How Do I Print from OITware to a Network Printer?
Technical Note 1060
Applicable Model(s)
MicroOIT
OIT
MAP Series
Title
How Do I Print from OITware to a Network Printer?
Date
06/17/2003
Rev
01
P/N
0907-1060
Summary
This document describes how to print to a network printer when using OITware-200. Part I of this document describes the necessary steps when using Windows 95, Windows 98, or NT4.0. Part II describes what to do when using Windows XP or Windows 2000.
Solution
Part 1: Using Windows95, Windows 98, or NT4.0
1.
Configure Your Network Client PC
a.
In the My Computer folder, open the Printers folder.
b.
In the Printers folder, right-click the desired printer’s icon and then select Properties. The Properties dialog box appears.
c.
In the Properties dialog box, select the Details tab.
d.
In the Details tab, choose the Capture Printer Port button. The Capture Printer Port dialog box appears.
e.
In the Device drop-down list box, select a printer port other than LPT1. LPT1 already exits as a device on the PC, and is not addressable.
f.
In the Path drop-down list box, enter the network path and printer name. The path may already be defined; click the Path drop-down list box to find out.
g.
Choose the OK button to return the Properties dialog box.
h.
In the Details tab, choose the Apply button, then choose the OK button.
2.
Print from OITware-200
a.
Start OITware-200 and open your project.
b.
From the File Menu, select Print. The Print dialog box appears.
c.
In the Print dialog box, choose the Setup button. The Print Setup dialog box appears.
d.
In the Print Setup dialog box, choose the printer and port configured in STEP 1.
e.
Choose the OK button to return to the Print dialog box.
f.
In the Print dialog box, select what you want to print and then choose the OK button.
g.
OITware-200 should now print your project to your network printer.
Part 2: Using Windows XP or Windows 2000
NOTE: Some system-level operations are required. If you don’t understand any of these instructions, please contact your organization’s Information Technology (IT) department.
The following operations may require administrator-level access to the computer.
1.
Assigning the Network Printer to a Local Port
a.
Open the Command Prompt
b.
Use the Net Use command to attach the network printer to a local printer port. The syntax is:
NET USE LPTn: \\[computer name]\[printer name]
c.
If entered properly, the system should respond with a completion message. The network printer will remain mapped to LPT2 after restarting Windows.
See Part 3 for details on removing the mapping.
2.
Assigning the New Local Port to a Printer
After the new local port has been created, a printer must be connected to that port. It is suggested that a new printer be added, instead of assigning the existing printer to the new port. This way, any applications that use the existing printer will still work.
a.
To add a printer, open the Printers and Faxes dialog
a.
Open the Printers and Faxes dialog
b.
Even though the printer is a remote printer on the network, we want Windows to think it is a local printer. So when prompted, select to add a Local Printer.
c.
Select the Local Port configured in Part 1 above. In the example, we used LPT2.
d.
When prompted to select the printer, select the one already installed. If no printer is installed, install it normally.
e.
If prompted to use or replace the existing driver, select to keep the existing one.
f.
Give the printer a unique name. You cannot use the same name as an existing printer. If adding a new printer, and the existing printer is named “HP”, you could call the new one “HP on LPT2”.
g.
The next pages in the Wizard are not critical, and are left up to you.
3.
Removing the Printer Mapping
a.
To un-attach the network printer from the local port, use the following command:
net use /DELETE LPTn
NOTE: “n” is the port number in this case.
In the example from Part 1:
b.
Once the mapping is removed, the printer that was created in part 2 will no longer work.