LInux Mint printing multi-page documents one page at a time
 

My new Linux Mint 21.3 install found my multi-function printer automatically, and it will both scan and print.

Problem is, it will only print an individual page at a time, and then stop. So, with a 10-page document, I have to print each page manually. Not so bad with a shorter doc, but with a longer one it is a real pain.

CUPS printing, on a Canon GX7000 series printer.

Help?

It's a long shot, but you might try this:

Start your word processor (or whatever you are printing from) from the command line and then print a multipage document. Then check the terminal output for any output that might help shed some light on this.

OK, I tried that twice, from libreoffice.

It printed only the first page, and there was no terminal message or output. Here is what the terminal looked like before and after printing.

Drat.

Have you tried looking the cups logs, particularly the error log (/var/log/cups/error.log)?

Print the document to file as a PDF from libreoffice and then try printing from the command line:

lp -d print_queue document.pdf

If it prints the entire document then it might be a printer dialog problem.

I have had similar problems which I traced down to which application program I used to print with. I never got Okular to print more than one page on my setup. I can get the Vivaldi browser to work on pdf files although it sometimes does the one page only trick. I can get libreoffice --draw to work consistently.

It might be as michaelk implies that some programs handle the dialog with the printer better than others.

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Steve Stites

How much memory does your Canon gx7000 have installed in it?
memory was not mentioned in the official specs, so perhaps it is user upgradable.

But if Cups is printing graphically, with multiple bytes per pixel at 1200x1200, then even one page could need a lot of memory. But the way Cups works now, it does not support much more than Ipp printing. And for Ipp, every print job must fit into the available printer memory.

I think it might be possible to write a script that automatically splits large multi-page print jobs into n-number smaller single-page jobs.

At the risk of repeating what you already know...

If by chance your Canon printer is a gx7020, Canon has linux drivers for both the printer and scanner that you might find useful.

This is not much help, but I can say that I've had the same thing happen before and it was also in Mint. It would take a super long time to print, the printer would say "Receiving data..." so it was communicating, although very slowly, and then it would print 1 page at a time, the printer would wind down, then it would start all over the same process to print the next page and so on. I honestly don't remember the details of what I did to fix it, but it had to do with changing to a different driver. I believe I had to download it from Brother (in my case) directly. So maybe play around with that to see if it gets you anywhere. I'd check with Cannon to see if they officially support Linux and have an available driver.

It sound to ,me like the OPs issues aren't with cups or the method by which the document is being past thru a graphical application weather said application is launched from the GUI or the command line(terminal) It sounds to me like its an issue with the driver that canon is providing for CUPS. This being said I'd strongly recommend that the OP got to the Cannon support page that relates to his/her device

FWIW, I have a HP printer here and the time between pages or repeats of the same page varies. Sometimes there's several seconds, others they're nearly end to end. I'm not attempting to explain it, but I don't care. The sky doesn't fall in because the printer has a yawn between pages.

1. Open your web browser and type "localhost:631" in the address bar. This will take you to the CUPS (Common Unix Printing System) interface.
2. Once you're in CUPS, click on the "Administration" tab.
3. Under "Administration," select your printer from the list.
4. Look for an option called "Set Default Options" or something similar. This is where you can tweak the printer settings.
5. Check if there's an option related to "Page Size" or "Media Type." Sometimes, printers default to printing one page at a time if they're set to a specific page size or media type.
6. Adjust the settings to match the paper size and type you're using for your document.
7. Save your changes and try printing your document again.

That should hopefully do the trick!