Lukas Beeler's IT Blog

Printing from the System i sucks as much as printing from any other platform – but with one added twist. The System i has it’s own proprietary printing system called IPDS.

In general, the System i can talk to network enabled printers that support a PCL or PS datastream directly – they must also support a print control protocol like SNMP or the more popular PJL. If you want to attach a desktop printer, you will have to use IBMs iSeries Access. And then there’s IPDS, which some printers can support through either a option ROM, a network appliance, or a conversion software.

If you’re wondering if your printer supports PCL/PS, look it up at the manufacturers website. Here are my quick and dirty rules, which are usually 99% right:

• SOHO equipment usually doesn’t support PCL/PS
• Workgroup equipment always does – there’s a small exception for low price workgroup equipment
• B&W desktop printers above 300 CHF usually do, Color desktop printers above 500 CHF usually do

iSeries Access

iSeries Access can be used to connect printers without a network interface, or without PCL/PS support to the System i. This functionality is quite rudimentary, and can’t be used to print customer facing documents. For the quick printing of a query or a joblog, this is usually sufficient.

If you have a printer that does support PCL/PS, but has no network interface (or an unsuitable one, like cheap print servers), you can use HPT through iSeries Access – this will allow you to support all the printout options that HPT supports.

iSeries Access without HPT is not really an option, except for some quick & dirty printing. iSeries Access with HPT isn’t quite as bad, but a network interface for the printer can be had for just a bit of money.

Host Print Transform

Host Print Transform, also known as HPT. I’ve written about this earlier.

HPT isn’t that bad, and can work well for desktop printers. It’s what we usually use for desktop printers.

IPDS Option roms

You can get IPDS option roms for most workgroup printers. The problem with IPDS option roms is that they’re hugely expensive (around 1500CHF for a single printers). So you’ll have to buy an expensive workgroup printer, but also have to buy an expensive IPDS option rom. If your printer dies, and you can no longer get a similar replacement – your investment has just become worthless.

The good thing about IPDS option roms is that they’re usually troublefree, and come with all the important fonts (like OCR-B) preloaded. This allows for a very easy deployment, at a in my opinion unreasonable cost.

IPDS converters

There are many products that do conversion from IPDS to PCL. I only have experience with a single product ExcelliPrint. This product works quite well, though there are a few things that you’ll need to think about, like OCR-B support.

There are also embedded appliances available that do the same thing. I’ve never used them, so i can’t tell much about them. Maybe those have embedded font support, avoiding the soft font issue that you’ll need to be aware off when using ExcelliPrint.

ExcelliPrint costs about 750 CHF, about half that of an IPDS ROM. If you only have a single printer, an IPDS ROM might not be that more expensive. But when we’re talking about 5-10 printers, the difference becomes quite noticeable.

Conclusions

So what should you do?

I generally recommend against any use of iSeries Access, even with a HPT printer. Purchase a simple desktop laser which is supported by HPT. For printing of invoices etc., i would recommend a workgroup printer with ExcelliPrint.

While researching an unrelated issue, i wandered about the big table of font mappings, directly from IBM:

Printer to Host fonts mapping table

This is going to be a big help for anyone that wants to use software fonts from the System i. The main use i’ve had with software fonts was to print OCR-B using ExcelliPrint.

ExcelliPrint is an excellent software package to enable IPDS on a plain, PCL5 capable printer. With release 3.2, Excelliprint now fully works with Host-Resident fonts.

This enables you to print OCR-B from your System i without having to buy the fonts as a printer module, or buying memory for the printer to download fonts to.

Now for those of you who don’t work with ERP Systems in Switzerland – OCR-B is a font used on many Swiss financial documents for better automated scanning of those. It’s usually needed if you print bills with an attached ‘Einzahlungsschein’.

Setting up host resident fonts on i5/OS isn’t difficult, but the whole process isn’t well documented.

So here’s a very quick run through.

First, you’ll need to fonts in 300 DPI resolution on your system. The default fonts supplied as AFP compatibility fonts (5722SS1 Option 8) are 240 DPI fonts, unsuitable for printing.

With your shipping of i5/OS, you should have received a CD called IBM AFP Font Collection. You’ll need to restore three libraries from this CD:

RSTLIB SAVLIB(LA1300) DEV(OPT01) RSTLIB(QFNT300LA1)
RSTLIB SAVLIB(OCR300) DEV(OPT01) RSTLIB(QFNT300OCR)
RSTLIB SAVLIB(CDEPAG) DEV(OPT01) RSTLIB(QFNT300CPL)

If you do not have this CD, you can get the fonts from any other System that has them.

The next step is to create an appropriate font mapping table:

CRTFNTTBL FNTTBL(*PHFCS)

Now you’ll need to add mappings for OCR-B to that table (and also for all the other fonts you use):

ADDFNTTBLE FNTTBL(*PHFCS) PHFCS((3 144 *NONE 1269) (C0920BB0))

This example is just OCR-B. You’ll need other fonts for all your documents to print pretty. You can view your font table with DSPFNTTBL.

The last step is to reconfigure the PSF Configuration Object for your printer to use Host-Resident fonts.

CHGPSFCFG PSFCFG(EXCELLPSF) RESFONT(*NO) DEVRSCLIBL(QFNT300LA1 QFNT300CPL QFNT300OCR)

(Most of the research for this walkthrough was made by Ralf Christen)

After upgrading from V5R2M0 to V5R4M0, the ESA is usually completely broken. You can’t even reactivate it by using GO SERVICE, 1.

So, what does one do?

Use WRKOBJ to delete all *DTAARA Objects from the QSRVAGT Library, than run GO SERVICE, 1 again. It will work.

I’m writing this entry because i’ve seen many Google searches looking for information about this.

Disabling the System i5/iSeries/AS/400 attention light is easy, but you should never do this without thinking it through.

First, go into DST or SST. The first can be accessed by performing a manual IPL, or using Function 21 of the control panel after switching the System to manual mode (this can be done during production – it doesn’t hurt). The DST will then appear on the console. STRSST kann be used from any 5250 session.

If you’re running V5R1M0 or later, you will be asked for an username and password. If you do not know these, you will have to reset QSECOFR’s service password using CHGDSTPWD. Please note that after doing so, you can only login in to DST, not SST – you will need to use function 21 to enter DST, change your password, and then use STRSST (this behavior can be changed, but this is the default).

Then, in SST or DST, perform the following steps:

• Start a service tool
• Hardware Service Manager
• Service Action Log
• On the selection screen, press Enter
• Press F6 to turn off the system attention light
• Press F10 to confirm this<7li>

With this, you should be done. Note that you will see the option to use F6 in the bottom of the screen. If you do not see this, then i5/OS does not know about the attention light and your problem lies somewhere else. You should then use the ASMI to turn off the attention light.

Footnote: Yay. The 100th post. I’m actually quite impressed that i made it this far. It seems that i still don’t have much of a readership (very few comments), but according to Google many people are looking for solutions to problems i’ve had too – so i will try to keep it up.

This weekend i upgraded a System i Model 800 from OS/400 V5R2 to i5/OS V5R4. While doing all the preparation for installing i5/OS using Image Catalogs, the image catalog check failed with the following message:

VERIFICATION OF IMAGE CATALOG FAILED WITH REASON CODE 02. LOAD SOURSE TOO
SMALL FOR RELEASE V5R4M0. RELEASE V5R4M0 REQURIES A LARGER LOAD SOURCE.
TO DETERMINE THE MINIMUM LOAD SOURCE SIZE, REVIEW THE ISERIES
INFORMATION CENTER FOR RELEASE V5R4M0 FOR INFORMATION ABOUT ALLOCATING
ADDITIONAL LICENSED INTERNAL CODE (LIC) SPACE. SEE THE TOPIC ON PERFORM
INITIAL UPGRADE OR REPLACEMENT TASKS.

I only read the first part of the message, and rechecked the load source size. It was a 36GB Disk, and V5R4M0 requires a 17GB load source minimum. So that was okay. I reread the message, and now saw the part about allocating the additional space for the LIC. But i already did that, and IPLd the System – while doing so the SRC C6004250 appeared longer than usual. So i assumed it went fine.

I checked using the menus in GO LICPGM, 5, and then the LIC space allocation screen. I was told that the space was already extended. I reIPLd the system, but the problem persisted.

In the installation manual, there is an additional method available by manually calling a program that will then set the flags for LIC space extension.

CALL PGM(QLPALCSP) PARM('V5R4M0' '0')

I ran that, reIPLd the system. Again, C6004250 appeared longer than usual. After that, the image catalog verification ran without issues, and the release upgraded succeeded after some more hours.

We’ve just received a new System i from IBM, and are preconfiguring it for deployment at the customers site.

Part of this process is configuring ESA – the Electronic Service Agent. While i still think that it is a very cool function (which is also available on Windows on System x machines), it is very quirky with lot’s of interesting problems you will encounter when configuring it.

I’ve followed my own manual for configuring ESA – which worked fine, but the test with QS9AUTOTST failed, and produced message CPIEF02 in the QSYSOPR message queue.

This error message is as generic as it could get, so i had a look at the ESA logfiles (GO SERVICE, Menupoint 14).

It had this wonderful and descriptive error message:

07/06/01 12:07:31 QS9PRBSND : ECS Failed for Problem 0715240986.

Okay, now i at least knew which program was the culprit, and had a look at the joblog of QS9PRBSND in the QSYSWRK subsystem.

And there it was:

Nachrichten-ID . . . . :   CPF8C17
Sendedatum . . . . . . :   01.06.07      Sendezeit  . . . . . . :   11:36:20

Nachricht . . . :   Anmeldung fehlgeschlagen.                               

Ursache  . . . . :  Der Anmeldeversuch am IBM Servicesystem war erfolglos.
Fehlerbeseitigung:  Den Servicegeber verständigen und diesen über den
  fehlgeschlagenen Anmeldeversuch sowie den Rückkehrcode informieren.
Technische Beschreibung  . . . . :  Der Rückkehrcode ist 00000110.

Okay, so i had an interesting return code to go with. While i found several references to CPF8C17 and MSGCPF8C17 (a nice trick to find more IBM material), none of them mentioned the return code i had.

So i opened a call with IBM. I got my answer rather fast – the system i had doesn’t exist. I had to wait one or two weeks until their systems knew about new shipments, or so i was told. I’ve had this working with other systems before, though. It’s still just very, very confusing that a multi billion dollar corporation doesn’t know when it ships new systems.

The System i offers a variety of console options. All of them have some advantages, and also several drawbacks.

Recommendations

Thin Console

The Thin Console is usually included in a new System order. I’ve written an earlier post about the disadvantages of the Thin Console (here). Even though it isn’t the best, it is usually the way to go. After setup, i’ve never had any issues with those devices, they work without problems behind a KVM switch, the only problem is rack integration, because it doesn’t come in a 19″ form factor. The biggest disadvantage is that it doesn’t support LPARs and remote acccess. Most Small Business aren’t able to afford LPARs, so it isn’t really a problem.

HMC

The Hardware Management Console is the way to go. If it is possible, buy the HMC. It is hugely expensive though, but it comes in 19″ form factor, can easily be integrated, you can install an RSA II adapter for enhanced remote access (remote console access is possible by default). This comes at a price, though. A HMC costs about 6000 CHF – you can buy an “okay” Intel Server for that (strictly, the HMC is an “okay” Intel Server).

Legacy

Operations Console

The Operations Console is the most stupid product IBM ever launched. The killer is the fact that it doesn’t run on Windows Server. So you can’t run it on rackmounted hardware, because these usually don’t support Windows XP. It’s a big mess that IBM made for only one reasons: selling HMCs.

Twinax

Twinax works. No remote access, no complicated device, no rack mount, and all consoles are already End of Sale. But if you still have Twinax equipment, the Twinax console is very sturdy and works well.

Okay, so we have the Year 2007, and i still see System i administrators order CDs and install them by swapping out one CD after the other. And if i ask them what they’re doing, i got told that image catalogs are too complicated.

So here is a complete, to the point walk through on how to install PTFs from an Image catalog.

Obtaining the images

Step 1 is to obtain the necessary disk images. All you need is a computer with a web browser, you don’t even need java support anymore (YAY!).

Under V5R4, it’s also possible to download the images using SNDPTFORD. This hasn’t always worked for me, and monitoring it was always pretty sketchy.

Go to: IBM Fix Central. As i can’t remember such a stupid URL, i always search Google for “iseries fix central”, which has worked fine for me since a few years.

Next you will need to log on with your IBM ID. You can create one if you don’t have one already, it’s pretty painless and requires no other resources.

Then you’re in the PTF selection menu. You will need to select the topmost, even if it says “Documents”. You can’t order Groups and CUM in the same order, so just reuse these steps after completing the CUM order. Click “Add to my Download List”. If you are on your second pass, trying to order the Group PTFs, you should make sure that the download list is cleared before you add the Group PTFS to your list.

Next, make sure that you select “Do not connect to my System”, [x] “Include requisite PTF”, and use FTP for the download. You will receive these instructions by Mail.

After clicking continue, you will land on the Summary page, where you can see if you order succeeded. You will now receive two E-Mails, one with an order confirmation, and one with the FTP data. The second can take quite a while, sometimes more than an hour. You should now place a second order for all Groups that might affect you.

Both Exchange’s IMF and SpamAssassin like to classify the Mails sent by IBM as spam. If you don’t have it in an hour, make sure to check your Spambin.

Downloading the images

This is Step 2. You get an E-Mail from IBM with all the infos you will need. I usually download the Images to a Windows Server using FileZilla, because it supports multiple connections (IBM has a per-connection speed limit). But you can also download them with Internet Explorer, or with the FTP Client directly on your System i – make sure to always use binary mode, the System i client does _not_ default to that.

No matter what you do, you will need to save the images in the IFS. I usually use the path /CUMPTF, but any will do.

Use MKDIR '/CUMPTF' to create the directory, and then use the Windows commandline FTP client to upload it. Make sure that your first command is “cd /CUMPTF”, this will make sure that you’re using the IFS.

Creating the image catalog and the virtual optical device

Okay, welcome to step 3.

First, we create an optical device for the image catalog. This needs to be done only once per i5/OS instance.

CRTDEVOPT DEVD(OPTVRT01)
RSRCNAME(*VRT)
TEXT('Virtual optical device for image catalogs')

Note that by default the device is varied off. We will need to vary it on before using it.

VRYCFG CFGOBJ(OPTVRT01)
CFGTYPE(*DEV)
STATUS(*ON)

Then, we will need to create the image catalog.

CRTIMGCLG IMGCLG(CUMPTF)
DIR('/CUMPTF')
CRTDIR(*NO)

We will need to add all files to the image catalog. You will need to use this command once per image file. It doesn’t matter in what sequence you add them, though. The important part here is *FROMFILE, which will make sure that the Image file you already uploaded is reused (and not copied).

ADDIMGCLGE IMGCLG(CUMPTF)
FROMFILE('/CUMPTF/SF99504_1.bin')
TOFILE(*FROMFILE)

The last step is to load the Image Catalog. Use WRKIMGCLG, and then Option 8 to load the image. Then use Option 10 to sort and verify the Images, make sure to choose *PTF, to reorder the items.

Applying the PTFs

Okay, this is rather easy, and you should already know this. Type GO PTF, select Option 8, choose OPTVRT01 as a device, and then make sure that the media option is on number 2. I won’t go into details here, because most people have more experience with this than i do.

Update: Fixed a missing sentence.

The new 9407-515 is out, and it has some problems from the beginning. The message CPI9E64 is displayed every hour in the QSYSOPR *MSGQ.

Nachrichten-ID . . . . : CPI9E64
Sendedatum . . . . . . : 08.05.07 Sendezeit . . . . . . : 01:20:26

Nachricht . . . : Lizenzberechtigungsinformationen für 5722SS1 installiert.

Ursache . . . . : Es wurden Lizenzberechtigungsinformationen für Produkt
5722SS1 Lizenzlaufzeit V5 Feature 5051 installiert.

When googling for the message id, Google doesn’t return any results (yet).

So i opened a support case, and a fix already exists. Just order PTF SI27389 using SNDPTFORD (will download the PTF using the Internet automatically), and install it using GO PTF, 8, *SERVICE. After that, the issue is resolved. Simple as that.

Now if IBM would make it websites Google-friendly, and the APAR Pages would’ve been indexed, there would’ve been no need to make a support call.