Technical Memo: RANGECHECK ERRORS, OR NOTHING PRINTS OUT





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RANGECHECK ERRORS, OR NOTHING PRINTS OUT

revised: 12-Aug-2002

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If you are having trouble printing (especially to an Apple Laserwriter or Tektronix Phaser 300i) such that when a job is printed, nothing comes out of the printer even though both the queue and the printer appear to process the job, it is likely because some printers do not allow explicit papertray selection. If something does print on the printer, and this is the problem, it will be a PostScript error page describing the error:

  error : rangecheck   offending command : lettertray

NOTE: The offending command could be any tray selection command such as: legaltray, a4tray, etc.

ScriptServer® PAN Printing System

Most modern PostScript printers ship with firmware which duplicates the functionality of EHANDLER and PERM_EHANDLER, but they are available on request and can be defined and used as resources.

Once you have determined the specific offending command, verify that it is not being injected into the job stream by use of an inappropriate resource. If there is no resource which is injecting the command, then it is coming from the application which generates the PostScript code, or from the use of a PPD which is inappropriate for the specific make and model of printer, or from a printer with misconfigured media types.

ScriptServer® for VMS

If you are not getting this PostScript error page, you can verify that this error is occurring by printing the file with the qualifier: /SETUP=EHANDLER

  $ PRINT/QUEUE=queue-name/SETUP=EHANDLER file-name

where "queue-name" is the name of the queue pointing to the printer in question and "file-name" is the name of the file you are trying to print.

To correct this situation, you need to define the tray selection logical:

  SSV$device_TRAY_tray-command

where "device" is the name of the device (i.e. LAT port or TCP/IP address) to which the printer is connected and "tray-command" is the offending tray selection command, as a "null command".

For example, to "disable" the tray selection command for letter-sized paper on a printer attached to LAT port LTA9997:, use the following command:

  $ DEFINE/SYSTEM SSV$LTA9997_TRAY_LETTERTRAY " "

To disable the tray selection command for legal-sized paper on a printer connected to the network at TCP/IP address 192.100.10.2, use the following command:

  $ DEFINE/SYSTEM SSV$192.100.10.2_TRAY_LEGALTRAY " "

NOTE: This is discussed more fully in section 7.3.1 "Customizing Paper Tray Selection" in the ScriptServer Printing SystemUser's Guide V5.0 Revision B, January 1996.