[gentoo-user] Is cups crap?

[Thierry de Coulon]

Hello all,

I am trying to configure a small network (two desktops and a notebook) to 
share printers.

Desktop 1 runs Gentoo and has a B/W Laserjet on LPT1
Desktop 2 runs OpenSuSE 10.0 and has a color Laserjet on LPT1
The Notebook is a Thinkpad runing OpenSuSE 10.0 nad has no printer attached.

Both printers are intalled on their computers and work fine... localy

On the Gentoo computer I have managed to intall the color Laserjet in Cups 
(connecting though localhost:631). The interresting thing is that I can print 
a test page from the KDE printer manager on either printers, but the very 
same test fails from localhost:631 with the message "you don't have access to 
the resources on this server" (?!). Anyway, from this computer everything 
works, which is the most improtant to me.

Now to the two SuSE computers. Desktop 2 shares it's printer but can't see the 
B/W laserjet on Desktop 1. Neither can the Notebook - but it can print on the 
color printer. I can print the test page on the color printer, but I can't 
set a root password for cups (unable to open passwd file: Permission denied ; 
and I _was_ root!). On the notebook lppasswd works. On Gentoo I get the 
message: "lppasswd: failed to backup old password file: No such file or 
directory"

The B/W Laserjet does show up, but it's not usable, and on the other computers 
I even have ghost printers (Laserjet_Color@Desktop1). On the Notebookand 
Desktop 2 the Laserjet 1300 is seen as  "Printer State: idle, accepting jobs" 
but there is no url and trying to print a test page either gives "you don't 
have access to the resources on this server" (Desktop 2) or "Test page sent" 
but nothing is ever printed.

>From the KDE printer manager Notebook can print on the color Printer attached
to Desktop 2 but does not have access to laserjet on Desktop 1, while Desktop 
2 (from localhost:631) is forbidden to use Laserjet 1300 but can print on 
it's own local printer......

Now, appart from the fact that three recent installations of cups work in 
three different ways (so I must confess I'm quite lost), and the fact that 
all three cupsd.conf files are mostly the same, How can I make the Gentoo 
computer share its printer ??

Thierry

-- 
Stupidity is like a fractal; universal and infinitely repetitive.

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