[Samba] (2.2.5) Does AUTO PRINTER DRIVERS work - definitive statement please

[Gerald (Jerry) Carter]

On Fri, 16 Aug 2002 peter.a.bryant at mainroads.qld.gov.au wrote:

> Hi, could someone who is close to the Samba development make a comment
> about the automatic printer drivers features in Samba 2.2.5 I've been
> trying to get this working unsuccessfully, and have seen many messages
> posted from people having trouble with this feature. Not sure if this is
> an unnusual number of people with problems, but it seems like it ( I
> could be too close to the problem to see clearly).

It does work in 2.2.5 as long as you add the couple patches I've posted in 
the past.  You can download them from 

  http://download.samba.org/samba/ftp/patches/jerry/post-2.2.5

Or you can grab the latest SAMBA_2_2.  There will be a 2.2.6 release
in the next few weeks.  Most of the Samba team will be at a CIFS interop 
conference (www.cifs2002.org) next week so things are a little hectic.

Oh and it seems that many more people are trying to use it now which 
would account for the increased number of postings about it.

Trust me...it does work :-)

> Strange thing is, I'm sure I had this working in 2.2.2, but now can't
> get it working using the same conf and setup with 2.2.5. I've also seen
> this commment made a few times by other people.

2.2.2 didn't save printing information IIRC (or was that 2.2.3a?)


> Any comments welcome, set me straight - is it just me or is there a
> problem. Just need to know whether to keep looking for solutions, or
> hang fire and wait for someone to do the hard work for me.

It works, it's just that the entire process is horribly more 
complicated than anyone ever expected (to devleop and to administer).

Couple of comments (which I fairly sure you've followed)

(1) Make sure you follow the Printing Chapyer in the pdf file
    explictly.
(2) Make sure you actually upload the drivers on the server
(3) Make sure you initialize the devicemode of the 
    printer on the server.

> I'm using Solaris 8 and mostly HP drivers.

Most of my testing is on x86.  However, there are no byte ordering
issues that I am aware of.

I am working on one issue where certain features are not available
to users even though they are set on the server (forms, duplex, etc...)

> Really appreciate all the hard work put in by the Samba development
> team. You guys are tops.

Thanks. :-)  Now if only those printers....






cheers, jerry
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