Computing: Computer Administration

Setting up Windows Server 2003: 7. Printer sharing setup.

In part 5 of the tutorial (Windows Server 2003: File sharing configuration), I explain how to proceed to share files, located on Windows Server 2003 with other computers, that are part of the domain. In this part, you will learn how to share a printer, connected to the Windows Server 2003 machine with other computers, i.e. how to proceed to make it possible that the user, running a workstation that is part of the domain, can print their documents on a printer, that is locally connected to the server.

If you read the first part of the tutorial (Windows Server 2003: Introduction), you know that I do not use real hardware, but that my entire network is a virtual environment, managed by VMware Workstation 16. And, as are my Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000 computers, my printer is a virtual device, too. In fact, I use doPDF – Free PDF Converter, provided by Softland (cf. my tutorial Installing a PDF printer on MS Windows), that is actually installed on my Windows 10 laptop, that also hosts VMware Workstation. Adding a virtual printer to the VMware configuration of the Windows Server 2003 VM emulates the printers available on the host as local printers on Windows Server 2003. Working in a virtual environment, but using a physical printer connected to the host (instead of the virtual PDF printer), should not make a difference: Adding a virtual printer to the configuration of the VM will let appear the printer as local printer on Windows Server 2003. Finally, if you run Windows Server 2003 on real hardware, you have to connect your printer to the server machine, and configure it. For the setup of printer sharing, the environment should not make a difference (?). However, I think that there could possibly be driver problems, if you use real hardware (?). Anyway, the tutorial pre-supposes that there is a local printer present on your Windows Server 2003 computer, and that printing from the server machine works correctly.

Printer sharing is very similar to file sharing, and we'll have to take the following steps:

1. Configuring the printer to be shared.
2. Configuring the rights to use the printer.
3. Adding the shared printer to Active Directory.

Configuring the printer to be shared.

From the Windows Start menu, choose Printers and Faxes. This opens the Printers and Faxes window, where you find all printers connected to the server. If, on the screenshot below, you can see a whole bunch of printers, that's due to the fact that adding a virtual printer to a guest in VMware Workstation, will show all printers available on the host as local printers in the VM (thus, the printer called "Microsoft Print to PDF", for example, is the default PDF printer device, shipped with Windows 10).

Right-click the printer, that you want to share (in my case the doPDF printer), and from the opening context menu, choose Sharing...

This opens the Sharing tab of this printer's properties. Select the Share this printer radio button. Accept the default share name, or change it (I changed it to "doPDF10"). The checkbox "List in the directory" is automatically selected.

The Advanced button allows to select the printer drivers that should be available to the clients. As the x86 drivers for Windows XP and Windows 2000 have been installed by default, we don't need to make any changes here.

Configuring the rights to use the printer.

Configuring the rights to use the printer is similar to configuring the NTFS rights, when setting up file sharing. Right-click the shared printer and from the opening context menu, choose Properties. In the printer's Properties window, open the Security tab. You will find a list of local users (in particular your actual Windows Server 2003 user "Administrator" and the "Administrators" group) and their actual rights to use the printer. Push the Add button to add a new user.

I chose to give printer access to everyone. If you think that that's inappropriate, add user "Admin" and group "Standard Users" (cf. Windows Server 2003: File sharing configuration) instead.

By default, new users get nothing but the Print right. I let this setting for user "Everyone", and it seems to be enough rights to ensure proper printing from the client computers.

Adding the shared printer to Active Directory.

After having shared the printer, a new item, called Print Server, will be listed in the Manage Your Server window. Before proceeding, insert the "Windows Server 2003" installation CDROM (needed to install some files); if the installation program is launched by Autostart, just push the Exit button. Then, in the Manage Your Server window, among the Print Server items, select the link Upgrade to R2 Print Server Role.

You can check if the doPDF printer is well shared in Active Directory, by selecting the link Manage the Print Server in the Manage Your Server window. Right-click the printer, and choose Properties > Sharing from the opening context menu. The printer should appear as shared with the name that you set when configuring the share.

All this seems "easy going". Unfortunately, there is a problem (at least on my system): Printer sharing is undone after rebooting Windows Server 2003. No idea, what's the reason of this issue. A possible reason could have been that the Print Spooler service was not started automatically; this was not the case on my system. Thus, that all we can do is to reconfigure printer sharing each time we start the server. That is somewhat annoying, but not really a big deal, because it's quickly done: Choose Manage the Print Server in the Manage Your Server window. Right-click the printer, and choose Properties from the opening context menu. In the Sharing tab, select the Share this printer radio button. Then, in the Security tab, add user "Everyone".

Printing from a Windows XP client.

From the Windows Start menu, choose Printers and Faxes. In the opening Printers and Faxes window, choose the Add a printer task in the left pane.

This starts the Add Printer Wizard. In the first window of the Wizard, choose to add a network printer (screenshot on the left). In the second window, choose to find the printer in Active Directory (screenshot on the right).

In the Find Printer window, push the Find Now button. The doPDF10 printer should now be listed in the bottom part of the window.

Note: On the screenshot above, the doPDF10 printer is listed twice. This is in relationship with the loss of the sharing after rebooting Windows Server 2003, I guess (in fact, I did a reboot, and reconfigured the share of the printer). This is not a problem; just select the first entry in the list.

In the next window, you are asked to specify a printer. I have no idea, what's this about. Just let the default setting selected.

Note: This window stayed for a rather long time on my system (it even finished by becoming corrupted). This does not mean that the system hangs, or that something else is wrong. Just be patient, and wait until the window closes automatically.

The wizard should now be finished, and the doPDF10 printer on Windows Server 2003 should be installed and usable on Windows XP.

Opening Printers and Faxes, the doPDF10 printer should now be shown. Right-clicking the icon and choosing Properties should show the properties of the new printer. To check if all is as it should be, push the Print Test Page button.

The screenshot below shows the printer output on my system.

Note: Having to reconfigure printer sharing after rebooting Windows Server 2003 has no effect on printing from Windows XP. The network printer stays available as was before, and printing works just as before.

How does printing from my Windows XP Media Edition using the doPDF10 printer on my Windows Server 2003 work in practice in my virtual environment? Let's take as example, printing out a photo from Roxio PhotoSuite 5.

In Roxio PhotoSuite, open a picture file and, from the menu, choose File > Print.

There are several ways how to print out the photo. I first choose to print multiple photos per page, then I choose the "Avery A4" category, where I selected "C2531 Photo Paper Glossy 9×13 on A4" (2 x 2 pictures). This leads to the page layout as shown on the screenshot below. Push the Print button to start printing.

This will open the doPDF software on my Windows 10 laptop (where VMware workstation is running), and I can choose the path where to save the PDF, that will be created (the default, in this case, is "Roxio PhotoSuite - Print Multip.PDF" saved to the Windows 10 user's "Documents" folder).

And finally, opening the PDF file created in Foxit PDF Reader (on Windows 10, of course).

Printing from a Windows 2000 client.

Setting up the printer on Windows 2000 is essentially the same as on Windows XP. The installation on my system was successful, however, printing fails with the error message shown on the screenshot below. No idea, what the problem is...

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