Cannot print on new printer because "Waste Toner Box (waste-toner) seems to be empty."

[addiks]

I have bought a new Color-Laser Printer (Kyocera ECOSYS PA2101cx), but my System is refusing to print on it because it thinks that one of the cartridges is empty, one named "Waste Toner Box" (waste-toner). But this is not a normal toner-cartridge, it is a waste-box for used toner, it is perfectly fine for it to be empty to be able to print. In fact if the waste-toner would be full it would be an error. The printer itself is able to print test-pages (using the on-device display).

CUPS seems to misinterpret the printer-status for this waste-toner cartridge and refuses to print on a perfectly working printer.

There might be better solutions, but one simple 95%-quickfix should be to just ignore cartridges with the word "waste" in them. If you need more information from me (to f.e. better identify waste-cartridges) then please tell me how I could debug this, I'm happy to help.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Buy a Kyocera ECOSYS PA2101cx
2. Try to print anything
3. See error

Expected behavior
CUPS should be able to correctly interpret the completely fine printer-status that the waste-box is empty and print my pages.

Screenshots

System Information:

• OS: Tuxedo OS 12 (based on Ubuntu 24.04)
• KDE: 6.5.2 (Frameworks 6.19.0)
• Linux: 6.14.0-116036-tuxedo
• CUPS: 2.4.7-1.2ubuntu7.9 (cups-filters: 2.0.0-0ubuntu4.1)

Additional context
ChatGPT told me that cups-filters is responsible for interpreting the printer-status, which is why i created this issue here. If that was wrong, please point me to wherever this issue should be placed instead.

$ lpstat -l -p
Drucker Kyocera_ECOSYS_PA2101cx druckt jetzt Kyocera_ECOSYS_PA2101cx-31.  Aktiviert seit Di 30 Dez 2025 15:10:17 CET
        cfFilterExternal (ipp): Sleeping...  
        Geladenes Formblatt:
        Inhaltstypen: beliebig
        Druckertypen: unbekannt
        Beschreibung: Kyocera_ECOSYS_PA2101cx
        Alarme: cups-waiting-for-job-completed
        Ort: 
        Verbindung: direkt
        Schnittstelle: /etc/cups/ppd/Kyocera_ECOSYS_PA2101cx.ppd
        Bei Fehlern: kein Alarm
        Nach einem Fehler: fortfahren
        Erlaubte Benutzer:
                (alle)
        Erlaubte Formblätter:
                (keine)
        Banner erforderlich
        Zeichensatz-Set:
                (keine)
        Voreingestellte Gradation:
        Voreingestellte Seitengröße:
        Voreingestellte Porteinstellungen:

[addiks]

Excerpt from /var/log/cups/error_log:

2025-12-30.kyocera-printer-error.log

Relevant lines (as far as I can tell):

D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-colors 1setOf nameWithoutLanguage #00FFFF,#FF00FF,#FFFF00,#000000,none
D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-high-levels 1setOf integer 100,100,100,100,95
D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-levels 1setOf integer 92,92,92,95,0
D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-low-levels 1setOf integer 3,3,3,3,0
D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-names 1setOf nameWithoutLanguage Cyan TK-5490CS,Magenta TK-5490MS,Yellow TK-5490YS,Black TK-5490KS,Waste Toner Box
D [30/Dec/2025:16:11:02 +0100] [Job 34] cfFilterExternal (ipp): marker-types 1setOf keyword toner,toner,toner,toner,waste-toner

At least in this case, the waste toner is reported with a marker-color none instead of an actual color. Maybe this indicator (together with the name containing "waste"?) can be used to apply a different restriction for these cartridges?
The toner is explicitely marked with the marker-type 'waste-toner' (opposed to all others: 'toner', this should be enough to identify these cartridges and apply a different logic to them

Instead of marker-level must be above marker-low-level for printing to be allowed it should be marker-level must be below marker-high-level for printing to be allowed for waste cartridges.

[ValdikSS]

Your printer reports that it successfully printed zero pages and completed the job.

I wonder if this is an URF issue.
Please try this: OpenPrinting/cups-filters#660 (comment)

To be able to say something more precise, please do this: OpenPrinting/cups-filters#660 (comment)

[tillkamppeter]

Note that there are 2 types of consumables and IPP supports this fact:

• Those which come full and need to get replaced when empty, like ink or toner
• Those which come empty and need to get replaced when full, like a waste toner box

I do not know how in IPP it is told which of the 2 senses applies for each consumable (marker) item, looks like it is just the marker-type name, toner or waste toner. How does that work, @michaelrsweet ?

It seems that somewhere the waste toner box is misinterpreted and the new, empty box considered used up.

[tillkamppeter]

As the filters do not check or handle consumables, but this is actually done by the ipp backend and by CUPS itself I am moving this to CUPS ...

[tillkamppeter]

Could you run the command

driverless

It lists URIs of printers in your network. Find the one of your Kyocera.

Now run

ipptool -tv URI get-printer-attributes.test > attrs .txt

replace URI by the URI you have found in the first step and attache attrs.txt to this bug report.

[michaelrsweet]

@tillkamppeter Printer supplies are reported in two ways.

The first uses the CUPS "marker-xxx" attributes where the "marker-low-levels" and "marker-high-levels" values tell you whether a supply is filled or consumed.

The second uses the IPP "printer-supply" attribute, where the "class" property in the string value is 'supplyThatIsConsumed' or 'receptacleThatIsFilled'.

WRT the printer working or not working, supply levels are informational and do not prevent printing from occurring.

[tillkamppeter]

So @addiks the job should print independent of any report about the levels of the consumables. The mis-interpretation here is probably happening in the GUI (KDE) and is not more then displaying the waste toner level in a misleading way. This is a bug of KDE and should be reported to there.

The jobs not being printed is a problem independent of this one.