[FreeNX-kNX] printing under freenx/knx

[Kurt Pfeifle]

On Tuesday 12 April 2005 13:20, Cardon Denis wrote:

> I've read throught the mailing list that printing was scheduled for
> freenx0.4 coming out in may. As I was badly needing printing recently, I
> tried to find a way to work out printing on my local machine, and I
> though I could share it with other. 

You may also want to look at these two links on our Berlios site to 
see how you can enable printing already now with FreeNX, if you are 
prepared to do some manual work. 
 
http://developer.berlios.de/feature/?func=detailfeature&feature_id=617&group_id=2978
http://developer.berlios.de/feature/?func=detailfeature&feature_id=618&group_id=2978

The first one is based on SSH-portforwarding the local (NX client)
system CUPS daemon's port 631 to any other (above 1024, f.e. 30631) 
port on the remote NX server. Then, for printing set the IPP_PORT
environment variable to 30631 (or whatever), or configure kprinter
to use

The second one creates a userspace cupsd. That userspace cupsd has 
its own configuration (cupsd.conf) and is bound to a non-privileged 
port (so that a non-root user can
  a) adapt the cupsd.conf to all his special needs,
  b) install all printers to his likings and
  c) access the port...), which then is portforwarded in much the 
     same way as the first variant above.

The advantage of the second variant is that all the PPD/driver 
settings will be available with no further configuration in the
remote session. Its disadvantage is that you need to do much more
by your own. (I have/had a script that clones and adapts the
system cupsd into user space, and automates the process.)

Fabian has come up with a very elegant solution that combines the
advantages of both variants. This solution will require no additional
configuration whatsoever on the part of the user. It will "just work",
so that all the printers you usually have and "see" when working
locally, will also appear and work inside your remote FreeNX sessions.

The disadvantage of all this is that it only works, if

  a) the local NX client has a CUPS server installed (that is the NX 
     client must either be on Linux, FreeBSD, Mac OS X or Solaris --
     Windows is not supported

  b) and the remote session must go to a Unix server which has at
     least the CUPS client parts installed (no support for most 
     VNC or RDP sessions).

To support also Windows clients, we are interested in someone who 
could make some effort in getting CUPS compiled and installed on
a Windows system. There are two options:

  a) inside a Cygwin environment (probably the easiest -- to our
     knowledge there is not yet a CUPS package for Cygwin available)

  b) natively on Windows (CUPS *may* be made to compile on Windows,
     with some reduced functionality, f.e. some of its built-in 
     filters possibly missing).

Cheers,
Kurt