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10.5: Fix a CUPS printing problem in 10.5.5 System 10.5
There seems to be a bug in the OS X 10.5.5 update that make many printers behave oddly. I have found that printing to Adobe PDF Queues, Xerox, and Oki printers exhibit the same problem: the printout can be randomly zoomed, rotated, or offset each time you print!

The fix I have found that works on all 50 of my office's Mac Pros is to replace the pstops file in /usr/libexec/cups/filter directory with the one from a 10.5.4 machine.

Obviously this is an important system file, so make sure you backup first!

[robg adds: I can't confirm either the problem or the fix; the two printers I have here seem to work fine in 10.5.5.]
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10.5: Fix a CUPS printing problem in 10.5.5 | 6 comments | Create New Account
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10.5: Fix a CUPS printing problem in 10.5.5
Authored by: olivermomo on Sep 26, '08 08:30:26AM
10.5: Fix a CUPS printing problem in 10.5.5
Authored by: gsperling on Sep 26, '08 10:38:55AM

I am a University student, and print to our campus-wide printing system (CWPS) through the Pharos product. The underlying driver for this system is the Xerox Phaser 4500 and 8500 series printers. I, for one, would be really pissed if I came across this bug because I am charged 10 to 16 cents per page (if I duplex) for B&W and 70 to 90 cents per page for color.

I am running 10.5.5, and also currently use Adobe PDF 8.0 in addition to the aforementioned printer drivers. I have NOT come across this bug.

If you would like any information from my machine to see if it can help with the location or origination of this bug, I am happy to provide it. Sorry, but keep your "sudo rm -Rf /*" commands to yourself!



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Why the hurry?
Authored by: Ilgaz on Sep 26, '08 10:38:59AM

I understand 10.5.0 was rushed because Apple really cared about those Digg etc. trolls feedback but I don't get the hurry with OS updates.

As a side note, Apple is the company owning CUPS now. Owner of CUPS doesn't code a simple file right and this is Apple, king of DTP business. I can't imagine how much frustrated the Adobe based businesses are.

As Macosxhints is an actual Mac users site, I couldn't stand not posting this. Issue is, if every update creates such a huge issue, Mac users will soon find themselves resisting to updates which will create bigger trouble in long term. It is a major issue if you consider the OS X updates are also security fixes (although pro-active)



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Why the hurry?
Authored by: tatilsever on Sep 26, '08 01:11:58PM

Considering there is not any replies that confirms the same problem and even Adobe's notes say "some printers", what makes you think this was an easy to catch bug or even Apple's fault? If there are printers and apps out there that does not have this problem despite the update, it is very difficult to assign blame to just one party.



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Why the hurry?
Authored by: DamnItsHot on Oct 02, '08 07:42:23AM

Security updates are labeled as such or in a larger updated noted specifically to be so. I do not think you can assume all updates from Apple are Security Updates.



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Bug Confirmed in CUPS 1.3.8
Authored by: gerritdewitt on Oct 10, '08 10:23:04AM
I've seen this bug as well. It seems that most of the backends don't accept custom paper sizes when the data file is PostScript (hence the pstops filter is involved).

But back to the point: the problem lies with CUPS 1.3.8, so Mac OS X 10.5.5 and Server 10.5.5 are affected. I'm glad that you narrowed the problem down to the problematic filter, though!

One solution is to download and install a binary of CUPS 1.3.7 to replace the 1.3.8 installation in 10.5.5. This works and even integrates with the print service in Mac OS X Server.

However, it appears that Apple has fixed the problem. CUPS 1.3.9 is part of the Security Update 2008-007 for Leopard and Leopard Server, and it fixes the bug: http://www.cups.org/str.php?L2968

--Gerrit

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