Red Hat Knowledgebase

Using the Printer Configuration Tool requires root privileges. To start the application, select Main Menu Button (on the Panel) => System Settings => Printing, or type the command:

redhat-config-printer

This command automatically determines whether to run the graphical or text-based version depending on whether the command is executed in the graphical desktop environment or from a text-based console.

To force the Printer Configuration Tool to run as a text-based application, execute the command:

redhat-config-printer-tui

Important: Do not edit the /etc/printcap file or the files in the /etc/cups/ directory. Each time the printer daemon (cups) is started or restarted, new configuration files are dynamically created. The files are dynamically created when changes are applied with the Printer Configuration Tool as well.

To add a printer which is accessed using the SMB protocol (such as a printer attached to a Microsoft® Windows system), click the New button in the main Printer Configuration Tool window. The window shown in the following figure will appear. Click Forward to proceed.

In the window shown in the following figure, enter a unique name for the printer in the Name text field. The printer name cannot contain spaces and must begin with a letter. The printer name may contain letters, numbers, dashes (-), and underscores (_). Optionally, enter a short description for the printer, which can contain spaces.

Select Networked Windows (SMB) from the Select a queue type menu, and click Forward. If the printer is attached to a Microsoft® Windows system, choose this queue type.

As shown in the above figure, SMB shares are automatically detected and listed. Click the arrow beside each share name to expand the list. From the expanded list, select a printer.

If the printer does not appear in the list, click the Specify button on the right. Text fields for the following options appear:

• Workgroup - The name of the Samba workgroup for the shared printer.
• Server - The name of the server sharing the printer.
• Share - The name of the shared target printer. This name must be the same name defined as the Samba printer on the remote Windows machine.
• User name - The login name of the user that has access to the printer. This user must exist on the Windows system, and the user must have permission to access the printer. The default user name is typically guest for Windows servers, or nobody for Samba servers.
• Password - The password (if required) for the user specified in the User name field.

Click Forward to continue. The Printer Configuration Tool then attempts to connect to the shared printer. If the shared printer requires a username and password, a dialog window appears, prompting the user to provide a valid username and password for the shared printer. If an incorrect share name is specified, it can be changed here as well. If a workgroup name is required to connect to the share, it can be specified in this dialog box. This dialog window is the same as the one shown when the Specify button is clicked.

After selecting the queue type of the printer, the next step is to select the printer model. If it was not auto-detected, select the model from the list. The printers are divided by manufacturers. Select the name of the printer manufacturer from the pulldown menu. The printer models are updated each time a different manufacturer is selected. Select the printer model from the list.

The recommended print driver is selected based on the printer model selected. The print driver processes the data into a format the printer can understand. If a local printer is attached directly to the computer, a print driver is needed to process the data that is sent to the printer.

When configuring a remote printer (IPP, LPD, SMB, or NCP), the remote print server usually has its own print driver. If an additional print driver on the local computer is selected, the data is filtered multiple times and is converted to a format that the printer can not understand.

To make sure the data is not filtered more than once, try selecting Generic as the manufacturer and Raw Print Queue or Postscript Printer as the printer model. After applying the changes, print a test page to try out this new configuration. If the test fails, the remote print server might not have a print driver configured. Try selecting a print driver according to the manufacturer and model of the remote printer, applying the changes, and printing a test page.

Tip: Select a different print driver after adding a printer by starting the Printer Configuration Tool, selecting the printer from the list, clicking Edit, clicking the Driver tab, selecting a different print driver, and then applying the changes.

The last step is to confirm printer configuration. Click Apply to add the print queue if the settings are correct. Click Back to modify the printer configuration.

Click the Apply button in the main window to save the changes and restart the printer daemon. After applying the changes, print a test page to ensure the configuration is correct.

To print characters beyond the basic ASCII set (including those used for languages such as Japanese), review driver options and select Prerender Postscript.