Linux Printserver & windows clients without admin rights

English Network/Internet
1

Well, hi, I am new to openSUSE. But my question is quite general after all. Well, I am here in a university and we have a printer (HP Laserjet 4250) that is accessed via IPP.

Right now, we need to log in as administrator on the Windows clients (almost 100% XP) and than install the drivers manually. Now my job is to make that less complicated. I understand I can put the driver on the server so that the clients can download it from there.

My boss’ initial idea was to completely avoid drivers. Well, as I understand it, it’s not possible. So this post is only about being absolutely sure.

I am quite sure since the SAMBA documentation says: Currently, there is no program or method to convert a Windows client’s GDI output on a UNIX server into something a printer could understand. → Chapter*22.*CUPS Printing Support - but than what is all that stuff about RAW printing? I mean, is there anything else?

Thanks a lot in advance, I am going to read on myself, just my head started hurting :wink:

2

On Tue September 22 2009 08:16 am, meng-tian wrote:

>
> Well, hi, I am new to openSUSE. But my question is quite general after
> all. Well, I am here in a university and we have a printer (HP Laserjet
> 4250) that is accessed via IPP.
>
> Right now, we need to log in as administrator on the Windows clients
> (almost 100% XP) and than install the drivers manually. Now my job is to
> make that less complicated. I understand I can put the driver on the
> server so that the clients can download it from there.
>
> My boss’ initial idea was to completely avoid drivers. Well, as I
> understand it, it’s not possible. So this post is only about being
> absolutely sure.
>
> I am quite sure since the SAMBA documentation says: -Currently, there
> is no program or method to convert a Windows client’s GDI output on a
> UNIX server into something a printer could understand.- →
> ‘Chapter*22.*CUPS Printing Support’ (http://tinyurl.com/7l4oea) - but
> than what is all that stuff about RAW printing? I mean, is there
> anything else?
>
> Thanks a lot in advance, I am going to read on myself, just my head
> started hurting :wink:
>
meng-tian;
Have you read the section:
Network Printing (Windows Clients and UNIX/Samba Print Servers)
in
http://samba.org/samba/docs/man/Samba-HOWTO-Collection/CUPS-printing.html#id2640473

I have never tried this, but prefer to just download the native drivers from
the server, but it appears that you should be able to install a printer on
Windows as a postscript printer (even if the actual printer is not) and then
let CUPS convert to a form that the printer uses. This approach means you do
not need special drivers for each printer. In general, no matter what method
you choose, you need to have someone in either the “power user” or
administrator group, with permission to add drivers, install the printer.
But, you might be able to play around with group policies to designate some
other users the right to install printers.

This link, written for SLES but still good for opensuse, gives information on
installing drivers on the server.
http://www.pcc-services.com/sles/samba5.html

Once the drivers are on the server you can use “point’n’print” or the “add
printer wizard” on Windows to install the printer.

P. V.
“We’re all in this together, I’m pulling for you.” Red Green

3

Thank you for the reply. Well, we have only two printers so this postscript solution doesn’t help me much.

Well, I am quite sure it doesn’t work with opensource tools.

I couldn’t find any driver/tool/whatever that can convert Windows GDI data into something Linux can use. If someone knows some tool (can be commercial) that converts emf->postscript please tell me :slight_smile: