Changeset 2270 for pykota/trunk/FAQ

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Timestamp:
05/24/05 10:27:28 (20 years ago)
Author:
jerome
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Replaced the FAQ's contents with a link to the brand new online FAQ

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1 modified

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  • pykota/trunk/FAQ

    r2260 r2270  
    33  # $Id$ 
    44   
    5   * How can I diagnose the problem when something goes wrong ? 
     5  This document is now outdated and its contents were removed. 
    66   
    7     Put "LogLevel debug2" in cupsd.conf (usually in /etc/cups/). 
    8     Then put "logger: stderr", "debug: yes" and  
    9     "crashrecipient: youremailaddress" in /etc/pykota/pykota.conf. 
    10     Finally restart CUPS. 
    11     CUPS' error_log file will now contain many informations which 
    12     will help diagnose your problem. You will receive failure 
    13     notices by email, and you can send all this to us for 
    14     diagnostic. Please send complete files and not some sparse 
    15     parts of them. Also please send the log files as gzipped  
    16     (or bzip2-ed) attachments. 
    17      
    18     For LPRng, better to put "logger: system" in pykota.conf so 
    19     that all debug messages for PyKota will go to syslog's 
    20     destination for the LPR syslog facility. 
    21      
    22     IMPORTANT : please don't send log files to the mailing list 
    23     unless they are very small of unless someone asked for this. 
     7  You can access to the online and searchable FAQ at : 
    248   
    25   * Some commands tell me I'm not allowed to use them, why ? 
     9        http://otrs.librelogiciel.com/otrs/faq.pl 
     10         
     11         
    2612   
    27     Some commands refuse to work when launched as a normal user, 
    28     and output a message saying "You're not allowed to use this 
    29     command." This is because their use is reserved to PyKota 
    30     Administrators. A PyKota Administrator is any user allowed 
    31     to read the pykotadmin.conf file. Beware : any user who can 
    32     read this file can connect to PyKota's database in read+write 
    33     mode, so take care of not opening a breach when modifying 
    34     the permissions on this file. 
    35      
    36   * What permissions should I use on PyKota's configuration files ?    
    3713   
    38     It's probably best to do this : 
    39      
    40         $ chown pykota.pykota ~pykota/pykota.conf ~pykota/pykotadmin.conf 
    41         $ chmod 640 ~pykota/pykota.conf 
    42         $ chmod 600 ~pykota/pykotadmin.conf 
    43          
    44     Then the user 'pykota' will be the only PyKota Administrator     
    45     (with user 'root' of course), but all members of the 'pykota' 
    46     group will be allowed to use unrestricted PyKota commands 
    47     like repykota. 
    48      
    49     But on some systems, the following may be needed instead : 
    50        
    51         $ chown lp.pykota pykota.conf pykotadmin.conf 
    52         $ chmod 640 pykota.conf 
    53         $ chmod 640 pykotadmin.conf 
    54          
    55   * How can I limit my users to N pages per day (month/year) ? 
    56    
    57     The easiest way to do this is to create their print quota 
    58     entries using something like : 
    59          
    60       $ edpykota --add -S 30 -H 30 user1 user2 user3 ... 
    61          
    62       this would limit users to 30 pages on each printer. 
    63          
    64     Then in a crontab launched every day (month/year) you could     
    65     do : 
    66      
    67       00 23 * * * /usr/bin/edpykota --reset  
    68          
    69       this would reset every user's page counter to 0 on each printer 
    70       at 23h00 every day.  
    71    
    72   * How can I tell PyKota to allow some users to print without limitation ? 
    73     
    74     Just create these users' print quota entries this way : 
    75      
    76       $ edpykota --add --limitby quota --noquota user1 user2 ... 
    77    
    78       This would effectively put these users in "no limit" mode on 
    79       each printer. If you want to do this only on some printers, just 
    80       use the --printer command line argument as well. See 
    81       edpykota's documentation for details. 
    82        
    83     Another way to do this when you limit your users by balance, is   
    84     to set an overcharging factor of zero for every user you want to 
    85     print with no limitation : 
    86      
    87       $ edpykota --add --limitby balance --overcharge 0 user1 user2 ... 
    88    
    89   * Nothing prints when my printer is in PowerSave mode, what 
    90     can I do ? 
    91      
    92     This happens if you use hardware accounting with SNMP, because 
    93     some (all ?) printers don't say they are idle when they are 
    94     in PowerSave mode. 
    95     For now your best bet is to disable PowerSave mode in 
    96     your printer. In the future, PyKota will modified to 
    97     handle such problems. 
    98    
    99   * I've installed all correctly, I've created users 
    100     and printers, but when printing nothing works.  
    101     What is the problem ? 
    102     The most probable cause for this is that you didn't 
    103     adapt /etc/pykota/pykota.conf to your own configuration. 
    104     The file installed by default is just an example, you 
    105     have to modify it. See the rest of this document to 
    106     learn how to really diagnose what went wrong. 
    107      
    108   * I've downloaded PyKota from Subversion using a Windows based Subversion 
    109     client, and now nothing works at all. What happened ? 
    110      
    111     Some (all?) Windows based CVS or Subversion tools translate *nix line  
    112     endings (character Line Feed, ASCII code 10) into Windows line endings 
    113     (character Carriage Return, ASCII code 13, followed with  
    114     character Line Feed). This breaks the software which has 
    115     to run under *nix compatible systems. Set correct options 
    116     in your Subversion software so that it doesn't do any translation, 
    117     or use an Unix-like version of Subversion, download again and 
    118     reinstall the software. It should work. 
    119      
    120   * Why doesn't CUPS under Debian Woody automatically 
    121     detects PyKota managed devices ? 
    122      
    123     The CUPS version in Debian Woody is 1.1.14 which is a bit 
    124     too old. To use PyKota with this version, just install 
    125     your printers as usual in CUPS web interface, and ensure 
    126     they work fine, then save your changes, and modify 
    127     /etc/cups/printers.conf manually as explained in 
    128     PyKota's toplevel README file. Finally restart CUPS, 
    129     and your printers should be managed by PyKota. 
    130     Another solution is to install a newer CUPS release. 
    131      
    132   * Is print accounting ever exact ? 
    133    
    134     No. Print accounting is **never** exact, because it depends 
    135     on external factors like the presence of paper in the printer, 
    136     the quantity of remaining ink in the print cartridge, paper 
    137     jams, etc... All these things are very difficult to account 
    138     for correctly, and no print accounting package deals with 
    139     these artefacts correctly in all situations. 
    140     We are however confident that PyKota is one of the more 
    141     exact print accounting software, because by default it 
    142     asks the printers for how many pages they have really printed. 
    143      
    144   * Can PyKota account for ink usage ?   
    145    
    146     No. Actually PyKota doesn't account for ink usage, but this 
    147     may come in a future release. PyKota only accounts for pages 
    148     printed and/or money spent.  If ink accounting is a necessity 
    149     for you, PrintBill is recommended instead of PyKota. PrintBill 
    150     allows you to bill differently per color, and to bill depending 
    151     on the percent of the ink covered part of the pages. 
    152      
    153   * What is a 'dumb printer' ? 
    154    
    155     In PyKota, the term 'dumb printer' defines a printer which doesn't  
    156     natively understand PostScript, PCL5 (up to), PCLXL (aka PCL6), PDF  
    157     or ESC/P2 and doesn't have an internal page counter, and for which  
    158     you don't know how to compute a job's size in number of pages by  
    159     analyzing its content.  
    160     Any printer which is not a 'dumb printer' according to the above  
    161     definition is supported by PyKota.  
    162  
    163   * How can I make PyKota work with my non-postscript printer under  
    164     CUPS ?   
    165    
    166     From version 1.16alpha7, PyKota includes a CUPS backend which 
    167     allows you to use any type of printer and any driver, provided 
    168     your printer is not a 'dumb printer' (see above). 
    169      
    170   * How can I use my 'dumb printer' with CUPS and PyKota.   
    171    
    172     You have to use a software accounter directive, and  
    173     create a script which understands your printer's 
    174     Page Description Language. 
    175      
    176     PyKota natively understands DSC compliant PostScript,  
    177     PCL3, PCL4, PCL5, PCLXL (aka PCL6), PDF and ESC/P2. Support  
    178     for Binary PostScript is done through GhostScript. More PDLs 
    179     will be added in the future.   
    180     However you can always plug your own PDL analyzer in PyKota. 
    181            
    182   * I've got a great number of users. How can I automatically 
    183     set an initial print quota for them on first print ? 
    184      
    185     You have to define an external policy for unknown users, 
    186     to automatically add them to the Print Quota database. 
    187     The sample configuration file contains examples to do this. 
    188      
    189   * What does the --prototype command line option to edpykota do ? 
    190    
    191     This option allows you to use an existing user or group 
    192     as a template when creating or modifying other accounts. 
    193      
    194   * How can I share print quota between some printers only (not all) ?    
    195    
    196     To do this you have to put the printers into a printers group, and 
    197     set quota on the printer group, instead of (or in addition to) 
    198     the printers themselves. 
    199      
    200   * What is a printer group ? 
    201    
    202      A printer group is exactly like a normal printer, but is 
    203      unknown by the printing system. You can use printer groups 
    204      to share print quota between printers. 
    205      
    206   * How can I create a printer group ?    
    207    
    208     Just use pkprinters, like for normal printers, then create 
    209     quota entries for users or users groups on it using the 
    210     edpykota command 
    211   
    212   * How can I put a printer into a printer group ? 
    213    
    214     Use the pkprinters command to do this. 
    215      
    216       $ pkprinters --help 
    217        
    218     Will print the complete help and tell you how to do. 
    219      
    220   * How quota checking and update is done with printer groups ?    
    221    
    222     Print accounting and quota checking is done for a printer and 
    223     all the printers groups it belongs to, recursively. 
    224     If quota is reached on ANY of these printers for the current user, 
    225     printing is denied. 
    226      
    227   * Is this feature robust ? 
    228    
    229     It should be. However, beware of integrity problems. LDAP has no  
    230     sense of database integrity, and PostgreSQL constraints have not  
    231     yet been fully implemented. The code actually *tries* to forbid  
    232     circular printers groups, but if you create printer groups with 
    233     another tool (e.g. psql or gq), then you are mostly on you  
    234     own to not create infinite loops. 
    235      
    236   * How is computed the job's price ?   
    237    
    238     A job's price is computed with this formula : 
    239      
    240       SUM((NbPages * PricePerPage) + PricePerJob) 
    241        
    242     For current printer and all the printers groups it is  
    243     a member of, if any, recursively. 
    244     This may be difficult to grasp, but offers unprecedented 
    245     flexibility. 
    246  
    247   * My question isn't answered there, can you help ?   
    248    
    249     Sure. Ask your question to the mailing list. If this is a 
    250     frequently asked question, or if your problem is on the contrary 
    251     very specific, it will probably be added to this document. 
    252      
    253     You can also ask questions by IRC : 
    254      
    255         /server irc.freenode.net 
    256         /join #pykota 
    257          
    258 Send any new questions to Jerome Alet - <alet@librelogiciel.com>