Samba Share Part 3 - Windows Configuration
For : Mepis Linux / Microsoft Windows
by : je.saist
| While sharing printers within a Mepis Network is easy,
sharing across to a Windows Computer on the network is by contrast
painful. Buckle down, this is going to require some work. And this is the doozy. All together this guide exceeds 90 steps. It is larger than the e.P.S.X.e guide. This is probably the most complex guide so far, involving 2 operating systems as well as manual file configuration. I'm sorry, but this one isn't staying inside GUI operations. However, this is the most effective way to share a printer with Mepis as the printer will be seen as if it was a native windows device. Unlike the Adobe driver you will not lose any of the printers capabilities or control with this process. Because of this some notes must be made. First : Completing the Local Share Guide is not needed. This guide will cover that. Second : The printer needs to be supported by Linux and have Windows drivers available. Part 1 : I need to start over Part 2 : I shouldn't have skipped class Part 3 : You are here In Part 2 we configured CUPS to share the printer and made sure that the printer was visible to Windows. Now lets configure Windows itself. 65: We last left Windows looking at our printer on the network. If we look to the right, we should see our /home folder and a folder labled /printers Double Click on Printers  66: Hmm, remember the last picture of Part 2? It showed the printer on the network, but this printer is a little bit different. It actually seems to be shared to Windows with the shared hand symbol cupping the printer. Double Click on the Shared Printer  67: Hmm, we can see the queu for our Linux printer. We should also see a line of text at the top Printer Document View Help Click on Printer  68: And our first option should be to Connect Click on Connect  69: And Windows will now request a driver. This is where the Samba share truely seperates itself from the Adobe Postscript. Windows will see and treat the printer natively once the drivers are installed. As far as the user will be considered, it will be identical to sharing a printer over a Windows network. Click ok  70: Don't count on finding your driver under Microsoft's inbuilt list. Actually, if your driver is listed there, don't count on it working either. We need to Find the Vendors Drivers.  71: Now here is where what you will do will differ from what I will do. The printer I installed under Mepis is a Hewlett Packard. So I am going to go to http://www.hp.com If you do not have a HP or Compaq printer, you will need to visit the site for your Printer Manufacturer and obtain drivers for your version of windows. This section of the guide is built on the prospect that you do not have your printer drivers on hand to work with. If you have the printer CD or Floppy on hand, just hang tight.  72: HP has a nice seach system in place, so I'm going to place the model of my printer into the search bar at the bottom of HP's home page. In this case, I am searching for a Photosmart 7350 If you have an HP or Compaq product, you can type the model and number in here as well. If you do not, search your Printer Manufacturer's site for your product.  73. HP returned a few results, among them products. I am going to select the HP Photosmart 7350 Printer under select a product  74: Under Product Quick Links I have a link to Download drivers and software Your printer manufacturer should have a similar link on their page.  75: Although I am using Windows 2000, I am going to select the WindowsXp Driver. The operating systems are identical. If you are using Windows ME or 98, choose the ME driver.  76: HP gives several options for obtaining the driver. In this case, I'm going to click on the driver itself to download.  77: HP will now bring me to a download screen where I can download now  78: Since I am using FireFox, I have a download tracker built in. All I need to do is simply click open on the recently downloaded file from HP. If you are using a different browser or a different download manager, make sure you open your file up as well.  79: Many drivers will give you an option to Unzip the driver. HP allows me to specify a location which I will unzip the drivers to. In this case, I am unzipping them to C:\hp-print Some printer manufacturers will create driver bundles that will only install if the printer is physically hooked up. In such a case, you will want to install the printer on windows first.  80: Once the drivers are on the computer, we can look them up. At this point, what you do should be back in line with what I do again. Go back to the add printer wizard and Click on Have disk  81: Typcially Windows should look on a floppy first. Click Browse Unless your drivers are on a floppy. Then feel free to just hang tight.  82: This shows where I found C:\hp-print and then I drilled down till I found the drivers under the folder win2k_xp You will probably have to drill down in the driver folder to get to your operating system as well. If you have a floppy or a CD, find the drivers on your floppy or CD at this time.  83: Once you have the driver selected, Click Open  84: Now click OK  85: Windows has now asked which Printer to install. Select your printer and click OK  86: At this point the wizard will probably close. Go ahead and Close the queue  87: Time to check the printers on this computer. Lets go to our start menu. Then click on Settings.  88: In most versions of Windows there should be a heading for Printers under the Settings menu. If there is not, you are probably under Windows XP, and in this case you can only Click on Control Panel  89: If you are in WindowsXP, you will probably need to Switch to Classic View to find Printers (the switch to classic view is located in blue letters on the left hand side of the screen)  90: And there we have our Linux printer listed.  91: Left Click on the Printer Once. We should see the left hand bar to change and indicate Status: Ready  92: Alright, Right Click on the printer and choose properties  93: Under Properties click on Print Test Page  94: Do not be allarmed if this takes several minutes. This portion took about 6 minutes to complete on an Athlon64 2800+ However, just a note, afterwards printing is fairly quick, with sub 1 minute wait times. Eventually a message should come up telling the test page was being sent. Go ahead and hit okay.  95: If we go over and check our printer, we should have something like the following.  Now, go to bed. Return to Part one for Samba configuration Return to Part two for CUPS configuration Take me back to the printer blitz Take me back to the guides  |