Share Printers with other Computers

Task #95

Difficulty Level 2

You can share printers on your network. This enables you to use one printer with multiple computers. Because printers are devices that you probably do not use continuously, it makes sense to share them with other users on the network. Sharing printers can save you time and money. You do not have to invest extra money in multiple printers, and you get more work done because you are not always running into another room to print on another computer.

You can activate printer sharing in the Sharing pane of System Preferences. If you activate Windows sharing, even Microsoft Windows computers can print to shared Mac printers.

When printer sharing is activated, other users on the network can access shared printers by using the standard Print dialog box. Panther supports a wide array of printers, but only if you install their drivers. The Panther installation disks contain numerous print drivers for you to use.

Did You Know?

As soon as you click the Print button to commence printing, the Print Center application takes over the print job. It takes care of printing the document in the background so that you can continue working in other applications.

Caution

If you make a mistake and print the wrong document, click the Print Center icon in the dock to bring it to the foreground. In the Print Center, you can cancel jobs or even deactivate printing altogether. If the printer has some sort of technical problem, you will also find alerts about the problem in the Print Center. The alerts help you diagnose and repair the problem.