How to Setup A Network Printer Or Share Your Printer in Ubuntu

Suppose you have multiple computers in your network and you would like all pcs to be able to access the printer, then sharing the printer on the network as a network printer is a big bonus.Here's how you set it up in ubuntu.
NOTE:You need to have samba installed in order to share your printer.CLICK HERE incase you havent installed samba
SERVER SETUP

Step 1: Go to the terminal(Applications->Accessories->Terminal) and type sudo gedit /etc/samba/smb.conf
Step 2: TextEditor should open with the smb.conf file. now find the following lines

# printing = cups
# printcap name = cups


and replace them with

printing = cups
printcap name = cups

You are basically uncommenting the two lines , i.e. removing the #

Step 3: Save the changes made and close the file
Step 4: Back in the terminal type sudo /etc/init.d/cupsys restart and sudo /etc/init.d/samba restart
Now the server setup is complete.Here's how you connect to this printer

CLIENT SETUP

Step 1: In windows , open windows explorer and type \\(ip of ubuntu pc or pc name) .. you can either enter the ip address of the ubuntu machine or the name of the ubuntu machine.You can find your ip address by typing ifconfig in the terminal..
Here's a typical ifconfig output
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:08:A1:8A:48:A5
inet addr:192.168.1.10 Bcast:192.255.255.255 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: fe80::208:a1ff:fe8a:48a5/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:147292 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:122969 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:133956215 (127.7 MB) TX bytes:87153195 (83.1 MB)
Interrupt:16 Base address:0x8000

Here 192.168.1.10 is the ip of the ubuntu machine

Setup 2: Now you should find a folder called Printers and you should see the printer listed there or the printer maybe listed at the main page itself..Double click on the printer name and the setup should go on by itself
Step 3: If you cannot find your printer.Then go to control panel->Printers and click on add printer . then select network printer and allow it to search for printers on the network.If it found the printer , well and good continue with setup, its quite simple next,next,next etc. if it didnt find the printer Click on Select a shared printer by name and enter the details manually. in my case it is \\192.168.1.10\hp_printer . You can get the printer name(in this case hp_printer) by going to system->administration->printing . You will see the printer name under Local Printers in the left hand side column.

Step 4 : Once you entered the link windows should find the printer and you should be able to access your network printer successfully!!

NOTE: Incase you have trouble , ensure that Your printer is shared successfully under System->administration->Printing.
You should find an option like Policies under your printer settings.Ensure that Shared Is Checked. then restart cupsys and samba and try again(Step 4 server setup)


You can follow the same instructions on any number of clients you wish.Steps for most windows versions are the same.