OS X 10.3 Panther: Sharing Windows Printers

November 06, 2003

OS X 10.3 Panther now includes GIMP-Print, which has a whole bunch of drivers and a web-based administration interface. I had trouble using the OS X GUI tool for using a Windows-shared printer on the local network, but it’s dead easy with GIMP-Print. This is how you do it:

1. Open a web browser and go to http://localhost:631
   
2. Click “Do Administration Tasks” -> Add Printer
   
3. Give the printer a name (e.g. “My Printer”), describe its location and give it a description. Click Continue.
   
4. Select Windows Printer via SAMBA. Click Continue.
   
5. Enter the address of the printer as: smb://WORKGROUP;WINUSER@WINMACHINE/PRINTERSHARENAME where:
   WORKGROUP is the name of the Windows workgroup the machine sharing the printer is part of, WINUSER is the username of the user sharing the printer, WINMACHINE is the name of the Windows machine sharing the printer, and PRINTERSHARENAME is the share name of the printer. Click Continue.
   
6. Select the make of your printer. Click Continue.
   
7. Select the model of your printer. Click Continue.
   
8. Click on Printers at the top of the page, and then click Print Test Page for the printer you just added. You should be able to print.