Difference between revisions of "Printer Drivers for Windows Workstations"

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Latest revision as of 13:54, 11 May 2010

Install printer drivers as described below in order to allow your Windows Workstations to find and install the drivers for shared network printers automatically.

Printer Driver Installation

  1. Login to the SME server command-line and run the following commands:
  2. db configuration setprop smb UseClientDriver no expand-template /etc/samba/smb.conf service smb restart
  3. Add the printer on the server-manager page
  4. From a Windows client, (logged in as admin) click start run and type \\servername
  5. Double click Printers and Faxes
  6. Right Click on the printer you added in step 2
  7. Click Properties
  8. Click the Advanced tab
  9. Click New Driver
  10. Follow the wizard to add the driver for the printer added in step 2
  11. Click Apply

Driver Upload for a group

This allow a group (let´s use the group named "technicians" with "Domain Admins" description as example) to upload drivers to servers.
(This is great to allow technicians to join computers to domain without let them know root password!).

Run:

 chgrp -R technicians /home/e-smith/files/samba/printers


From Shad Lords tip for Bug/NFR 4431 ( http://bugs.contribs.org/show_bug.cgi?id=4431 )

Installing Adobe Postscript Drivers on SME Server

Since the Adobe Postscript Drivers do not come with a .inf file you can not install them as above. The Adobe Postscript Drivers can be used to install a PDF printer which for instance has been installed using the smeserver-cups contrib.

  1. Download the Adobe Postscript drivers for Windows from the website of Adobe.
  2. Extract the executable using winrar or another tool than can extract zipped executables.
  3. Copy the files in the WinXP folder to your server and remember where your put them. I created the following directory (/usr/share/cups/drivers/) and put them there. After you have done that you might have to create a Samba administrator user;
  4. If you have a Samba administrator user cnfigured you can copy the files using a command like this where you fill in the correct path and the username and password of your Samba administrator user: smbclient //localhost/print$ -N -U'username%password' -c \ 'mkdir W32X86; \ put /usr/share/cups/drivers/DEFPRTR2.PPD W32X86/DEFPRTR2.PPD; \ put /usr/share/cups/drivers/PS5UI.DLL W32X86/PS5UI.DLL; \ put /usr/share/cups/drivers/PSCRIPT5.DLL W32X86/PSCRIPT5.DLL; \ put /usr/share/cups/drivers/PSCRIPT.HLP W32X86/PSCRIPT.HLP' After pressing return it should copy the drivers to the Samba print$ share, which looks something like this: Domain=[SIMPSONS] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.0.10-1.4E.12.2] NT_STATUS_OBJECT_NAME_COLLISION making remote directory \W32X86 putting file /usr/share/cups/drivers/DEFPRTR2.PPD as \W32X86/DEFPRTR2.PPD (286.4 kb/s) (average 286.4 kb/s) putting file /usr/share/cups/drivers/PS5UI.DLL as \W32X86/PS5UI.DLL (3315.8 kb/s) (average 1656.9 kb/s) putting file /usr/share/cups/drivers/PSCRIPT5.DLL as \W32X86/PSCRIPT5.DLL (3933.6 kb/s) (average 2962.8 kb/s) putting file /usr/share/cups/drivers/PSCRIPT.HLP as \W32X86/PSCRIPT.HLP (1210.8 kb/s) (average 2794.1 kb/s)
  5. After that we have to add the copied files to the driver database of Samba. This can be done with the following command (again fill in your username and password for your Samba administrator user). rpcclient localhost -N -U'username%password' -c 'adddriver "Windows NT x86" \ "AdobePPD:PSCRIPT5.DLL:DEFPRTR2.PPD:PS5UI.DLL:PSCRIPT.HLP:NULL:RAW:NULL"' After hitting return this should put the following message on your screen: Printer Driver AdobePPD successfully installed.
  6. Now we still need to define the driver for our PDF printer, which I created using the smeserver-cups contrib. This can be done with the following command (again supplying the username and password of your Samba administrator): rpcclient localhost -N -U'username%password' -c 'setdriver PDF AdobePPD' If succesfull this should output: Succesfully set PDF to driver AdobePPD.
  7. Now navigate to your server and right click on the printer. Choose the Connect option and the drivers should now be automatically installed for this printer.

References

  1. NetAdminsTools' Point and Print in Samba
  2. Forum thread: Howto install windows printer drivers on SME?
  3. Novell's Cool Solutions How to Configure Automatic Printer Driver Download by Integrating CUPS and SAMBA
  4. Adobe Postscript drivers for Windows