Digital Products NETPrint and JETXPrint Printing at AIX Versions 4.x
Contents
About this document
Digital Products, Inc. references
Hardware setup
Printing to NETPrint at AIX 4.x
Setting up AIX as a bootp server
Setting up as an AIX ARP server
Telnet configuration of the NETS/JETX box
Additional information
This document describes methods for setting up remote queues to print
to printers attached to Digital Products NETPrint and JETXPrint print
servers. This information is provided to assist you in the setup but
the print servers are not part of the IBM product set and are not
supported by AIX. These instructions do not provide an endorsement of
the Digital Product print servers.
This document applies to AIX Versions 4.x.
The NETPrint and JETXPrint print servers are manufactured by
Digital Products, which provides support for these products on AIX.
In most cases you will simply set up the NETPrint print server as
a remote queue. If it has multiple ports, use the queue names
PORT1, PORT2, and so on.
Digital Products offers both external boxes - X designation, and
cards that fit in some Hewlett-Packard printers.
In some cases, you will need to set up AIX as a bootp server for
the NETPrint. You can either make an entry into the /etc/bootptab file
or use the arp -s command as described at the end of the document.
The following is information on how to find technical support
assistance:
The setup should look like this:
/
/
+-------------+ connected +-------------+ /
| Client | via | NETPort | +---------+
| RISC System |--------------| Print |-----| printer |
| hostname: A | TCPIP | Server | | |
+-------------+ +-------------+ +---------+
Overview
Since the NETPrint box supports the LPD protocol, the setup simply involves
setting up the printer as a remote printer. The remote queue name that
you use will indicate the port on the server (PORT1, PORT2, and so on). These
instructions describe how to create the remote queue to print to the
NETPrint box with AIX virtual printer support to control attributes like
pitch and paper drawer. This assumes that the NETPrint box has an IP
address. If it does not have one, contact Digital Products on how to
set one up. The box does support a BOOTP protocol, and this document describes
how this MIGHT work from AIX. The latter procedure has not been tested.
Setup instructions
The following instructions should allow you to set up an AIX queue to print
to a NETPrint server. This assumes the NETPrint has an IP address and
is attached to a printer. You should be able to print a test page to
the printer before following these instructions. The test page should
contain the IP address of the NETPrint box.
- Add an entry to the /etc/hosts file as follows:
123.1.1.2 netp1
- 123.1.1.2 should be changed to the printer IP address from the test page.
- Change netp1 to the printer host name you will give the NETPort box.
- Test the TCP/IP connection. Enter:
ping netp1
If this does not show a successful connection, fix the communication
problems before continuing with adding a printer.
- Add the remote queue. Enter:
smit mkpq
- Choose remote (Printer attached to the remote host)
- Choose Local filtering before sending to print server
- Choose the printer manufacturer, for example, Hewlett-Packard
- Choose the printer model, for example, hplj-4
Fill out the following screen:
Add a Remote Print Queue with Local Filtering
Type or select values in entry fields.
Press Enter AFTER making all desired changes.
[Entry Fields]
Description Hewlett-Packard LaserJ>
Names of NEW print queues to add
PCL [pcl1] <- Enter ASCII queue
PostScript [ps1] <- Enter PostScript
queue name
HP-GL/2 []
Remote server characteristics
HOSTNAME of remote server [netp1] <- Enter /etc/hosts
printer name
Name of QUEUE on remote server [PORT1] <- Enter port # case
sensative.
TYPE of print spooler on remote server BSD <- Use BSD selection
Send PASS-THROUGH FLAG to queue no <- Set this to off
on remote server?
NOTE: The remote server queue PORT1 or PORT2 determines port on
NETPort box.
Press Enter to add the queue.
- Test print to the queue. Enter:
lptest 10 10 | qprt -Ppcl1
- Customize your settings using SMIT. For example, to change the pitch
to 17, enter:
smit chpq
- At PRINT QUEUE name, enter pcl1
- Next choose 2 Default Print Job Attributes.
- Move the cursor to TYPESTYLE and PITCH.
- Press F4 or Select.
- Choose courier 17 or lineprinter 17
- Press Enter or DO to set 17 in the main menu.
- Press Enter or DO again to make the change.
- Exit SMIT.
You should now have a working queue to print to your NETPort attached printer.
NOTE: This procedure has not been tested.
Overview
AIX can act as a bootp server to deliver an address to the NETPort or
any other bootp client. When the NETPort is turned on, if it is set
to get its address through bootp, it will send out a bootp request.
This request contains a hardware address. If AIX has the hardware
address in its /etc/bootptab table and is set up to respond to bootp
requests, then it will send an IP address, IP gateway, and subnet mask
to the hardware address that made the request. The /etc/bootptab
file documents itself fairly well. Some clients also want a
bootp download file. AIX can deliver the file, but the file
must come from Digital Products. It is not known if this is
required in this case.
Setup
- Edit /etc/bootptab and add the following entry:
netp1:hn:ht=ether:ha=0800095e9e10:ip=5.1.1.5:
sm=255.255.255.0:gw=5.1.1.152:
- If there is a file to download, include it with
bf=/usr/local/NETPboot.
- The ht will have to be changed to tok for token-ring.
- The ha is the hardware address from the NETPbox test page.
- ip is the IP address.
- gw is the gateway.
- sm is the subnet mask.
- Enable bootpd and tftp in the /etc/inetd.conf
file by uncommenting the following lines. Remove the # sign at the beginning
of each line.
bootps dgram udp wait root /etc/bootpd bootpd
tftp dgram udp wait nobody /etc/tftpd tftpd -n
- Refresh the inetd daemon. Enter:
inetimp
refresh -s inetd
- Turn on and off the NETPort box.
- Print a test page to see if the IP address was loaded.
If the address was not loaded, stop bootpd
and rerun bootpd in debug mode. The most common
problem is entering the wrong hardware address. The debug
mode will show you the address being broadcast.
- ping the address.
AIX will also support ARP download of IP addresses. Use:
- arp -s (IP address of NETS\JETX) (LAN address of NETS\JETX)
For example:
arp -s 192.00.20.10 01-12-23-FE-A2-00
NOTE: You must use dashes (-) to separate the numbers of the LAN address.
In this example, the IP address 192.00.20.10 is the IP address we are
assigning to the NETS\JETX unit.
- See the arp table with the command arp -a.
- Enter ping 192.00.00.10. At this time, there may be no reply.
- Reset the NETS/JETX by resetting the power.
- Enter ping 192.00.00.10. This time there should be a reply.
Once you get a successful ping, the NETS/JETX has its IP address.
- Go to the $ or # prompt in AIX and telnet to the NETS/JETX.
- Enter tn netp1 where netp1 is the host name of the NETS/JETX box.
- The login and password is sysadm.
- When the main menu appears, select option 1 to configure the remaining
IP parameters (subnet mask and default gateway if applicable).
- Press Enter to get back to main menu.
- Choose option 3 to disable any protocols that you are not using.
- Go back to the main menu, and choose option 2, LPD Printers, to set the type
of output. If you receive garbled output, increase the strobe to 5 or 10
microseconds.
- Save changes and reset the NETS/JETX. You should now be ready to proceed
with the AIX setup steps.
AIX support is only responsible for setting up the remote queue.
Digital Products is responsible for making this work with their
product.
Some of the information needed was obtained from Digital
Products Technical Support Bulletin TSB 2004, TSB 2011,
and TSB 2002, obtained
from the Web page listed in the References section.
[ Doc Ref: 91946152810460 Publish Date: Mar. 01, 2000 4FAX Ref: 6458 ]