New update to Ubuntu 22.04 LTS seems to have broken CUPS through conf file / program incompatibility.

[John-Nagle]

Someone else just reported this at https://askubuntu.com/questions/1560253/printing-service-is-not-available-after-software-update-on-24-04

I hit it too.

Diagnosis:

sudo cupsd -t
Unknown directive JobPrivateAccess on line 94 of /etc/cups/cupsd.conf.
"/etc/cups/cupsd.conf" contains errors.

This looks a lot like the problem reported in 2024 at #990

Reading the current manual page suggests that directive can only be used inside a section, but in the auto-created conf file on my system, it's at top level. Was there a change at some point which invalidated old conf files?

Conf file:
cupsd.conf.txt

CUPS version I have installed: 2.4.1op1-1ubuntu.15

which is what Ubuntu installs.

I suspect that something went wrong in Ubuntu's packaging of CUPS. And that a lot of people will not be able to print on Monday. But I don't want to go manually editing the conf file, since something in Ubuntu land generates that.

Please advise. Thanks.

[graywd314]

me too ... need a workaround ASAP

[michaelrsweet]

No changes to cause this or to allow JobPrivateAccess at the top level. Try the following:

1. Stop cups (systemctl stop cups)
2. Edit cups.conf and comment out (#) the JobPrivateAccess line.
3. Start cups (systemctl start cups)

[j-i-l]

Howdie,

Just ran into the same problem and noticed that in the config file (/etc/cups/cupsd.conf) the following lines reside outside of the <Policy> tag:

JobPrivateAccess default
JobPrivateValues default
SubscriptionPrivateAccess default
SubscriptionPrivateValues default

In my case, the problem seems to be solved by simply moving these four lines above the line:

</Policy>

I'm not sure if this is good advice, but at least for me printing is working again.

[YanbingLiu]

Same Issue, I shouldn't update to 2.4.1op1-1ubuntu.15, which causes me a bit problem in printing.

[sobyrne030-del]

No answer, but the same problem.

[John-Nagle]

Discussion on the Ubuntu side is proceeding:

https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/cant-print-cups-printing-daemon-fails-to-start-with-a-report-of-a-syntax-error-in-the-config-file/72859/13

Many people report printing failure today.

Consensus seems to be:

1. Something changed in CUPS which caused stricter enforcement of the cupsd.conf format requirements.
2. Whatever updates that file in Ubuntu was not updated.
3. Nobody seems to know what in Ubuntu land writes cupsd.conf but something does. Settings, maybe.
4. A workaround exists (deleting the offending lines from cupsd.conf) but nobody knows what the side effects are.

So far, nobody knowledgeable about CUPS has commented. Need to hear from someone who understands what changed and why.

[michaelrsweet]

@John-Nagle At this point the whole JobPrivateXxx and SubscriptionPrivateXxx directive discussion isn't something that the stock CUPS software does anything with, at least when it comes to updating existing conf files for Ubuntu. Nothing changed in cupsd WRT how strict it is about configuration directives.

Removing the offending lines just reverts to the compiled-in default policy which is privacy-preserving and will cause the web interface (for example) to not show the job titles in the list of active print jobs.

There is a separate issue affecting GTK+-based applications we are investigating that seems to be caused by a latent GTK+ bug.

[michaelrsweet]

@John-Nagle At this point the whole JobPrivateXxx and SubscriptionPrivateXxx directive discussion isn't something that the stock CUPS software does anything with, at least when it comes to updating existing conf files for Ubuntu. Nothing changed in cupsd WRT how strict it is about configuration directives.

Removing the offending lines just reverts to the compiled-in default policy which is privacy-preserving and will cause the web interface (for example) to not show the job titles in the list of active print jobs.

There is a separate issue affecting GTK+-based applications we are investigating that seems to be caused by a latent GTK+ bug.

[sobyrne030-del]

Hello John, Thanks very much for the update. Interested to see what happens. Meanwhile, no more updates! Discussion on the Ubuntu side is proceeding: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/cant-print-cups-printing-daemon-fails-to-start-with-a-report-of-a-syntax-error-in-the-config-file/72859/13 Many people report printing failure today. Consensus seems to be: Something changed in CUPS which caused stricter enforcement of the cupsd.conf format requirements. Whatever updates that file in Ubuntu was not updated. Nobody seems to know what in Ubuntu land writes cupsd.conf but something does. Settings, maybe. A workaround exists (deleting the offending lines from cupsd.conf ) but nobody knows what the side effects are. So far, nobody knowledgeable about CUPS has commented. Need to hear from someone who understands what changed and why. — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub , or unsubscribe . You are receiving this because you commented. Message ID: <OpenPrinting/cups/repo-discussions/1433/comments/15127588 @ github . com>