Cups won’t start
I have Ubuntu 16.04 which has been perfect until now. It has been printing perfectly since day one but the other day I got an error which I stupidly failed to write down and I didn’t go look at /var/log/syslog . The error was something about a cups directory gone missing. At this point I had not been messing with any configuration, it just broke all by itself. I thought rather than me manually create whatever has gone missing, I will fix it by removing and re-installing software. I removed and re-installed both HP’s print software «hplip» and «cups». This seems to have wrecked cups completely. It no longer starts. Below is the systemctl status output for cups , before and after a start command:
$ systemctl status cups cups.service - CUPS Scheduler Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/cups.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Sun 2016-11-06 10:06:50 GMT; 55min ago Docs: man:cupsd(8) Process: 1029 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/cupsd -l (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Main PID: 1029 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Started CUPS Scheduler. Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Unit entered failed state. Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Start request repeated too quickly. Nov 06 10:06:50 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Failed to start CUPS Scheduler. Nov 06 10:06:52 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Start request repeated too quickly. Nov 06 10:06:52 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Failed to start CUPS Scheduler. vince@vw-desk2:~$ vince@vw-desk2:~$ systemctl start cups vince@vw-desk2:~$ vince@vw-desk2:~$ systemctl status cups cups.service - CUPS Scheduler Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/cups.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Sun 2016-11-06 11:03:42 GMT; 24s ago Docs: man:cupsd(8) Process: 3664 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/cupsd -l (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Main PID: 3664 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE) Nov 06 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Started CUPS Scheduler. Nov 06 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE Nov 06 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Unit entered failed state. Nov 06 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. Nov 6 10:11:54 vw-desk2 anacron[786]: Job `cron.daily' terminated Nov 6 10:11:54 vw-desk2 anacron[786]: Normal exit (1 job run) Nov 6 10:17:01 vw-desk2 CRON[3371]: (root) CMD ( cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.hourly) Nov 6 10:19:11 vw-desk2 AptDaemon: INFO: Quitting due to inactivity Nov 6 10:19:11 vw-desk2 AptDaemon: INFO: Quitting was requested Nov 6 10:19:11 vw-desk2 org.debian.apt[843]: 10:19:11 AptDaemon [INFO]: Quitting due to inactivity Nov 6 10:19:11 vw-desk2 org.debian.apt[843]: 10:19:11 AptDaemon [INFO]: Quitting was requested Nov 6 10:21:52 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Starting Cleanup of Temporary Directories. Nov 6 10:21:52 vw-desk2 systemd-tmpfiles[3435]: [/usr/lib/tmpfiles.d/var.conf:14] Duplicate line for path "/var/log", ignoring. Nov 6 10:21:52 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Started Cleanup of Temporary Directories. Nov 6 10:28:01 vw-desk2 CRON[3481]: (root) CMD ( test -x /etc/cron.daily/popularity-contest && /etc/cron.daily/popularity-contest --crond) Nov 6 10:30:29 vw-desk2 systemd-timesyncd[409]: Timed out waiting for reply from 91.189.94.4:123 (ntp.ubuntu.com). Nov 6 10:30:29 vw-desk2 systemd-timesyncd[409]: Synchronized to time server 91.189.89.198:123 (ntp.ubuntu.com). Nov 6 11:03:37 vw-desk2 gnome-session[2312]: Gtk-Message: GtkDialog mapped without a transient parent. This is discouraged. Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: Started CUPS Scheduler. Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Unit entered failed state. Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 kernel: [ 3413.846764] audit_printk_skb: 84 callbacks suppressed Nov 6 11:03:42 vw-desk2 kernel: [ 3413.846767] audit: type=1400 audit(1478430222.644:39): apparmor="DENIED" operation="sendmsg" profile="/usr/sbin/cupsd" name="/run/systemd/journal/socket" pid=3664 comm="cupsd" requested_mask="w" denied_mask="w" fsuid=0 ouid=0 On second thoughts, that last line looks like it must be relevant. How can I get printing working again?
Thread: CUPS broken
5 Cups of Ubuntu 
CUPS broken
Hi,
At some point, my cups installation has become broken, and after a lot of digging around, I’ve no idea how to solve. 18.04.
I’ve tried things like purging all cups packages, dpkg, etc.
systemctl status cups.service
● cups.service — CUPS Scheduler
Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/cups.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: failed (Result: timeout) since Mon 2018-10-15 15:53:33 BST; 26s ago
Docs: man:cupsd(8)
Process: 4652 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/cupsd -l (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
Main PID: 4652 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
Oct 15 15:52:03 xps13 systemd[1]: Starting CUPS Scheduler.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: cups.service: Start operation timed out. Terminating.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result ‘timeout’.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: Failed to start CUPS Scheduler.
Oct 15 15:52:03 xps13 systemd[1]: Starting CUPS Scheduler.
— Subject: Unit cups.service has begun start-up
— Defined-By: systemd
— Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support
—
— Unit cups.service has begun starting up.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: cups.service: Start operation timed out. Terminating.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result ‘timeout’.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 systemd[1]: Failed to start CUPS Scheduler.
— Subject: Unit cups.service has failed
— Defined-By: systemd
— Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support
—
— Unit cups.service has failed.
—
— The result is RESULT.
Oct 15 15:53:33 xps13 polkitd(authority=local)[1070]: Unregistered Authentication Agent for unix-process:4606:174094 (system bus name :1.207, object path /org/freedesktop/PolicyKit1/AuthenticationAgent, locale en_GB.UTF-8) (disconnected from bus)
If anyone can help, please let me know!
Linux Mint Forums
[SOLVED] CUPS stopped running and can’t start it
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[SOLVED] CUPS stopped running and can’t start it
Post by csimon » Fri May 03, 2019 4:30 pm
Fresh install of Mint 19.1 and am in the process of setting it all up. I managed to get my network printer (actually a USB printer HP Deskjet 1220C connected via a little print server) working very easily, printing off a test page etc via the Printers app, but after a while with the Printers app open, the printer icon disappeared before my very eyes.
The Printers app now just says «Printing service not available. Start the service on this computer or connect to another server»
There are two buttons — Start Service which is greyed out, and Connect which when pressed brings up a CUPS dialog that says «CUPS server: /run/cups/cups.sock» with another Connect button, which when pressed results in «CUPS server error. There was an error during the CUPS operation: «failed to connect to server».
I’ve searched for this problem and can’t find an answer, though there was a hint to run a status command on the CUPS service, and this was the result after a reboot:
cups.service — CUPS Scheduler
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/cups.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: failed (Result: start-limit-hit) since Fri 2019-05-03 12:10:50 BST; 26s ago
Docs: man:cupsd(8)
Process: 1077 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/cupsd -l (code=killed, signal=TERM)
Main PID: 1077 (code=killed, signal=TERM)
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: cups.service: Service hold-off time over, scheduling restart.
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: cups.service: Scheduled restart job, restart counter is at 5.
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: Stopped CUPS Scheduler.
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: cups.service: Start request repeated too quickly.
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: cups.service: Failed with result ‘start-limit-hit’.
May 03 12:10:50 NoFan-PC systemd[1]: Failed to start CUPS Scheduler.
I’ve also removed and reinstalled cups via the software manager but the result is the same.
Can anyone help me get cups running again?