Sunday, February 27, 2011

Connecting to a windows 7 printer from Mac

It seems that I am ending up searching for these instructions many times, just so I don't forget these steps

On the Windows 7 PC

1. In Windows 7 Control Panel

2. Select "Programs and Features" pane

3. Click "Turn Windows Features on or off"

4. Click on the "LPD Print Service". Under "Print and Document Services"

5. Ensure printer(s) are shared

On the Mac

1. Open "System Preferences" - "Print & Fax"

2. Click "+" to add a printer

3. Right click -> tool bar to customize and add "Advanced" button

4. Select "Advanced"

5. In the "Type:" field select "LPD/LPR Host or Printer"

6. In the "URL:" field enter lpd://ipaddressofwindows7machine/PrinterShareName

Using lpd://ServeName/PrinterShareName does not work, the IP address must replace ServerName

The IP address is the address of your PC, the one assigned by your router

7. Click the "Add" button

If nothing works, just reset the print system on your mac.  This would delete the existing printers allowing you to start fresh.

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Asp.net WebSite Administration Tool

Asp.net allows to quickly setup a security for the site using WebSite Administration tool, which can be instantiated from visual studio.  If that tool throws an error, there is no place find what went wrong.

I ran into one such case with the following cryptic error.

"An error was encountered. Please return to the previous page and try again."

I found a work around for this problem.  I needed to hit F5 (run the site in the debug mode) and then click the "WebSite Administration tool" icon from solution explorer to get rid of the above error.