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I've got a HP printer pretty similar to the one mentioned in the thread. In the course of trying to set it up, I by chance pointed my browser to the printer's n

by lftl 14y ago

I've got a HP printer pretty similar to the one mentioned in the thread. In the course of trying to set it up, I by chance pointed my browser to the printer's network printing port. Interestingly enough it printed out all my browser headers. It seems like these printers just spit out anything that hits that port.

igrekel 14y ago
Yes, I used to do a netcat on printers to print for free in college.
- ZoFreX 14y ago
  Tip for networked computers in colleges, schools, workplaces, and similar environments: You can upload postscript files to them via FTP, this lets you bypass the printer queue running on a server somewhere. Why would you want to do this? Various nefarious reasons, but the reason I did it was because in 90+% printer outages at university, it was the queue server and not the printer itself experiencing a fault. If you don't know the IP address of the printer, you can normally get them to print out a diagnostics page by fiddling with the buttons, and this page will contain that information. So far I have always succeeded at logging in with guest credentials. To network admins who don't want people bypassing their queues: vlan your printers!
  - mindslight 14y ago
    I added several strategically-located university printers to my /etc/printcap such that I could just-in-time print homework from my dorm and pick it up on my way to class. True cloud printing ftw!
  - hrrsn 14y ago
    We had this problem when I was still at high school. It worked for the most part, but when us photography students started printing to the photo printer all hell broke loose. Things would frequently take 30+ minutes to go through the Pharos print server. At the time they had just hired a new IT guy so we asked him if he could set the printer up on our personal laptops (we only had 3 workstations in the room). After much frustration he managed to get it running, except he accidentally set them up to print directly to the printer, not via the print server. Magically things started popping out after a minute or two, which got the teacher inquisitive. Eventually they realised that we weren't being charged for printing anymore when the print information had our personal computer usernames rather than ID numbers but couldn't blame us as they had set it up themselves. After being told not to do that anymore, we all just set up secondary users with our ID numbers so it all looked legit.
    - ZoFreX 14y ago
      Ah, yes - I forgot to mention that side effect, bypassing the print queue will also mean you don't get charged (assuming your institution has a print credits system set up).
sixothree 14y ago
I never would have expected that, but it would certainly explain what we're seeing.

by lftl 14y ago

igrekel 14y ago

Yes, I used to do a netcat on printers to print for free in college.

ZoFreX 14y ago
Tip for networked computers in colleges, schools, workplaces, and similar environments: You can upload postscript files to them via FTP, this lets you bypass the printer queue running on a server somewhere. Why would you want to do this? Various nefarious reasons, but the reason I did it was because in 90+% printer outages at university, it was the queue server and not the printer itself experiencing a fault. If you don't know the IP address of the printer, you can normally get them to print out a diagnostics page by fiddling with the buttons, and this page will contain that information. So far I have always succeeded at logging in with guest credentials. To network admins who don't want people bypassing their queues: vlan your printers!
- mindslight 14y ago
  I added several strategically-located university printers to my /etc/printcap such that I could just-in-time print homework from my dorm and pick it up on my way to class. True cloud printing ftw!
- hrrsn 14y ago
  We had this problem when I was still at high school. It worked for the most part, but when us photography students started printing to the photo printer all hell broke loose. Things would frequently take 30+ minutes to go through the Pharos print server. At the time they had just hired a new IT guy so we asked him if he could set the printer up on our personal laptops (we only had 3 workstations in the room). After much frustration he managed to get it running, except he accidentally set them up to print directly to the printer, not via the print server. Magically things started popping out after a minute or two, which got the teacher inquisitive. Eventually they realised that we weren't being charged for printing anymore when the print information had our personal computer usernames rather than ID numbers but couldn't blame us as they had set it up themselves. After being told not to do that anymore, we all just set up secondary users with our ID numbers so it all looked legit.
  - ZoFreX 14y ago
    Ah, yes - I forgot to mention that side effect, bypassing the print queue will also mean you don't get charged (assuming your institution has a print credits system set up).

sixothree 14y ago

I never would have expected that, but it would certainly explain what we're seeing.