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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer System

This hint will seem trivial to unix users, but might greatly help non-unix users stuck with the same problem that I had this morning. All my printers were gone, and I could not add any without getting this message "An error occurred while trying to add the selected printers. Error 1282". This error is documented on Apple's website in article 107054, but I had to fix it a little differently.

After typing sudo mkdir cups (as specified in the instructions) in the Terminal window, I got the following error message:

mkdir: cannot create directory `cups': File exists
So, before creating it, I deleted the cups directory using sudo rm cups. The rest went fine.
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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer | 13 comments | Create New Account
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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: lukec on Jul 25, '03 12:36:31PM

I'd like to know *why* this works. In the case of the apple TN, the system searches for /var/spool/cups and there appears to be no provision to make a directory in the event it doesn't exist.

However, in the case of the hint submitter, I'd suspect a permissions problem. I noticed that if I chowned the cups dir to 000 it would actually put the permissions back to 700 when I issued a killall -HUP cupsd . So, I'm unsure of how the hint submitter was able to get that error while the directory existed.

I suspect that this discussion might be too technical for this forum, I also suspect that someone is going to tell me to check out the darwin project ;)

Note: "sudo rm cups" will not work without a -r or a -d switch.

Luke



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: zarqman on Jul 25, '03 03:03:03PM

if he didn't use a parameter on rm, instead issuing 'sudo rm cups' as described, perhaps that's the key. perhaps the cups directory was replaced by a file called cups. which would mean everything that was in it, isn't. and that you would be unable to add anything to it. likewise, permissions wouldn't help. just a thought...



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: cparnot on Aug 07, '03 02:18:43PM

Thanks for the comments.
Now, I am not sure anymore what I really did (rm -r or rm). I was so annoyed that I did not bother too much about understanding what happened.
If it was really a file, something really weird must have happened...

I guess the bottom line would be: just make a brand new folder 'cups' if you don't care about loosing some ongoing printing jobs.

---
charles



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: seann on Jul 25, '03 09:09:15PM
This has been a standard trouble shooting step for many months for myself. Also, this thread may shed some light on some other trouble shooting tips:
deletion of cups
Also
indepth for printer recovery
And my version:

You must be logged in as an Admin user. Follow these steps:
1. Open Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/).
2. At the prompt type: sudo su
3. Type your Admin user password when
prompted, and then press Return. 4. Type: cd /var/spool/
5. Press Return
6. Type: rm –R cups
7. Press Return
8. Type: mkdir cups
9. Press Return.
10. Type: cd cups
11. Press Return.
12. Type: mkdir tmp
13. Press Return.
14. Type cd ..
15. Press Return
16. Type: chown –R daemon:admin cups
17. Press Return.
18. Type: exit
19. Press Return
20. Type: exit
21. Quit Terminal. (If it asks, Yes we really do want to Quit)


You now have the choice of either restarting the computer to make sure the changes will take place, or you can go ahead to try and see if your Print Center will add your printer or if your queue will now restart.

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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: kay on Aug 24, '03 02:57:46PM

I have tried to use this solution on my g4...after restarting my mac...nothing happend...i still have the anoying error message



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: ames27 on Feb 23, '05 03:05:59PM

This script finally worked for me - I don't know the languages at all, so the adding tmp files, deleting CUPS directories, whatever, was making no sense and the script on the Apple site did not work at all. This particular script worked upon restart and now I even have an old printer back in Print Center that had been long gone. ! Thanks!



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Update on error 1282
Authored by: cparnot on Nov 11, '03 02:30:11PM

I posted the initial hint, and I am glad there has been a number of comments and fixes.

This problem happened again today on another computer, and the initial hint remains valid (except for the rm -r instead of rm). This is basically the same as Apple's note, with the addition of a rm -r cups:

1. Open Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/).

2. At the prompt type:

cd /var/spool/
then press Return.

3. Type:

sudo rm -r cups
then press Return.

4. Type your Admin user password when prompted, then press Return.

5. Type:

sudo mkdir cups
then press Return.

6. Type:

sudo chown daemon:admin cups
then press Return.

7. Type:

sudo chmod 700 cups 
then press Return.

8. Quit Terminal.

9. Restart the computer.

It did not work w/o step 9.

All of this was done with 10.2.8.

---
charles

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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: macdaffy on Jan 31, '04 09:53:53PM

I just resolved my long battle with the 1282 printing error. I kept trying the "rm -R mkdir..." fix to no avail. I then referred to the configuration on a working machine and found that the following files were missing from the ~/etc/cups directory:

cupsd.conf
printers.conf
cupsd.conf.bak
printers.conf.bak
cupsd.conf.old

I booted into Classic on both machines, burned the files onto a CD and transferred them. Worked like a charm. The .bak and .old files probably aren't necessary, but the other two are critical.



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: gkk on Mar 30, '04 07:51:58PM

Instead of monkeying around with the dozen or so UNIX commands, we created a script and packaged it, so even your end-users can just double-click on the package and fix this printer problem.

http://www.lsa.umich.edu/lsait/AdminTools/osx/software/


Caveat... we created this for use here at U of Michigan, so we can't guarantee that it will work in your environment. Please be sure to read the README in the .pkg file, and the LICENSE disclaimer. Thanks to Apple and everybody here to tipped us to this fix!



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still the error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: pesiho on Apr 27, '04 08:53:45AM

I have this problem : error1282 when trying to add a printer. I did the steps described in the thread (like create a new folder /var/spool/cups, with a tmp folder in it) but i still have that same error.

Anybody can help me ??
I m on OSX10.2.8.

Thanks



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still the error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: mkeblunt on Sep 04, '04 07:41:03PM

I too am still getting the 1282 error message and I tried everything, except getting the files from another computer which just isn't an option for me right now. I tried the first thing on this string [sudo rm cups] and it told me cups is a directory and didn't seem to remove it.



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: jarmentrout on Oct 07, '04 12:34:01PM

I too was still getting issues after the posted fix in 10.2.8. The Apple and MacOSXHints work flow is correct only I had to add one step near the end. Apparently the printer SW is expecting a tmp folder inside the cups folder. So perform the steps as outlined earlier. Then go into the cups directory and:

sudo mkdir tmp

and it started to work. Hope this helps someone...

John Armentrout



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A fix for error 1282 when adding a printer
Authored by: jarmentrout on Oct 07, '04 12:49:41PM

I read more carefully one of the entries above, and they did state to go into cups and make a tmp directory. Something the official Apple document neglected to mention. So follow those steps and things should be good.

john



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