Default printer through a TCP/IP connection?

[Scott Nagle]

Hoping someone can help a Unix wannabe - I'm by no means an expert, but know
enough AIX and Linux to get myself in trouble. Anyway...

One of our departments in our City are all connected to our SCO Unix system
via serial cables @ 9600baud. Whenever they connect through our emulation
software, they are given a TTY number, such as TTYR030. The software they
use on UNIX somehow recognizes them as having a default printer, any printer
for that matter. Therefore, when they're in the software and need to print,
the unix software gives them the option of printing to (P)rinter or (C)rt.
When they choose P to print, the print job goes through the emulation
software to whatever they have set as their default printer, even to a
network printer if need be, all through Windows 2000 TCP/IP networking
anyway... We're very happy with these results on those computers connected
through the serial ports.

We got the bright idea that if we installed a 2nd NIC card on this Unix
Server we could have all of the PCs connecting through TCP/IP to give remote
locations the ability to connect without dialing in, and could possibly
remove a ton of messy wires. We were very pleased with the results until it
came time for a coworker to print. From what we have learned, all of these
TCP/IP connections are considered pseudo terminals(sp?) and are assigned a
different TTY number such as TTYP7. These terminals do not have default
printers assigned to them because I guess they're not really terminals. Our
problem is, the software therefore doesn't give the option to print to (C)rt
or (P)rinter as it did before, so all print requests go to the main office
printer, without even prompting.

I sort of understand the terminology as why there can't be a printer hooked
to a pseudo terminal, but is there any way that they can be fooled into
thinking they have one? It doesn't matter what printer is assigned to them,
as long as they think there is a printer, the user on these TCP/IP
connections will be given the option to print. Of course, all can do screen
prints from the emulation software, it's being able to print from the unix
software is the problem...

If anyone could give me specific instructions if this is at all possible,
I'd be very appreciative...

Many thanks,

Scott Nagle, NH

[Scott Nagle]

Hi Scott,
Thanks for the help.. It's 3.2v5.0.5
SCO 5 I'd say...
We're using TUN 11.1 as the emulator and they're all plugging into the
regular serial port 1 of their white box 600MHz or Dell 1.8GHz PCs...

The application is a home-grown police database system, all text based...
It's their program that's not giving the option to print to screen or
printer
when connecting to the same TUN 11.1 through TCP/IP vs. serial; we're
using the same emulation program, just a different way of connecting.
The company that made the software and installed the server really wants
nothing to do with us since we're not going to upgrade to their new product
but instead something else within a year's time, so we're stuck trying to
figure this out for ourselves if at all possible...

Hope that helps,
Scott

> OK, I'll bite:
>
> What version of SCO? (post the output from uname -X)
> What application are the users running on the SCO system? Home-grown?
> What type of serial ports? (Make and model)
>
> And finally...
>
> What emulation software are the Windoze boxes using? (Make and
> version)
>
> Sounds to me like the application on the SCO system handles the
> printing, or perhaps it is some function of the driver for your serial
> I/O device(s). Could be the emulation software, but I would think
> that would handle the change to ethernet.
>
>
> Scott McMillan
>