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LP(P)			   POSIX Programmer's Manual			 LP(P)

NAME
       lp - send files to a printer

SYNOPSIS
       lp [-c][-d dest][-n copies][-msw][-o option]...	[-t title][file...]

DESCRIPTION
       The  lp	utility shall copy the input files to an output destination in
       an unspecified manner. The default output destination should  be	 to  a
       hardcopy device, such as a printer or microfilm recorder, that produces
       non-volatile, human-readable documents. If such a device is not	avail‐
       able  to the application, or if the system provides no such device, the
       lp utility shall exit with a non-zero exit status.

       The actual writing to the output device may occur some time  after  the
       lp  utility  successfully exits. During the portion of the writing that
       corresponds to each input  file,	 the  implementation  shall  guarantee
       exclusive access to the device.

       The lp utility shall associate a unique request ID with each request.

       Normally, a banner page is produced to separate and identify each print
       job. This page may be suppressed by implementation-defined  conditions,
       such as an operator command or one of the -o option values.

OPTIONS
       The  lp	utility	 shall	conform	 to  the  Base	Definitions  volume of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.

       The following options shall be supported:

       -c     Exit only after further access to any of the input files	is  no
	      longer  required. The application can then safely delete or mod‐
	      ify the files without affecting the output operation.  Normally,
	      files  are  not copied, but are linked whenever possible. If the
	      -c option is not given, then the user should be careful  not  to
	      remove  any  of the files before the request has been printed in
	      its entirety. It should also be noted that in the absence of the
	      -c option, any changes made to the named files after the request
	      is made but before it is printed may be reflected in the printed
	      output. On some implementations, -c may be on by default.

       -d  dest
	      Specify  a string that names the destination ( dest). If dest is
	      a printer, the request shall be printed only  on	that  specific
	      printer.	If  dest  is a class of printers, the request shall be
	      printed on the first available printer that is a member  of  the
	      class.  Under  certain  conditions (printer unavailability, file
	      space limitation, and so on), requests for specific destinations
	      need not be accepted. Destination names vary between systems.

       If  -d is not specified, and neither the LPDEST nor PRINTER environment
       variable is set, an unspecified destination is used. The -d dest option
       shall take precedence over LPDEST , which in turn shall take precedence
       over PRINTER . Results are undefined when dest contains a value that is
       not a valid destination name.

       -m     Send  mail  (see	mailx  ) after the files have been printed. By
	      default, no mail is sent upon normal  completion	of  the	 print
	      request.

       -n  copies
	      Write  copies  number  of copies of the files, where copies is a
	      positive decimal integer. The  methods  for  producing  multiple
	      copies  and for arranging the multiple copies when multiple file
	      operands are used are unspecified, except that each  file	 shall
	      be output as an integral whole, not interleaved with portions of
	      other files.

       -o  option
	      Specify printer-dependent or  class-dependent  options.  Several
	      such  options  may be collected by specifying the -o option more
	      than once.

       -s     Suppress messages from lp.

       -t  title
	      Write title on the banner page of the output.

       -w     Write a message on the user's terminal after the files have been
	      printed.	 If the user is not logged in, then mail shall be sent
	      instead.

OPERANDS
       The following operand shall be supported:

       file   A pathname of a file to be output. If no file operands are spec‐
	      ified, or if a file operand is '-' , the standard input shall be
	      used. If a file operand is used, but the -c option is not speci‐
	      fied,  the  process  performing the writing to the output device
	      may have user and group permissions that differ from that of the
	      process invoking lp.

STDIN
       The  standard  input  shall be used only if no file operands are speci‐
       fied, or if a file operand is '-' .  See the INPUT FILES section.

INPUT FILES
       The input files shall be text files.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The following environment variables shall affect the execution of lp:

       LANG   Provide a default value for the  internationalization  variables
	      that  are	 unset	or  null.  (See the Base Definitions volume of
	      IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section  8.2,  Internationalization	 Vari‐
	      ables  for the precedence of internationalization variables used
	      to determine the values of locale categories.)

       LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values  of  all
	      the other internationalization variables.

       LC_CTYPE
	      Determine	 the  locale  for  the	interpretation of sequences of
	      bytes of text data as characters (for  example,  single-byte  as
	      opposed to multi-byte characters in arguments and input files).

       LC_MESSAGES
	      Determine	 the  locale  that should be used to affect the format
	      and contents of diagnostic messages written  to  standard	 error
	      and informative messages written to standard output.

       LC_TIME
	      Determine	 the format and contents of date and time strings dis‐
	      played in the lp banner page, if any.

       LPDEST Determine the destination. If the LPDEST environment variable is
	      not  set, the PRINTER environment variable shall be used. The -d
	      dest option takes precedence over LPDEST . Results are undefined
	      when -d is not specified and LPDEST contains a value that is not
	      a valid destination name.

       NLSPATH
	      Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of
	      LC_MESSAGES .

       PRINTER
	      Determine	 the  output  device or destination. If the LPDEST and
	      PRINTER environment variables are not set, an unspecified output
	      device  is  used.	 The -d dest option and the LPDEST environment
	      variable shall take precedence over PRINTER . Results are	 unde‐
	      fined  when  -d  is  not specified, LPDEST is unset, and PRINTER
	      contains a value that is not a valid device or destination name.

       TZ     Determine the timezone used to calculate date and	 time  strings
	      displayed in the lp banner page, if any. If TZ is unset or null,
	      an unspecified default timezone shall be used.

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       The lp utility shall write a request ID to the standard output,	unless
       -s  is specified. The format of the message is unspecified. The request
       ID can be used on systems supporting the historical cancel  and	lpstat
       utilities.

STDERR
       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

	0     All input files were processed successfully.

       >0     No output device was available, or an error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The  pr and fold utilities can be used to achieve reasonable formatting
       for the implementation's default page size.

       A conforming application can use one of the file operands only with the
       -c  option  or  if  the	file is publicly readable and guaranteed to be
       available at the time of printing. This is because IEEE Std 1003.1-2001
       gives the implementation the freedom to queue up the request for print‐
       ing at some later time by a different process that might not be able to
       access the file.

EXAMPLES
	1. To print file file:

	   lp -c file

	2. To print multiple files with headers:

	   pr file1 file2 | lp

RATIONALE
       The  lp utility was designed to be a basic version of a utility that is
       already available in  many  historical  implementations.	 The  standard
       developers considered that it should be implementable simply as:

	      cat "$@" > /dev/lp

       after appropriate processing of options, if that is how the implementa‐
       tion chose to do it and if exclusive access could be granted  (so  that
       two users did not write to the device simultaneously).  Although in the
       future the standard developers may add other options to	this  utility,
       it  should  always  be  able to execute with no options or operands and
       send the standard input to an unspecified output device.

       This volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 makes no representations concerning
       the  format  of the printed output, except that it must be "human-read‐
       able" and "non-volatile". Thus, writing by default to a	disk  or  tape
       drive  or  a display terminal would not qualify. (Such destinations are
       not prohibited when -d dest, LPDEST , or PRINTER are used, however.)

       This volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 is worded such that a  "print  job"
       consisting  of  multiple	 input	files, possibly in multiple copies, is
       guaranteed to print so  that  any  one  file  is	 not  intermixed  with
       another, but there is no statement that all the files or copies have to
       print out together.

       The -c option may imply a spooling operation, but this is not required.
       The  utility  can be implemented to wait until the printer is ready and
       then wait until it is finished. Because of that, there is no attempt to
       define a queuing mechanism (priorities, classes of output, and so on).

       On  some	 historical systems, the request ID reported on the STDOUT can
       be used to later cancel or find the status of a request using utilities
       not defined in this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001.

       Although the historical System V lp and BSD lpr utilities have provided
       similar functionality, they used different names	 for  the  environment
       variable	 specifying  the  destination  printer.	 Since the name of the
       utility here is lp, LPDEST (used by the System V lp utility) was	 given
       precedence  over	 PRINTER (used by the BSD lpr utility). Since environ‐
       ments of users frequently contain one or the  other  environment	 vari‐
       able,  the  lp  utility	is required to recognize both. If this was not
       done, many applications would send output to unexpected output  devices
       when users moved from system to system.

       Some have commented that lp has far too little functionality to make it
       worthwhile. Requests have proposed additional options  or  operands  or
       both that added functionality. The requests included:

	* Wording requiring the output to be "hardcopy"

	* A requirement for multiple printers

	* Options for supporting various page-description languages

       Given  that  a compliant system is not required to even have a printer,
       placing further restrictions upon the behavior of the  printer  is  not
       useful. Since hardcopy format is so application-dependent, it is diffi‐
       cult, if not impossible, to select a reasonable subset of functionality
       that should be required on all compliant systems.

       The term unspecified is used in this section in lieu of implementation-
       defined as most known implementations would not be able to make defini‐
       tive statements in their conformance documents; the existence and usage
       of printers is very dependent on how the system	administrator  config‐
       ures each individual system.

       Since  the  default  destination,  device type, queuing mechanisms, and
       acceptable forms of input are all  unspecified,	usage  guidelines  for
       what a conforming application can do are as follows:

	* Use the command in a pipeline, or with -c, so that there are no per‐
	  mission problems and the files can be safely deleted or modified.

	* Limit output to text files of reasonable line lengths and  printable
	  characters  and  include  no device-specific formatting information,
	  such as a page description language. The meaning of "reasonable"  in
	  this	context	 can  only  be answered as a quality-of-implementation
	  issue, but it should be apparent from historical usage  patterns  in
	  the  industry	 and the locale. The pr and fold utilities can be used
	  to achieve reasonable formatting for the default page	 size  of  the
	  implementation.

       Alternatively,  the  application can arrange its installation in such a
       way that it requires the system administrator or	 operator  to  provide
       the appropriate information on lp options and environment variable val‐
       ues.

       At   a	minimum,   having   this   utility   in	  this	  volume    of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001  tells  the	 industry that conforming applications
       require a means to print output and provides at least  a	 command  name
       and  LPDEST  routing mechanism that can be used for discussions between
       vendors, application writers, and users.	 The use of  "should"  in  the
       DESCRIPTION  of lp clearly shows the intent of the standard developers,
       even if they cannot mandate that all systems  (such  as	laptops)  have
       printers.

       This volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 does not specify what the ownership
       of the process performing the writing to the output device may  be.  If
       -c  is  not  used, it is unspecified whether the process performing the
       writing to the output device has permission to read file if  there  are
       any  restrictions  in  place  on	 who  may  read file until after it is
       printed.	 Also, if -c is not used, the results of deleting file	before
       it is printed are unspecified.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       mailx

COPYRIGHT
       Portions	 of  this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       --  Portable  Operating	System	Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base
       Specifications Issue 6, Copyright (C) 2001-2003	by  the	 Institute  of
       Electrical  and	Electronics  Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the
       event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
       The  Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard
       is the referee document. The original Standard can be  obtained	online
       at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE/The Open Group		     2003				 LP(P)
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