[h-e-w] networkprinter-installation

[Geert Ribbers]

Hi.

Installing my networkprinter gave me some headaches (emacs 21.1.1, W2k).

First: when I use customize-group 'lpr to fill in the network-name of the
printer for variable printer-name then I can't since the widget is defined
to be file and I get the error-message "File \\pragem\HP DeskJet 970Cxi
doesn't exist" (correct in itself, just I'm talking about a printer, not
about a file).
I changed the definition of printer-name as copied below and then I could go
on.

Next problem: there are blanks in the network-printer-name.
In buffer "*print-region-helper*" I find the error-message: Invalid switch -
"/D:\\pragem\HP DeskJet 970Cxi".
I tried to change function (direct-print-region-helper) to let it supply
quotes at the right spot in the string, but didn't succeed.
Only when I changed the name of the network-printer and removed the blanks
it finally worked.

It looks to me there are 2 bugs in the print-system?

Regards, Geert Ribbers

The changed printer-name definition:

(defcustom printer-name
  (and lpr-windows-system "PRN")
  "*The name of a local printer to which data is sent for printing.
\(Note that PostScript files are sent to `ps-printer-name', which see.\)

On Unix-like systems, a string value should be a name understood by
lpr's -P option; otherwise the value should be nil.

On MS-DOS and MS-Windows systems, a string value is taken as the name of
a printer device or port, provided `lpr-command' is set to \"\".
Typical non-default settings would be \"LPT1\" to \"LPT3\" for parallel
printers, or \"COM1\" to \"COM4\" or \"AUX\" for serial printers, or
\"//hostname/printer\" for a shared network printer.  You can also set
it to the name of a file, in which case the output gets appended to that
file.  If you want to discard the printed output, set this to \"NUL\"."
  :type '(choice :menu-tag "Printer Name"
                 :tag "Printer Name"
                 (const :tag "Default" nil)
                 ;; could use string but then we lose completion for files.
                 (string :tag "Name"))
;;               (file :tag "Name")) ;; doesn't allow to specify network-prints:
\\<server>\<shared-printer-name>
  :group 'lpr)