[vox-tech] Printing to non-Linux-supported printer using Windows XP

[Mark K. Kim]

Keywords: printing, printer, print, CUPS, gimp-print, Lexmark,
unsupported, LPR, LPD, MacOS X, Windows XP, WindowsXP, Mac OS X, Unix
Print Services

This one's for the archive.

So I got a Lexmark x6150 all-in-one color inkjet printer today for my
parents' Windows XP computer.  Since our computers are networked, I
thought it'd be nice to get my Linux box to print to their printer (just
like they can print to my LJ1100 B&W laser printer.)

To make the long story short, the printer isn't supported under
CUPS/Linux, but I found this website detailing how to print to a printer
connected to Windows from a MacOS X.  The same technique works beautifully
under Linux:

  http://iharder.sourceforge.net/macosx/winmacprinter/

Basically:

  1. Install a postscript printer.

  2. Use RedMon to redirect poscript printer's output to Ghostview's
     gsprint.exe program.

  3. Redirect gsprint.exe's output to the real printer (Lexmark x6150,
     in my case.)

  4. Create a LPR printer using the Windows' Unix Print Services.

So I added a virtual printer to my Linux box that prints to the Windows XP
box's LPR port (via http://localhost:631/).  Now whenever I send something
to that printer, Linux prints to the Windows XP's LPR port, which gets
sent to the virtual postscript printer, which gets redirected to
gsprint.exe, which gets sent to the real printer (Lexmark x6150), and out
comes the output page...

Beautiful.

-Mark


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Mark K. Kim
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