Can't get a connection to a network printer.

Message

nodder · #1 Post by **nodder** » Fri 27 Oct 2006, 17:25

Newbie looking for help, please !!

Running Puppy 2.11 on a very aged PC (Duron 750 MHz - 256 MB). This is connected to a home network (wired, through a Netgear DG834 router/modem) to 2 other PCs (both very modern and both running WinXP).

The one printer in the system is an aged Brother MFC 9000, which is connected to the Parallel port of one of the WinPCs.

From the PuppyLinux machine, using Samba, I can query the WinPC and can 'see' the printer. However, I cannot get anything to print from the PuppyLinux machine.

Thanks in advance

Nodder

rcrsn51 · #2 Post by **rcrsn51** » Fri 27 Oct 2006, 20:01

Have you tried CUPS - the Common Unix Printing System? There is an excellent dotpup located somewhere in this forum that will install it.

Guest · #3 Post by **Guest** » Fri 27 Oct 2006, 20:24

nodder wrote:Newbie looking for help, please !!

Running Puppy 2.11 on a very aged PC (Duron 750 MHz - 256 MB). This is connected to a home network (wired, through a Netgear DG834 router/modem) to 2 other PCs (both very modern and both running WinXP).

The one printer in the system is an aged Brother MFC 9000, which is connected to the Parallel port of one of the WinPCs.

From the PuppyLinux machine, using Samba, I can query the WinPC and can 'see' the printer. However, I cannot get anything to print from the PuppyLinux machine.

Thanks in advance

Nodder

You also must have printer sharing activated in windows.

It would be MUCH easier to share the printer as a standalone device on your network. Configuration is then a snap!!

We do it all the time at my workplace, and share all different makes/types of printers printing from Unix/Windows 2K, XP/ Linux boxes all over the lan.

Bob

Béèm · #4 Post by **Béèm** » Fri 27 Oct 2006, 21:09

FBrands wrote: It would be MUCH easier to share the printer as a standalone device on your network. Configuration is then a snap!!

We do it all the time at my workplace, and share all different makes/types of printers printing from Unix/Windows 2K, XP/ Linux boxes all over the lan.

Bob

And what are the precise steps to accomplish this in a mixed XP/Linux environment?
Should this printer be a lan connected model?

JB4x4 · #5 Post by **JB4x4** » Sat 28 Oct 2006, 01:00

I don't personally have my printer shared through XP, but I am sharing it over the network with Samba (running Kubuntu 6.10). You need an additional file and packagesinstalled in Puppy to make it work. First off, download the file smbspool from here- http://www.jb4x4.com/linux/smbspool.tar.gz / untar the file with the command tar -zxvf ./smbspool.tar.gz , then copy the file "smbspool" to /usr/bin (cp ./smbspool /usr/bin) - Next run the CUPS installation, it can be found here - http://dotpups.de/dotpups/Printing/cups ... v0.2r1.pup .

After giving your printer a Name: , continue on to Device: - there should be a choice of "Windows Printer via Samba" - For Device URI: it should be -

smb://guest@NAME-OF-HOST/NAME-OF-PRINTER

or

smb://NAME-OF-HOST/NAME-OF-PRINTER

NAME-OF-HOST = Name of the computer that the printer is hooked to.
NAME-OF-PRINTER = Name of printer that Samba/LinNeighborhood sees.

Finish the installation by selecting the proper type of printer and try a test page.

Note: The binary file "smbspool" is needed to make the connection with your printer. The CUPS install creates the proper simlink to it at /usr/lib/cups/backend/smb , but it is a dead link because smbspool is missing in the base Puppy install.

Béèm · #6 Post by **Béèm** » Sat 28 Oct 2006, 07:58

Interesting info, JB4x4, thank you.

Your principle is to use a shared printer, whether through Windows or Linux/smb
My remark to FBrands's solution was that I didn't understand his concept to share the printer as a standalone device on the network.
I interprete this as a direct to lan connected printer, which is addressed as a TCP device. Such printers exists and is probably a neat solution in a professional lan environment, but not so often used in personal environments.

raffy · #7 Post by **raffy** » Sat 28 Oct 2006, 12:18

Nodder, Jeffrey has found the solution to that sometime ago, here http://www.murga.org/~puppy/viewtopic.php?t=6919

nodder · #8 Post by **nodder** » Sat 28 Oct 2006, 22:08

Many thanks for all assistance. Have successfully managed to print several pages.

Way cool !!

I used JB4x4's method. There were a couple of wrinkles that I wriggled through as I went. These may be of interest...

1. I downloaded the ppd file BEFORE running CUPS. When I got to CUPS Help screen, I thought that it seemed sensible to get the right ppd in place before firing up CUPS.

2. I have a Brother MFC-9000, for which I couldn't find a ppd which matched exactly. I used the Brother MFC-9050 and it seems OK (not challenged with big, fancy graphics as yet...)

3. The name used for the printer (in the smb://NAME-OF-PRINTER, needs to match PRECISELY what the preinter is called on the Windows network (obvious, really - but it took me a couple of goes to sort out).

Also, I had a bit of hassle with the printer going 'missing' in SambaLinNeighbourhood. It seems that I have to manually go to SambaLin Neighbourhood at every start up to scan the network and make the printer visible - any handy hints on how to automate this process would also be gratefully received.

I'm finding that the faster I drop old, bad habits (double-clicking on everything, wishing to boot from Hard Drive, etc) the better that Puppy runs.

Increasingly addicted...

Thanks again to all.

Cheers

Nodder

nodder · #9 Post by **nodder** » Sun 29 Oct 2006, 20:57

Well...seems I've solved my own problem.

Re-cap...I had a bit of hassle with the printer going 'missing' in SambaLinNeighbourhood. It seems that I have to manually go to SambaLin Neighbourhood at every start up to scan the network and make the printer visible.

Here's a way of doing it....(welcome any comments on risks, pitfalls, etc of this approcah, but it seems to work).

Edit the file rc.local (found in /etc/rc.d/) to include the comand smb://SERVER-IP/PRINTER-NAME

Where SERVER-IP is the IP address of the Windows box to which the printer is connected.

And PRINTER-NAME is the name of the printer

Added line (and comment - in red) are at end of file.

Cheers

Nodder

#this file called from rc.local0
#you can edit this file
#When firewall is installed, will append lines to this file...

if [ -x /etc/rc.d/rc.firewall ]; then
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall start
fi

# Start cups
/etc/rc.d/rc.cups start

# Auto Mount Brother Printer
smb://192.168.0.2/MFC9

raffy · #10 Post by **raffy** » Sun 29 Oct 2006, 23:50

That's the idea - forum helps someone solve a unique problem - cheers!

Guest · #11 Post by **Guest** » Mon 30 Oct 2006, 01:37

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barriew · #12 Post by **barriew** » Wed 22 Nov 2006, 12:56

Thanks JB4x4 - that's fixed the final issue in my attempt to find a use for an old memory light laptop.
2.12 gave me a solution to my WiFi adapter driver, and this gave me printing.

Thanks to all contributors to the Forum and to the developers of Puppy. Although I 'can' load XP very slowly, I have not succeeded in loading any other live Linux distro. Both Ubuntu and PCLinuxOS never get to a runnable state.

Barrie

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Can't get a connection to a network printer.

Can't get a connection to a network printer.

Re: Can't get a connection to a network printer.

Re: Can't get a connection to a network printer.

jeffrey

cheers

RE:Networked printer