Now do I use a printer on my local computer from a remote desktop window?

[Mark F]

How do I use a printer on my local computer from a remote desktop
window?

I am running Windows XP Professional. The computer that I am
connected to through what Windows 7 calls a Remote Desktop Connection
is running Windows 7. (The program making the remote desktop
connection are proprietary with no support.)

When the remote system was running Windows XP we were able to
use the add printer dialog and the printer on the local machine
showed up with an obvious name on the remote computer and it
was easy to add the printer.

The remote system was replaced by a computer running Windows 7.
The pseudo printers that are on the local computer are defined
on the remote computer with obvious names. The pseudo printers
work: the output files for the pseudo printers are on the remote
computer but the computation (say for a PDF pseudo printer) seems
to be done on the local computer.

The printers that are served to the local computer from other
computers in its LAN show up with obvious names on the remote
computer, but printing to them doesn't seem to produce any output.

There are also about 20 printer entries of some sort on the remote
computer that seem like they are referring to the local computer,
but I can't tell what they are actually referring to. I don't
want to try Add Computer on the remote machine since I might
wind up messing up something on the local computer.

The particular printer that I want is an OKI C3400n on
port 192.168.1.110 on the local LAN. I don't know how to
specify the location of the printer to the Add Printer
dialog on the remote machine.

I'd like to have the remote machine use the printer device
on the local machine since this would allow me to monitor print
progress on the local machine. This is how things worked when
the remote machine was running XP.

An alternative would be to have the remote computer use the
Ethernet connection on the local machine to talk to the
printer directly.

I can't use Google Cloud Print or some other service
to connect to the local printer since the data has to be encrypted
I am not permitted to trust Google or other third party.

Is there an tunneling server that I can run on the
local machine so that I could make the local 192.168.1.110
be known to the remote machine so that I could define the
printer that why?

Thanks.

 

[Don Phillipson]

How do I use a printer on my local computer from a remote desktop
window? . . .
The particular printer that I want is an OKI C3400n on
port 192.168.1.110 on the local LAN. I don't know how to
specify the location of the printer to the Add Printer
dialog on the remote machine.

First you need a Win7 driver to run a printer from a Win7 console.
http://my.okidata.com/dsdownWeb.nsf/driverlookup/1736DDBF3434EEFA852575C80049B9F6
suggests this is fully documented for installation.

Some uses may find it simpler to print to the OKI on the network
rather than through a remote desktop (2nd PC.)

 

[Mark F]

First you need a Win7 driver to run a printer from a Win7 console.
http://my.okidata.com/dsdownWeb.nsf/driverlookup/1736DDBF3434EEFA852575C80049B9F6
suggests this is fully documented for installation.

The idea is to use the printer as described on the machine that
has made the connection, not to use the Ethernet port on the LAN
on the machine that has made the connection. (This evidentially
needed
to have something setup on the REMOTE machine, but the knowledge was
lost by the people supporting the remote machine before the entire
thing was outsourced.)

The second possibility would be to use the LAN connection on the
local machine, but I can't figure out what to tell the device
driver do get it to use the LAN connection on the local machine, not
a LAN connection on the remote machine.

There is a possibility that the device driver installation software
could scan for the printer and find it, but the printers on
non-network ports on the remote machine come first, then the LAN
printers on the remote machine, then other stuff. The LAN
printers on the remote machine number in the ten's of thousands
and take more than 40 seconds each for some to be found. I couldn't
try long enough to see if it finds the "then other stuff" printers
or dies because a table gets too big after a few days of listing
printers.

Some uses may find it simpler to print to the OKI on the network
rather than through a remote desktop (2nd PC.)

I can make the local printer be known to the WWW and print
using Google print or probably a bunch of other things, but I
am not permitted to send the data to the local printer except
by the trusted link that the remote session came in on,
so I can't use Google Print or any of the other print over the
network things that I found.

The work-around that we are using now is to print on a local
virtual PDF printer. This doesn't always work because of problems
in the virtual printer that happen even when used locally.

 

[Corne Loots]

Install the printer driver on the remote machine to a dummy port eg. LPT1. Then after it is installed you will have to go change the port in you printer properties ( it will show up as "computername" PRN"printernumber" eg. TS007 DELL PRN3). The important thing is to install the driver on the remote pc first.