Connecting to Windows Printers via Samba in Linux

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Feb 26, 2007, 09:22 PM

I just spent a rather long time trying to get access to my Windows printers from within SUSE 10.2 using Samba.

I setup Samba for use with the file system and that seemed to work ok. I typed in my workgroup information and told it it was not a domain controller and it had no problem seeing the other computers in the work group and the shared drives / folders that they had. I did not have to type in a NetBIOS Hostname or any additional information. I got to it via the YaST dialog, under Network Services, Samba Server.

However, when it came time to do the printer, it wouldn't work properly.

It did not simply do a "browse" of the systems in the workgroup like it did for files. With files, it listed one of the computers, I selected it and all the folders that it shared were listed in their entirety.

Printers did not do the same thing though. I accessed it under the YaST dialog, under Hardware, Printer. I chose ADD, Network Printers, (next button) Print via SMB Network Server, (next button) and got to the main Samba or Windows Printer dialog.

Under Connection Information, it listed the following fields:

Workgroup
Hostname of Print Server
Remote Queue Name (with lookup button)
Username
Password

Since I have Simple File Sharing enabled in XP, a Username or Password is not needed.

So, I type in the workgroup name, the Hostname (which is the name of the machine as identified under System Properties under the Computer Name tab in that Windows dialog) and then clicked Look Up on the Samba screen.

It did not list anything but print$. Nothing else showed up at all.

There is no "browse" function that would simply attach to the workgroup and look for any printers listed. For some reason you have to manually type in the Hostname for the computer you want to look at.

Long story shorter, I did a google search and ran across a tip - if it does not seem to recognize the Hostname of the computer you are sharing the printer from, try typing in the IP address of that computer instead.

I typed in the IP addy of the PC and the next thing I knew, it listed the two attached laser printers after I clicked the Look Up button in the Samba dialog.

For whatever reason, it would ONLY work if I typed in that direct IP address.

So, I thought I'd post the info here just to share in case anyone has the same sort of issue. Perhaps a search of threads here will point folks to this post and help. I'd like to think I could save at least one person the hassle involved.

Sure would be nice if they had a Printer Browser that works like the Shares Browser, but I'm not the millionaire dot-com programming dude in charge of the Samba dialog, so hey, what do I know?

Xandros sure had no trouble browsing the network and letting me access the printers on my Windows machine.

Oh well, silly old Suse...

Happy printing!

H3X4D3C1M4L · Feb 27, 2007, 12:51 PM

I wonder if thats a samba thing or just SuSe's implementation of it? Personally I've never tried printer sharing under Unix/Linux/BSD because I couldn't be bothered

What version of samba was that by the way?

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Feb 27, 2007, 01:05 PM

I am not sure offhand what version, but it's in Suse 10.2, and that's just out, so it must be the latest.

Using Linux in a mixed networking environment means you need access to folders and especially printers.

Some distros do it very well. Others don't. It's wacky.

Maybe that is one of the things that prevents Linux from getting more of the desktop market - stuff like this should be virtually automatic.

EVERY distro should have Samba installed and active by default. Power users can turn it off if they want. EVERY distro should have a Samba network browser that reads everything - disks, printers, etc. EVERY distro should have a good Monitor/Video setup dialog that actually works effectively and not require someone to edit the xorg.conf file manually and worry about sync rates. EVERY distro should have a GUI "Safe Mode" so if X crashes out, you can default to like 640x480x256 and change settings. EVERY distro should have a command-line / character based app for configuring the monitor. EVERY distro should load Midnight Commander by default.

I dig Linux and stuff - but the "elitist" attitude of the terminal geeks who don't want Linux tained by n00bs who want to actually use a GUI are one of the reasons people just flat out give up on 'em. Another is that consistency and ease of use are lacking in many distros.

H3X4D3C1M4L · Feb 27, 2007, 01:11 PM

Well with the current machine I'm working on as my server, I'm using OpenBSD 4 and it comes with the Samba package and port already loaded. I personally don't see the need for a GUI when using the machine as a server, mainly because it adds alot of disk and memory bloat and the idea of most servers is pure performance or turning an old, resource limited machine into something useful for serving.

Besides, installing samba even from ports on OBSD is easy. Assuming your src tree and ports tree are well updated and in good shape, just cd to /usr/ports/net/samba and make install . Then it builds all the dependancies and installs it for you, you edit smb.conf and reboot and hey presto. A little time spend with the man page and you're well on your way

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Feb 27, 2007, 01:16 PM

GUI for config is less intimidating for many, I guess. You can just do a STARTX, config the stuff, then CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE to kill the GUI again.

If the command line had some standardized character-based interfaces that let you do the config, I'd probably not mess with the GUI either.

Midnight Commander is character-based with menu options, etc. It's a great time saver for going around the command line.

If they would come out with an app called SYSCONFIG, for instance, that was character based like MC and it allowed you to configure your Video, Samba, Apache Web Server and other common things that folks use, and then make that the standard (kinda like xfree86CFG used to be) and included it in all distros, I think that would totally rock.

H3X4D3C1M4L · Feb 27, 2007, 01:18 PM

Yeah but that's a hard thing to do, it would require alot of standardization and sort of ruin the idea behind different distros.

If more people spent time with the man pages they wouldn't need the GUI and they'd be able to configure more stuff

And as far as I know man is standard on everything

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Feb 27, 2007, 01:21 PM

KDE isn't ruining the idea behind different distros.

No reason not to have SOME standardized stuff when it comes to config. I think it is needed for the command line and the GUI.

It need not be the ONLY way to do it, but it is something that could easily be included in every Distro so that regardless of what is installed, someone can type the same program name and get the same options for configuring a systems basic components - especially for video.