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May 21, 2006

Suse 10.1 and Linksys WPS54G Print Server

I just figured out how to get our Linux machines here at the house to print to our Linksys WPS54G wireless print server using Suse 10.1. Since it works so well, I thought that I'd write up a how-to so that I can 1) teach others and 2) remember how the heck I did it should I ever have to do it again in the future. Keep in mind that we use Gnome here at the house, so if you're using KDE, I'm afraid that your out of luck. Sorry.

First, you need to configure the wireless print server to have a static IP address using the Web based interface on the device. Once this is done, you can move on to the printer configuration of your machine.

The Suse 10.1 Gnome Applications menu navigating to Printers.

By default, Suse 10.1 (and 10.0 if I remember correctly) installs CUPS and has an easy to use printer configuration tool. To get to this tool, you click on the Applications menu, followed by Utilities. Inside of this menu, you will see another option called Printing. Click on this option and three more options will appear. Click on Printers to continue. This will open the Printers window.

The Printers window, where you can add a new printer.

To add a new printer, simply double click on the "New Printer" icon to begin the process. This will open the "Add a Printer" wizard, which allows you to select either a locally attached printer or a network printer. Since this is a network print server, we're interested in the "Network Printer" option. When selecting Network Printer, the drop down menu to the right will be selectable, allowing you to select a network printing option. In this case, we're interested in using the CUPS Printer (IPP) option that is selected by default.

The "Add a Printer" wizard allows you to install printers on your machine.

Once you have selected "CUPS Printer (IPP)" option, you will be given an additional option to enter a URL. In this field, you will need to enter the following, replacing the xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx with the static IP address of your network print server:

ipp://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:631/ipp/P1

Once this has been done, you can click on the "Forward" button to continue. At this point, all you need to do to finish up the installation is to select a printer driver that either matches with your printer or is close enough in make/model number that it won't look like garbage when you print. Luckily, my HP printer is listed in the printer list, so it's 100% supported.

Once you've selected the printer, you'll be able to finish the installation. When this is done, a properties window for that printer will then open, allowing you to do a test print and make adjustments to your printer configuration.

~out...

Posted by ed at 05:35 PM | Comments (0)

It draws near

Today marks the "under a month" point for the wedding. Officially, there just under 4 weeks from the point when I post this message to the blog. It seems like it was only yesterday when I made note that the wedding was 7 weeks away, but that time has just flown by so fast that it really does seem that I made the comments just the other day.

Wedding countdown:
3 weeks, 6 days, 7 hours, 45 minutes
27 days, 7 hours, 45 minutes
655 hours, 45 minutes
700 minutes (damn, how's that for being accurate?)

We've managed to get quite a few things accomplished over the past few weeks. The wedding invitations have been mailed out. Originally, we were going to be spending a pretty penny to get these things mailed out to everyone. However, at the last minute Amanda found a great deal where we could get 100 invitations for $15.00. We just needed to write them up and print them out ourselves. Hell, that was no problem to do at all. We had plenty of ink in the printer. All we needed at that point was stamps and we're good to go. We received notice from several people this week that their invitations were received.

We've also gone through and updated our wedding registries. We're registered at some pretty generic places, but it ensures that people will be able to find a place to shop for us. We're registered at Target, Wal-Mart, Pier 1 Imports and Pampered Chef.

... Why in the hell are we registered at Pampered Chef? Obviously this is one call that I didn't make. As a matter of fact, the only one that I've been responsible for was Wal-Mart.

We've gotten most people fitted for their tuxes and dresses at this point. I'm still chasing down a few people to make sure that they have been taken care of. I haven't heard back from two people as of yet. I'm going to be making phone calls again today to see if these people have taken care of their rentals. You know, it's interesting that this works out the way that it does ... people always need to be chased down to get the tuxes or dresses taken care of. It's happened to me in the past ... people calling me and/or e-mailing me to get fitted before a certain date. For some reason, I and other people like to procrastinate. We're always waiting till the last minute, making other people sweat it out.

Now I know what it feels like on this end.

The wedding photography has also been taken care of. One of my employees at work, Matt, is also a wedding photographer. I asked him if he would be interested in doing our wedding, and he said yes. This is really cool, because I think very highly of Matt and his work. Granted, I've only been working with the man for about 2 months now, but his work ethic is fantastic and I couldn't picture a better person to take the photos at the wedding.

And here's a plug for his Web site: Broad Spectrum Photography.

We've also gotten the man to marry us. His name is David Blankenship, and he happens to be the father of two very old friends from my childhood: John and Andrew. They used to live one street over from Elkhorn Drive in Frankfort, and I really enjoyed them as friends. Unfortunately, time changes all things and they ended up moving away. I did see them in high school from time to time, but we never stopped to say hi or even acknowledge one another. It's a real shame, because I always thought very highly of them both.

We've also ordered and received the wedding rings. We decided to go with yellow gold for the color. Amanda's ring is 4mm while mine is 6mm. I decided that I wanted to go with something that was a little bit bigger than the size Amanda was going to have ... if for any reason to be able to tell who's ring is who's. Amanda and I have the same ring size ... that's the Amazon Woman (tm) coming out in her.

Here they are, the rings ... 4mm on the bottom and 6mm on the top.

At this point, most things have been taken care of. There's only a few more things that still need to be worked out, which Amanda is on the phone taking care of as I type this out. The rehersal dinner, music, reception stuff ... but it's all slowly coming together.

~out...

Posted by ed at 11:45 AM | Comments (1)