In the research computing environment, a printer is usually provided for students and visitors by their faculty supervisor. In most cases these printers are accessed through a print server that we have set up. The following are the instructions for setting up to print to a printer that is accessed through the print server. Access control is in place so please send an email to the administrators to get added to the list. Be sure to specify the name of the printer to which you need access and the name of your supervisor.
Windows instructions
If your computer is not connected to the Nexus domain, then the first step is to create a credential for the print server. If your computer is connected to the Nexus domain or you have already created this credential then you may skip this step. To create a credential you will need to start the Credential Manager. In the search box type the word credential and the system should find you the Credential Manager as one of the items of the search. Click on this to start the Credential Manager, as shown below.
Click on 'Add a Windows credential' to add a credential for the print server. Enter eceprtsvr.uwaterloo.ca (case insensitive) as the network address, nexus\userid as the user name (where userid is replaced by your University of Waterloo userid truncated to 8 characters if it's longer than 8) and your University of Waterloo password in the password field. Click OK to enter the credential. The picture below shows an example of this.
Now we are ready to install the printer. Use the keyboard shortcut Windows logo key + R to open the Run box and enter \\eceprtsvr.uwaterloo.ca (case insensitive) as demonstrated in the picture below.
Press the Enter key after entering the server name in the step above and you will then get a window showing all the printers connected to the print server. Find the printer to which you want to connect and right click on it. Then click 'Connect' on the resulting menu. An example is shown below.
It will then automatically install the printer, including the driver.
MacOS X instructions
The first step is to put your login credentials into your keychain. Open the Keychain Access application, which is in the Utilities folder in the Application folder. Click on the Passwords item in the Category pane on the left. You'll see a window like that shown below.
Click on the '+' sign on the bottom bar to add a keychain entry for the print server. Give the 'Keychain Item Name' as smb://eceprtsvr.uwaterloo.ca, the Account Name as nexus\userid, where userid is your UW userid, and put your UW password in the Password field. An example entry is shown in the image below. Then click 'Add'. Now it will show up in the main pane of the keychain access screen.
Find the entry you've just created in the main Keychain Access window and double click on it to bring up a window for the attributes of this entry. Click on 'Access Control' and choose 'Allow all applications to access this item'. Then click 'Save changes' to apply this change. Enter your password if prompted to do so. The image below shows this screen.
Now you're ready to add the printer. Open the Print & Scan application from System Preferences. Click the '+' sign to add a printer. Choose 'Add Other Printer or Scanner...'. You'll get an Add Printer window. The toolbar in this window likely shows icons labelled 'Default', 'Fax', 'IP' and 'Windows'. If you don't see an icon labelled 'Advanced' in the toolbar of this window then place your cursor somewhere in the toolbar, hold the control key and click. Choose 'Customize Toolbar...' from the resulting menu. Then you'll see a new window where you can drag the Advanced icon into the toolbar of the Add Printer window. Do this and your Add Printer window will have an Advanced icon as shown in the image below. Click on Advanced and then fill in the resulting information as shown in the image below. In this example, I have used rcsgprt2 as the printer I'm connecting to, in your case you would use the name of the printer that you would like to install. in the 'Print Using' field, you can choose 'Select Printer Software' and choose the type of printer that you have from the list of printers. If your printer doesn't show up in this list then you can try one of the generic printers or go to the manufacturers website to get a driver for the MacOS. Then click on Add and the printer should be installed and working.
On some versions of MacOS, you may have to specify the URL with a :139 designation, for example smb://eceprtsvr.uwaterloo.ca:139/ecexerox1. You would need to do this if the job went in the print queue but went into the pause state without printing.
Linux
These instructions are based on the Ubuntu version of Linux.
Click on the 'System Settings' icon (shown on the left here).
Double click the 'Printers' icon and you'll get the Printers window. Click on 'Add' to get the 'New Printer' window. Expand the arrow next to the 'Network Printer' device and you'll have a window like that shown below.
Select 'Windows Printer via SAMBA' as shown. In the text box under 'SMB Printer', enter 'eceprtsvr.uwaterloo.ca/printer' (without the quotes), where the word printer is replaced by the name of the printer you're installing. Use the syntax as shown in the Username box, but replace 'userid' with your university userid (truncated to 8 characters if it's longer than that). The Password is your university password. Don't use the Verify button, it will give misleading information. Click Forword to proceed.
After this, the install is straightforward. You'll be asked to choose a driver, so select the printer manufacturer, then the printer model number. In the 'Describe Printer' window, you can give the printer a name that you'll see as the printer name when you print.