Networking a LaserJet Series II with Linux

Request from ethernet address 08:00:09:54:18:02



Contents

* The story
* The situation
* The printer
* Setup step by step
* Printing from Windows and OS/2
* Feedback



The story

Some time ago, I aquired a LaserJet series II printer with memory extension and JetDirect cards. The printer is rather old and slow compared to todays models, but it's a nice printer anyway, especially if you get one for nothing.

After replacing most of the network cabling in the office by 10BASE-T, I decided that it's now time to get rid of the old fashioned parallel port interface and hook the printer directly onto the net.

Since I had no documentation for the printer, and since it's rather difficult to get information online from Hewlett Packard because of the age of the printer, I had to solve several problems. This text describes the problems I faced and how I solved them.


The situation

The local network consists of several Linux boxes running RedHat 5.x, a NT and one OS/2 box. Because of the limited capabilities of the latter two, most Linux boxes act as server systems in one respect or the other. Because of the current setup and because neither NT nor OS/2 is capable to drive the printer (see below), one of the Linux boxes was choosen to act as a printer server for this printer. The printer is accessed from the other hosts as SMB or lpr remote printer.

Most things described below work for RedHat Linux. However, since I describe in detail how it works, it shouldn't be a problem to get a similar setup running for other distributions. The text assumes that you know what IP addresses, UDP packets and similar things are. If you don't know that, get a good book and come back later.

Please note: There is absolutely no warranty that the instructions will work and don't cause any harm. I'm not responsible for any damages or problems caused by the instructions below. Use your brain, Luke!


The printer

The JetDirect interface for the LJ series II is somewhat old fashioned, but simple (the most difficult thing was to determine, how it works). After warmup, the printer sends a bootp request to determine it's IP address. After that, a TCP connection to port 9100 must be established, all data sent via this connection is printed. There is no lpr style interface.

Several people asked me about the JetDirect card, so here is the HP part number as printed on a sticker on the inside: 27305-60401. When searching for this number on Google, I found several companies still offering these cards!


Setup step by step

Enabling the JetDirect card

The first thing to do is to enable the network interface card in the printer. Take the printer off line, then press the Menu button for several seconds. Browse through this menu until you get an entry I/O=. Using the + and - keys, change this to read Optional I/O. Press Enter to make this the default, then reboot the printer. (Note: While bootp is not running, the printer cannot determine it's IP address and will show 43 Error on startup).


Installing bootp

The printer gets its IP address using bootp. So you have to install the bootp package on one of the Linux boxes. Be sure to Note: The host running the bootp server must be on the same subnet as the printer. It is possible to forward bootp requests, but this requires a more complicated setup and is not described here.


Configuring bootp

Create a file /etc/bootptab similar to the following:

#
# Sample bootptab file
#

# Settings for LJ series II printer.
# BEWARE: The printer does not accept subnets in the netmask
printer:\
       	ha=080009541802:\
       	ip=195.254.106.9:\
       	sm=255.255.255.0:\
       	vm=auto:
The ha entry is the hardware address of the printer. If you don't have any information about the card, just remove it from the printer (two screws - be sure to switch the printer off before doing this). There's a label on the card telling the address (which is always a string consisting of 12 hexadecimal digits).

ip is the IP address you want to assign to your printer. Note: If you don't have a name server entry for the printer, the first line of the entry must start with a dot. In this case, change printer to .printer or similar.

sm is the subnet mask. Note: The printer does not accept anything but the normal class A/B/C subnet masks.

If you already have an /etc/bootptab file, add an entry similar to the one above.

If your setup is ok, reboot the printer. You will find messages in the syslog file from the bootp server, and the printer will boot into the Ready state. If you still get 43 Error, something is wrong with your setup. Check the messages in the syslog file and recheck your /etc/bootptab file.

You may use the arp command to display the ARP table. It should contain an entry showing your printers hardware and IP addresses. If the printer displays Ready, you may telnet to port 9100 of your printer and type some text to print.


Setting up the lpr daemon

This paragraph is somewhat RedHat specific, but all distributions I know of work in a similiar way, so just use your brains.

The printer setup most similar to the one we need is an SMB printer (filter the data, then pipe it into a network connection). So, use printtool as root to install a new SMB printer. You may enter random data for the user and password settings since they aren't used.

After that, go into /usr/lib/rhs/rhs-printfilters and copy smbprint to hpprint. Edit the file, remove anything but the last line (which pipes the data into a network share), and replace this last line by

nc -w 3 printer 9100
Replace printer by the name or IP address of your printer. If you don't have netcat installed, it's now time to do so, since it's a great tool, and it is used in the line above. There is a solution using perl in the Linux Printing-HOWTO, but it has more than 20 lines and cannot be used without several changes.

There are of course more elegant solutions. You may add a .config file so you don't have to hardcode the printer IP in the script. Feel free to add any bells and whistles you feel are necessary.

We now have code to do the network connection. What we need is to tell the printer spooler to use it. To do that, cd into the spooler directory for this printer (something like /var/spool/lpd/lp/), load the script named filter into your favourite editor and change the (one and only) call to smbprint to hpprint.

That's it! Of course, it's not nice to hardcode things in scripts, change system scripts and the more, but this is only a rough description and you are free to find a more elegant solution. The best thing would be if RedHat could support the printer setup from the printtool program. The changes needed are very small, but I was happy I got the printer running, so I was not in the mood to do it myself.

To test your setup, print a test page from printtool. Be sure not to edit the entry, otherwise the program may decide to replace your filter and you have to do the small change again.

Note: Starting from version 7.1, RedHat supports JetDirect natively from printtool. So all you need is the bootp setup as described above, then select "JetDirect Printer" in printtool and things should work!


Printing from Windows and OS/2

Just use Samba to export the printer as a network printer. Other (non Unix) systems may then easily access it via the network.


Feedback

If you think there are important things missing from this article, feel free to contact me. Remember: If you don't share your information with others, it looses it's value (of course, this is the reason, why I did this web page). Other feedback is also appreciated! If you think, this page sucks, please tell me about it. I will then activate my killer androids to visit you at home:-)



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