Mac > Papercut > Windows Server

[Matthew Strickland]

Hi all,

Just curious to know which method of many ways for our Mac's to print to Windows print queues with Papercut.

For me the most reliable and least nagging way for students (and staff) was to enable LPD printing services (old 2008 32bit server) and print via LPD (the Mac's are AD bound)

For students there is no popup, its charged straight to their personal account.For staff it pops up with department.

However I am going to upgrade to 2012r2 soon, and while I still see LPD there, I know its depreciated.

SMB was an issue with expired passwords saved in keychains, or keychains not updated after password changes, or sometimes the printer getting stuck on paused.

I'd use localhost:631 or edit printers.conf, use FQDN but it just was never reliable enough.

I think possibly giving PaperCut's LPD service a go, replicating the working system we have now.

Anyone else using SMB for multiuser device? Or prefer using Papercuts authentication?

Matthew Strickland

Karamu High School

Hastings, Hawke's Bay

[Patrick Dunford]

By the way the latest versions of papercut provide their own LPD support for later versions of Server, I think that it has recently been added to PC.

 

--
Patrick Dunford
System Administrator
IDSGT Ltd
itsu...@hillview.school.nz
Ext 224 / 027 601 7163

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[Matthew Strickland]

Hi Patrick,

Yes I mentioned I am thinking of using PaperCut's LPD service. It looks like it will be a direct replacement :)

Matt

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[Matt Strickland]

Hi all,

This is an old post I'm bouncing back up.

Ive been using PaperCuts LPD service for our mac's fine for a few years, but now this year jobs that refuse to authenticate (credentials either not being sent with the job) or its not asking to save them.

Sometimes this is saved in keychain but for jobs that authenticate with the logged in user this may not be.

I usually add printers either using the Advanced option in Preferences or via CUPS localhost:631 but either way doesn't work, (or it does for a day, next day no go)

Same with adding printers via SMB, works usually for kiosk macs (like student ones) where the user log's in and out, but not for mac's where the user stays in (laptop sleeps, returns from overnight etc)

Am I better to setup a Mac server on the network for printing and share the papercut database, use Windows for windows cues, Mac for Mac?

(I do also have Mobility Print, but that's basic printing from BYOD/L - it doesn't use extended print support like booklets, page reduction which is part of the official driver)

Matt

[Pete Mundy]

Heya Matt

We've just gone through a new PaperCut installation to enable print services from macOS, iOS and chromeOS devices. Plus one stand alone Windows (10) PC.

The PaperCut integrator's approach was to use a macOS based server and CUPS print-sharing system with PaperCut's web app running on the same device (it was actually a virtual machine running under VMWare Fusion with a couple of other macOS instances on a Mac Mini).

The printer queues for macOS devices all use IPP. So on the clients we configure by going Print & Fax, + , click on 'IP', change protocol to IPP then enter print server DNS name, specify queue, pick driver and set finisher options.

I gather from what the integrator said (but can't vouch 100% it's correct) that the CUPS print system uses IPP to send the jobs to the MFDs too.

He did make the comment that IPP is the de-facto protocol they're using in recent installs.

Do you think your jobs which are failing to authenticate might be doing so because the PCClient app has stopped on the device submitting the job? I've noticed a couple of times that the app isn't running for some reason or another (I always add it to Login Items so it should auto-launch and run headless in the background, but maybe it crashes?). I tell the users to check the menu extra icon is visible on RHS of menubar before choosing print just to be sure.

Pete

[Andrew Godfrey]

We use a Mac server sharing printers with Macs so all printing goes through the server and off to the printers directly. The Mac server has a Papercut Secondary loaded that will check print jobs with our main PC primary. The Mac clients run the papercut client. Both the PC client and printers get pushed from our Mac server to the Mac clients.

Andrew Godfrey  |  Network Manager

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[Matt Strickland]

Hi Pete,

Thanks - In my case its getting the queue to accept the job/credentials. I end up with paused or hold-for-authentication but no prompt for credentials (or when using LPD its usually the credentials of the signed in user)

If it gets to the queue, papercut client always prompts for release.

In a few cases I've actually set the user to auto-charge an account (no prompt), so the papercut client is not needed, as long as credentials are supplied with the job.

I've try a few more things but it seems like I may need a Mac server for mac queues, and Windows for windows and load papercut primary/secondary.

Matt

[Pete Mundy]

No worries man. The only other data point I could add on that particular topic (meant to mention it last time actually) is that the integrator gave up after spending a couple of hours trying to get the single Windows PC to submit jobs through the (macOS based) PaperCut server.

In the end he configured the PC to submit jobs directly to one of the MFDs instead. This means that user was unable to use the 'follow me' release feature, BUT he did manage to configure the MFD so that it reports the counts for this directly-received job back to the PaperCut server so they can be taken off the user's total (not sure what happens if they don't have enough credit though).

I guess the take-home from that is "yes, you may need to retain a Windows print-server for your Windows clients if you build a new macOS based one".

Pete

> On 8/02/2018, at 8:12 AM, Matt Strickland <ma...@zebis.co.nz> wrote:
>
> Hi Pete,
>
> Thanks - In my case its getting the queue to accept the job/credentials.

> <snip>

[Pete Eaton]

You can run https://nomad.menu/ on the Macs that will handle the authentication stuff to print to windows printers without having to join them to the domain.

The combination of Nomad and the Papercut Client lets users print to smb shared printers on Windows Servers - that is what we do.  Users sometimes have to log/on off to relaunch the two apps if they move on/off school wifi.

Pete

Sent from my iPhone

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[Matt Strickland]

Thanks Peter,

Ill take a look at this. I managed to get printing working via SMB for now. 

Weird thing is, I deleted the existing network credential saved in keychain (even tho the credentials were correct), manually re-created it (⌘K) by browsing to any share (save in keychain), then return to setting up the printer via SMB.

Gave up on LPD. Either credentials are not submitted or in the correct format, possibly changed in High Sierra. I'd have to gouge the logs to confirm.

Matt

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[andy....@linewize.com]

Who bind's macs to AD anymore?! 🤣

Pete has nailled it... use NoMAD! It fixes EVERYTHING with running Macs within an AD environment.

As per their tag line: "The power of AD... with none of the bind!"

https://nomad.menu/goodbye-ad/

I'm really looking forward to NoMAD Login... it must be nearly ready for showtime....!

NoLo - Controlling the Login Window with NoMAD Login

Now you can loose the bind at the loginwindow too! The same framework behind NoMAD, but now in Authentication Plugin form. NoMAD Login allows you to do a number of configurations for complex workflows.

- Require AD, or other IDP, authentication at the Loginwindow for local accounts.

- Perform just in time provisioning of local accounts based upon AD authentication for DEP or other Onboarding environments. Ship machines directly to end users, but instead of having them create their own accounts, create accounts for them on first login based upon successful AD authentication.

- Authenticate the “locks” in System Preferences via a non-local AD account.

In addition, NoMAD Login can allow for fully customizable text and graphics at the login window and custom authentication and other checks before allowing a user to login.

[andy....@linewize.com]

Also, why would you run a "print server" on Mac hardware? IMHO given the current state of Apple's hardware, they are not suitable "server" machines. (We miss you Xserve!)

A nice Windows Server 2012R2+ VM (the same one you use for Windows clients) will take care of this for you just fine and does a much better job of queue management (SMB is fine for most versions of macOS 10.9+) and running Papercut.

There are a few gotchas and tricks I had to learn along the way, but just HMU if you want to know them 😎