CUPS printing problems with 'Fit to Page Size' - WAS: problem using a parallel printer with usb/parralel converter

[Bernard]

Bernard wrote:
> Tommy Trussell wrote:
>
> In the end I got through my problem using the cups web interface. 
It did satisfy my needs for a few dozen of prints for which I didn't 
mind if they fit the whole page. However, one option fails to work. It 
is called:
"Shrink Page if Necessary to fit borders". In CUPS language, it is:

StpiShrinkOutput

It has three possible values: 'Shrink' 'Crop' or 'Expand'

Whenever printing directly from a shell:

lp -d MyPrinter myfile

I get same printing results, whichever value I chose for this option in 
the CUPS server on localhost:631

Same thing when the settings are being modified using 
'-system-config-printer'

same thing again when trying to override the default setting by calling 
the option in the command line like this:

lp -d MyPrinter -o StpiShrinkOutput=Crop Myfile

Biggest problem is: the printing that I get ALWAYS fills the whole page, 
whatever option is chosen. If I want to print a 300dpi image that is 
supposed to print about 10cmx10cm, it will print 20.9x20.9cm so that it 
fits the page, with lesser dpi. This is true with whatever file type I 
am printing, whether it is an image or a simple LibreOffice Calc file, 
however this does not apply to LibreOffice text files. It goes like if 
said page fitting option was inoperative. However, if I type :

lpoptions -P MyPrinter -l

I get a list of all available options and their possible parameters with 
a '*' showing which option is the default one ; the 'StpiShrinkOutput' 
option appears all right and the '*' shows at the right place according 
to the choice I make in the cups server... only thing is that it does 
nothing to the printing job.

I must emphasize that the other options do operate OK (media type, dpi 
for printing, contrat and gamma correction etc...

It wouldn't bother me that much that this option is inoperative, if the 
default behaviour was 'no page fitting, print according to the image 
file infos'

Back to whole page filling for LibreOffice Calc documents, the Page 
filling problem does exist, whether the document is printed using the 
'lp' command or the 'file/print" from LibreOffice menu...

BUT,

as far as images files are concerned, printing with 'The Gimp' does 
override the problem ! With the Gimp, 'file/print' displays menus to set 
options ; in 'advanced' there is a possibility to set up the 
Shrink/Expand/Crop page option. This does not seem to work either, but 
the advantage is that, in Gimp, the default printing scheme depends on 
something else (by default it prints with the default resolution in dpi, 
and that if you want to change printing size you only have to resample). 
My problem is that I mostly use Darktable instead of Gimp, and, since 
Darktable does not yet support printing, I get image files that I 
attempt to print with online commands using lp.

I have tried to uninstall my printer and reinstall it, to no avail so far.

CUPS 1.7.2 - driver CUPS+Gutenprint v5.2.10-pre2

Hewlett Packard Deskjet 1120C

Thanks in advance for your help

Bernard