The following is from a Windows-proficient friend who suddenly 
experienced failure of the ability to print from a DOS box to a 
networked printer using Windows XP. May prove useful to others.


        Russell

_______________________________________


Russell,

For some inexplicable reason my ability to print to a shared remote 
network
printer from a DOS box on my local machine suddenly failed.  I don't 
think
this problem is related to the recent one where I managed to get 100k
documents in my print spool queue  - especially as the problem was 
also
found to exist on Ross's machine (although we don't know how long it 
has
been that way as it's been quite a while since he last attempted to 
print
from a DOS box).  Any attempt to print from DOS box locked up the DOS 
VM
solid and the only way out was to kill the DOS VM task.

Both local machines run WinXP and the central server to which the 
printer is
attached runs Win2k.  All has been fine in the past.

After much un-installing and re-installing of printers on all the 
machines
involved the problem stubbornly remained  - we could print to the 
remote
printer from any Windows app running on the local machines but not 
from a
DOS bos.  We could however print OK from a DOS box running on the 
server
machine.

After some Googling I came across a Microsoft support document that
describes the problem and provides several solutions.

The solution relevant to us is to use the NET command to capture the 
LPT1
port and re-direct it to the shared printer on the remote server.  The
required command syntax (executed from A DOS box) is as follows:

NET USE LPT1  \\servername\printer_sharename /persistent:yes

Note that if either (or both) your servername or printer_sharename 
have
spaces in them, the ENTIRE 3rd parameter must be enclosed in quotes. 
In our
case the correct command was

NET USE LPT1 "\\server\HPLaserJet 2100" /persistent:yes


The strange thing is that neither Ross nor I have any recollection of 
ever
having to use this command before, and no idea why at some stage 
printing
from a DOS box should suddenly fail after working fine since the 
machines
were purchased several years ago.

Regards,

Ken Mardle


-- 
http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist