Hi,

I too have an interest in being able to print from Linux on printers in M$ networks. Whenever I have asked about this (in a number of work contexts now) the (Windows) SA gets a look on their face that says they've just remembered there is something very important they have to do (like rid the African continent of deadly disease) and can't I find some way some other way - like use a VM.

You need to check your assumption. Is the printer you want to use available for anonymous printing ? Have you actually asked your SA if anonymous printing is possible and got the feeling they understand the question ?

To use a machine's resources you generally have to provide credentials ("log on"). Not requiring credentials is not secure. Anonymous ftp is a special case to allow anyone from anywhere to down load files. Anonymous http also: I can browse this forum anonymously but to post a thread, as I am doing now, I have to log on. That's so the forum does not get defaced all the time with adverts for handbags.

I'm sure anonymous printing is possible but I don't see why it would be the default. Your SA could turn it on but without a good reason to I don't see why they would.

When you started the Windows VM did you enter a user name and password ? The log on screen has a domain name ? So, effectively, you logged onto your local Windows domain. You don't need to specify a user name or password to print or read e-mail or all sort of other things because your Windows supplies your log on credentals automatically. That does not make the printing anonymous, just convenient.

This is in the Windows OS so it works for all Windows applications. There's a system call or something. Under the Linux OS there is no system call for this: it is not in the Linux Kernel. There are libraries (libpam) and stuff that do this but not every application uses them (each to his own) and I find I have to supply the user name and password more often.

See http://wiki.debian.org/SystemPrinting#Printer_Sharing. Here it says ...

When printing to windows printers in an NT domain using SMB the Device URI should read

Code:
smb://username:password@domain/server/printername
This allows Samba to authenticate against a domain controller for access to the printer queue.
This might allow you to print without you having to enter a user name and password each time but, hey, the user name and password are there in the URI ... QED.

But it is not that simple because for the above to work you've got to have samba set up correctly and that doesn't happen automatically.

Last place I worked I use subversion. Check-out was anonymous but check-in required authentication. I supplied username and password but only once each time I was forced to change my password. Where I currently work I can't do this. I need to set up samba to use winbind and stuff so that authentication is automatic. In this case, more trouble that it is worth. But next time ....

You need to be able to talk to a SA in general, fundamental, enough terms to understanding how they have set up the printing system so that you can figure out what to do under Linux to use it. The problem I have had is that most (Windows) SA don't have the necessary general and fundamental understanding. All they know is how to navigate a window/menu system and which check boxes to tick but they don't really understand the significance of each check mark.