MVS --> AS/400 LPR/LPD Printing

[jmmcd...@adpc.purdue.edu]

Has anyone tried to do LPR/LPD printing from an MVS system to
an AS/400 ? When I send the print data (I'm on the MVS system) it
gets converted to ASCII as it should. When it gets to the AS/400
their LPD function leaves the data in ASCII. They want to take the
data to a line printer which requires EBCDIC. I can send the
print data using the binary command and it doesn't get converted
to ASCII and thus arrives there in EBCDIC. They are able to print
it OK on their line printer, but the binary option causes LPR
to ignore record boundaries (just as it is documented in the
MVS TCP/IP User's Guide) which doesn't work to well for printed
output.

I've found reference to this in IBMLink (item Q67526) and it
pretty much says that what we want to do won't work. But IBM
is telling the AS/400 system person that it will work. When they
are shown the results, the response is that there is something
wrong on the MVS system. From what I can see, it is working
exactly as documented on the MVS side.

Any suggestions on comments would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Jim

jmmcd...@adpc.purdue.edu

[Bruce Crabill]

It would sound like the AS/400's LPD is broken. A LPD is expected to be able
to receive data in ASCII and if the host requires some other format, then
that LPD (or other portion of the AS/400) must be able to handle the required
transformation. LPD is not an EBCDIC protocol. Tell the vendor to fix it.

Bruce