[Samba] 2.2.3a printing problems: no printing from Word, spools taking up all CPU on clients

[Steven Mackenzie]

I'm running Samba-2.2.3a plus the printer defaults patch (samba-2.2.3a-5mdk
rpm) on a Linux 2.4.(Mandrake 8.X). This server has been upgraded from
2.2.3, from 2.2.2, which was upgraded from 2.2.1. Everything was working
with the same printer configuration at version 2.2.2 and 2.2.1 (although I
have moved the WINS server from a new machine since then).

The server is a PDC/WINS server, and shares two printers, a networked
HP2200dn, and an Epson inkjet on the parallel port. There are NT and 98
drivers available.

Since upgrading to 2.2.3a we have been unable to use or print from Word.
(Word will format each document that it opens for the current printer, which
can lock up the client machine.)

Client machines are a mix or Windows 2000 sp2 and NT4 sp 5 and sp6.

Printer configuration is still very mysterious to me, but as far as I can
tell, the printers are configured and controlled using CUPS, and typically
when the print job is opened a 0 byte file owned by that user appears in
/var/spool/samba, but the job never makes it in to the CUPS queue (checked
using the CUPS admin page).

Here are the symptoms when using the networked HP2200dn as the default
printer, as described by one of the users:
***===***
I can print from Excel if I print one page at a time and manually stop and
restart spoolss in between.

I cannot print anything from Word - I can load small docs into Word but if I
load a doc over about 150k (with no graphics in it other than tables), I
cannot load the file and I have to close Word from the Task Manager.

The problem always happens for me.

I am using NT 4 with sp 6a and Word 97.

I have reinstalled MS-Office and I have reinstalled the NT service pack 6
and 6a and nothing changes.

I am just not sure how much my dodgy machine is affecting this or if my
machine has been made more dodgy by this spoolss thing - my intermittently
dodgy disk which powers itself on/off does not help!

I have read stuff on google groups that says that spoolss starts to grab CPU
after about 20 seconds............
***===***

I've seen a couple of reports in the list archive of similar problems, but
no resolution.

Is anyone else having problems with this? Is it definitely a problem with
2.2.3a, or could it be an odd config issue?

Is there a patch??

Thanks for any help you can give me,
Steven

===
Steven Mackenzie
Active Navigation Ltd
http://activenavigation.com/
+44 (0) 23 8074 2420
sjm at activenavigation.com