PRB: LAN Enhanced DOS Printer Message Not Displayed

ID Number: Q72206

2.00

MS-DOS

Summary:

SYMPTOMS

When a printer is temporarily out of service because the paper is

jammed, no paper is in the paper tray, or the printer is offline,

normally a message is sent to the DOS or OS/2 workstation stating

that the printer is unavailable to complete the print job. However,

quite often a DOS Enhanced workstation will not display the message

concerning the unavailability of the printer.

CAUSE:

The messenger section of LANMAN.INI contains a parameter called

sizmessbuf. On OS/2 workstations, the default value for sizmessbuf

is 4096 bytes. On DOS Enhanced workstations, the default value for

sizmessbuf is 256. When a message is received whose total size is

larger than the message buffer size, the message is dropped. The

printer unavailability message can easily exceed the 256 byte

buffer size.

RESOLUTION:

Increase sizmessbuf to accommodate longer messages. Doubling the

default value to a 512 byte buffer should be sufficient for the

printer messages. Please note, however, that doubling this value

will affect the total available memory to the DOS workstation.