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Cloud/Internet printing solutions

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    Cloud/Internet printing solutions

    I need to print from an Azure Windows VM to a printer at home - looking for solutions to get this working. The printer at home is wireless, so my initial test of attempting to share it as an RDP resource didn't work well (appears that only works consistently if the printer is plugged into the home PC). I'd like to go with a long term, stable solution.

    There's a few print services that would achieve this - Google Cloud Print & PrintNode. I would have thought Microsoft would have had a solution, but can't find one.

    I could also do something with a Raspberry Pi connected to the printer, but this introduces additional 'faff' and I may also need to print from a second remote location, so also adds a little more complexity.

    Anyone done something similar and got a good solution ?!

    #2
    Originally posted by Spoiler View Post
    I need to print from an Azure Windows VM to a printer at home - looking for solutions to get this working. The printer at home is wireless, so my initial test of attempting to share it as an RDP resource didn't work well (appears that only works consistently if the printer is plugged into the home PC). I'd like to go with a long term, stable solution.

    There's a few print services that would achieve this - Google Cloud Print & PrintNode. I would have thought Microsoft would have had a solution, but can't find one.

    I could also do something with a Raspberry Pi connected to the printer, but this introduces additional 'faff' and I may also need to print from a second remote location, so also adds a little more complexity.

    Anyone done something similar and got a good solution ?!
    You could setup a site to site VPN.
    Although if you have a fixed IP that makes that easier you could print direct over teh internet.

    RDP is likely to be the simplest though. If you're struggling with it it's likely that when the RDP session is started the RDC client cannot see the printer so doesn't map it. Check the event logs on the server as printer mappings should show there.
    See You Next Tuesday

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      #3
      print to PDF and then share?
      Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

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        #4
        Depending on your trust levels you could try Google Cloud Print if you have a suitable printer.

        Linky
        SUFTUM

        May life give you what you need, rather than what you want....

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          #5
          RDP printer sharing didn't work reliably - I believe because the local printer is not plugged into the laptop (wifi). Found a hack for this, but still couldn't get it to work well enough.

          Have setup Google Cloud Print and it seems to be working fine. Next step is to add a second remote printer...

          I would have expected Microsoft to have a similar service to GCP, but can't find anything.

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            #6
            HP have an email to printer functionality called eprint. You can email the printer an attachment and the attachment will get printed.

            https://www.hpconnected.com/uk/en
            Make Mercia Great Again!

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by BlueSharp View Post
              HP have an email to printer functionality called eprint. You can email the printer an attachment and the attachment will get printed.

              https://www.hpconnected.com/uk/en
              Thanks. I'm actually using this to connect the HP home printer to google cloud print, and it's working okay currently - I can print direct from the app on the remote server to the printer. This is saving the additional steps of saving to pdf & emailing the printer.

              About to hook up a second printer which does direct to GCP - exciting times

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