will work correct again as soon as you get cups_1.3.8-11ubuntu2 with an update. I have uploaded this package now and it will be on the mirrors in some hours.

The problem of the color squares not being printed with the pxljr driver is an upstream bug of the driver. It is even independent of the PDF printing workflow. It happens the same way independent whether Ghostscript is fed with PDF or PostScript input. To work around it, print in "High" quality ("Printout Mode" option) or use the HPIJS driver.

bwallum, news.bbc.co.uk prints correctly for me now (with the pxljr driver in "High" quality), used Firefox 2.x on a remote box). Probably the CUPS fix has covered this, too.

Thanks Till, I will wait and see if the updates fix all my issues before raising a separate bug. Thanks for the time in responding, apologies for not filing the bug properly in the first place. Bye just now, Bob

The SpliX crashes should not happen any more with the SpliX version which I have uploaded now.

The final fix of the CUPS package for the black pages will soon get uploaded, too.

New CUPS package is uploaded now. Please check whether you do not get black pages any more.