(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Just for the record, for those who keep getting "Cannot connect to CIFS host", I've got my printer going in Puppy 4.1 with the printer address set to:

smb://Administrator@windows_IP_address/printer_share_name

That is literally "//Administrator@", you don't have to put anything else instead.

Took a lot of Googling.....

Gerry

Would that IP work for puppy to puppy linking

@gerry: Thanks for that suggestion. I have added it to the original post. Hopefully, it will help other users with printing problems. By any chance, are you printing over a wireless network?

Looks like it works on wireless to the win machine
Took out Admin and it still worked.

Will have to try puppy to puppy again :S

@rcrsn51- sorry, no. Still good old wires...

Gerry

Okay puppy to puppy is still not working through wireless.
Interesting enough when I do nbtscan for the IP of the host nothing comes up even though it does have a static IP.

Is it a port thing?
If I made computer a samba server, would I have better luck getting into the host from puppy (wireless of course).

Needed Adminstrator for Puppy to Windows

Well, it stopped working AGAIN.

After a lot of work, during which I found in Puppy 4.1.1 that smb.conf in /etc/ is a symlink to /opt/samba/smb.conf which neither Pfind nor I could find, I eventually hit on the solution. Having done all the above, and copied smb.conf across from Puppy 3.01, all to no avail, I found that Pnethood is the answer.

Do Menu > Network > Pnethood Samba Shares

Make sure "Use cifs" box is ticked.

If all is well, you should see a line with print$ in it. Click on Connect.

Now go to the application that you wish to print from, and print!

The "cannot connect to cifs host" messages in cups are banished.

I have not tried removing the smb.conf file- so it may or may not be needed. EDIT: it is not needed, I removed it to see.

EDIT: Of course, this Pnethood connection is not permanent, and needs to be re-connected every time you boot.

Gerry (who is keeping his fingers crossed that this time it will keep on working, instead of being a flash in the pan.)

After much frustration trying to connect to my Canon PIXMA IP4000 on a Windows XP computer the following worked.

smb://work-group-name/computer-name/CanonPIX%20IP4000

The share name on the XP is CanonPIXIP4000. Being a new Puppy user, I don't know what the "%20" is doing, but I found it by using a Live CD for XUBUNTU and browsing for available shared printers.

Good work! The %20 suggests that that there is an embedded space in the Windows name of the printer. It looks like Windows drops the space when it displays the name, but Linux needs to use it.

I wonder what would happen if you went back to Windows and shortened the name to just eight letters, like CANONPIX?

Also, is the work-group-name necessary to connect on your system?

I was able to connect to my printer under Puppy 4.1.2 using the general directions at the beginning of this thread. The important points seem to be:

1. Designate the printer as "shared" and assign it name under Windows (I have Windows 98 running on the server, but XP should work the same way).

2. Start Pnethood. Under the Windows computer acting as print server, you should now see: PRINTER$. Mount it.

3. Make sure that you choose CUPS Device: Windows Printer via SAMBA.

4. As URI, enter smb://computer_name/printer_name.

If printing still doesn't work, the problem may lie with GhostScript, not CUPS or SAMBA.

Check this by opening a console and typing in "gs". If all is well, the GS interpreter will start with the prompt "gs >".

If not, you will get an interesting error message. In my case, I got:

"gs: Interpreter revision (81504) does not match gs_init.ps revision (81502)."

GhostScript would not start , hence no printing.

The problem may have arisen when I installed GSView, which did not work either and returned the same error message.

After agonizing over the difficulties involved in finding and correctly installing the packages necessary to resolve the conflict, I decided to simply give the baby a pacifier.

I opened gs-init.ps and changed 81502 to 81504 and presto, both GSView and CUPS printing worked.

I hope this works for at least some of you!

Nice work. It's still a mystery to me why some users need to first mount the printer through Pnethood.

Regarding your gs issue: I always start by connecting the printer locally so I can eliminate any internal problems first.

Go to Admin Tasks and start adding a new printer.

At the bottom of the Device list you can now select "Windows Printer via Samba"

I still don't have this part.

Ok, I'm using 4.2 on a laptop, frugal install, linksys router. I am trying to connect and use a windows printer. I can connect to the shared files on the computer fine (actually it was really amazingly easy).

I go to my desktop and right click to get the menu. Then I go to
Settup-->CUPS printer wizard which opens up the browser to the CUPS page.

There on the page under the Administration tab under Printers, I click on Add Printer.

I then get the page that I'm attaching as a picture.

there is no "Device" area and no chance to attach to windows via samba. i fear I am missing something early but not sure what...I have all the links specified in the first post of this thread...

Please advise..

**Edit: I'm not averse to command line, so suggestions on how to do this directly with smbspool would be acceptable, but I think I'm simply missing something...but what?

Puppy 4.2 uses CUPS 1.4b2, which has a different layout. However, the smb symlink needed to access a Windows shared printer is included with this version. So you shouldn't need to change anything.

Did you accidentally change the symlink? Look in /usr/lib/cups/backend.

rcrsn51 wrote:Puppy 4.2 uses CUPS 1.4b2, which has a different layout. However, the smb symlink needed to access a Windows shared printer is included with this version. So you shouldn't need to change anything.

Did you accidentally change the symlink? Look in /usr/lib/cups/backend.

Nope...the smb link to smbspool is there...I made sure multiple times...

You may be seeing some of the buggy behaviour of CUPS 1.4b2. Try booting a fresh copy with pfix=ram and see what happens.

rcrsn51 wrote:You may be seeing some of the buggy behaviour of CUPS 1.4b2. Try booting a fresh copy with pfix=ram and see what happens.

Fresh copy of which, 4.2? Or 4.2.1 or older?

**Edit: fresh 4.2, tried, same issue...will try with 4.0 next...

All right, ran pupfluxlite (based on 4.0).

Had to set the sym link to the backend myself, just fyi. Then ran cups and set it exactly per directions. Worked perfectly...didn't need the ppd file as it found the driver in the list perfectly (hplaserjet4L).

So, how can I get 4.0's CUPS on my 4.2 frugal install? Or how can I correct what is wrong with the 4.2 version of CUPS?

I don't know why your version of 4.2 would be different, but here is what I see in CUPS.

rcrsn51 wrote:I don't know why your version of 4.2 would be different, but here is what I see in CUPS.

Nope, it's just not there.

Just in case, I moved the 4.0 smbspool to 4.2, checked the link again, restarted cups, mounted "print" in xp computer...nope. Still not there...just exactly as I posted above.

What the heck? Can I get rid of this CUPS and put the older one on there? What is the most logical way for me to work around this?