[Samba] intermittent problem printing - cups+samba+ldap

[James Affeld]

A problem has come up in our computer labs.  We use one account for a given lab, except in the main lab where students have individual accounts.  In either case, printing is only intermittently successful.  We use a "net use lpt1 \\server\printer" command in a batch file run at login to connect the printer.  The command completes successfully.  The CUPS status page for the printer reports either "idle, accepting jobs" or "ready to print"

When attempting to print, an error popup comes up: "There was an error found when printing the document "foo" to ltp1:.  Do you want to cancel or retry?"  Windows Print Manager does not show a document queued, though the tooltip for the print manager icon in system tray shows "one document queued" until cancellation.

The network traffic shows a workstation sending what ethereal calls a "Open Print File Request" and getting an netbios-ssn > (source ephemeral port #) ACK from the server, then the server sends an "Open Print File Response, Error: STATUS_OBJECT_NAME_NOT_FOUND" or "STATUS_ACCESS_DENIED"  The former is more common by a factor of 3.  There does not seem to be a pattern as far as which goes first.  

Googling on 'STATUS_OBJECT_NAME_NOT_FOUND' brings up some (apparently) unrelated hits.

Environment: currently patched Win2k/sp4 clients.  The server has:
cups-1.1.14-15.4
samba-2.2.8a
openldap-2.0.27-2.7.3

Cups is configured to allow 
MaxJobs 500
Increasing MaxClients from 500 to 800 did not clear the problem.

This was all working a few weeks ago.  Restarting the samba, cups, and ldap doesn't clear the problem.  Reindexed ldap directory, without fixing the problem.  The server is not heavily burdened, and there is plenty of free disk space.  The server manages 35 printers.  

Creating a second printer object (for the same printer ip address) does not work either.

It may be that not all accounts are affected; most are, and all new ones appear to be.  It's hard to pin down the general area of the fault because of the intermittent nature of successful print jobs.  I think it's not account related because sometimes a given account can successfully print.  

Just now something cleared the logjam and everyone can print.  But the problem will undoubtably recurr.


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