[Macworld]

Post your comments for Mac troubleshooting: What to do when you can't print here

[fibercut]

Your speaking about common sense that is short supply these days. Good Luck.

[thubsch]

Good troubleshooting checklist; thanks!

But... then again, there are also "gremlins," such as when a certain type of documents (such as an end-of-year summary from a prominent credit card company that shall remain nameless, but has a youth with a Roman legionary helmet in the logo) keeps the printer in an infinite loop.

So, you poll the printer (HP LJ 8000 DN) error log (as instructed in the article) and find:

W [28/Feb/2013:17:33:45 -0500] [Job 112] The printer did not respond.
E [28/Feb/2013:17:38:44 -0500] [Job 112] Remote host did not accept data file (32).
E [28/Feb/2013:17:38:54 -0500] [Job 112] Stopping unresponsive job.

Oh. I see. Now, that clears it all up!

Every once in a while, if I "print" the printer-thwarting document (even if it already is a PDF) to a (new) PDF document, and the try to print that "new" PDF, it works. Or, it doesn't. Sometimes, holding fingers crossed while dancing a little printer dance with ululations seems to help...

When did printing become voodoo???

By the way, before you hose the entire printer seth-up (which you will then have to recreate from scratch), check if a different, plain-text document does print. In my above real-life example, it is only the end-of-year statements (in all of the offered formats, including the XL spreadsheet!!) that thwarts the printer; everything else I threw at it came out printed just fine, duplex, 2-pages-on-one, you name it.

[bretperry]

You might want to mention an annoying recent "feature" of Mac OSX, that you now must have admin rights to un-pause a printer. This is really annoying if i accidentally print to an off-line printer, then I cannot resume printing until IT comes and types in the admin password (most users at our large company are not allowed admin rights)