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Configuring a local printer in UNIX

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12 replies

by gstratton

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I work for a company in Australia that uses Unixware 7 and we need to set up a printer on a local machine so it can be printed to from a Unix program over the network. The remote PC has a static IP address but if we want to print to the printer we have to somehow give the printer another IP address, but how can you do this if the printer is local, it will conflict, or is there another way?

12 replies

by timthetoolman

Hi,

Just to confirm I've got your question right... You want to be able to print from UNIX to a local printer attached to a PC elsewhere on the network.

Although I've never had to do it, I believe you need to add the windows component...

"Other network file and print services"

Its in the "add/remove software" area of the control panel. Windows components.

That will allow a unix box to print to a PC's local printer. I'm fairly sure you'll need that before it'll work, and after that I'm not sure about what configurations must be made on the unix box. But I expect the help from Microsoft will tell you...

Cheers,
Tim.

by gstratton

Thanks but I could not find any config info from Microsoft. I still can not figure it out.

by les

Use Samba. Samba and windows printing works well. With Samba you setup a print queue and redirect to a shared windows printer.

by gstratton

Samba will do the opposite that i want, it's basically a free version of VisionFS it creates an NT environment on Unix, Samba will not see the Dial up connection from the Client office which is where the Printer is that i want to see from Unix. Thanks for your input though.

by les

OK so you actually want Unix to print to a windows printer over a dial up connection.

Could it not be easier to do something along the lines of generating the file on the Unix box then mailing it through automatically to the remote client so theycan print it manually on the remote site?

by gstratton

Les, The Files are quite large. The solution that i am looking for is that there is many offices around Australia that have this problem and if i can find out how to fix one i can fix them all. It would be quite time consuming to mail these files to all the clients. We want them to be able to print alone. Unix cannot see the printer (and we want unix to see it) because it is a local printer on a pc that dials up, the PC gets an IP address and that is the problem we need something to generate an ip address for the local printer so Unix can determine it from the computer. at the moment it can only see the printer. If i can solve it this will make a great deal of pressure dissapear. Thanks for all your help so far but unfortunately it still does not solve the issue.

by les

this may sound a bit wrong but....

Even if the files are large and mailing them would be a hassle then wouldn't it take equally as long to print over the network as it still has to send the data across to the remote printer?

What about zippingbefore mailing the file?

if the unix box can see the remote PC and the remote pc always gets the same static IP address is that PC on a seperate subnet? or does it join the same subnet as the Unix box after dial up?

by gazz

You have to have a third party product on the UW7 box. Samba will work.

There was a product from SCO called Advanced File and Print Server. This will make life easier then Samba.

There is a third product from SCO called Tarantella. This is a web front end for apps. This will be the best app for your environment. You can install it on your server and it will serve up the apps from a browser on a windows pc. It has remote printing built into it. You will not have to create printersfor every remote PC out there.
http://www.tarantella.com/
Take a look.
The bad news.....
Samba is Free :)
ADVFS is not free : (
Tarantella is really not free :(

I am not a salesman for SCO so I have no ideas on prices.

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