OTN (Old To New) Remote Printing Standard

"Letting Your Old Devices Print Again!"

Note, I was tired while making this, and kind of just winged it and threw some information on a file. It'll be revised some time later. Also note that this is TECHNICALLY not a standard, it just sounds cool.

OTN Remote Printing Standard lets your older devices like a PowerMac G3 or a Windows 2000 computer communicate with newer printers. Or, to be more specific, make a newer computer communicate to a printer for it.

How It Works

If you don't want to know and just want to set it up, skip this snd go to "Installation and Usage". Otherwise, read! It's pretty simple!

In this, the modern computer will be refered to as the "client" and the old computer the "server". This will be explained later.

The client hosts a script that controls all of the client-side magic. The server connects to the modern PC and inputs information (IP and file name).

The Client-side Magic

The client consists of 3 components - the Frontend, WGET, and, the beating heart of OTN, PDFToPrinter. WGET downloads the PDF from the server and PDFToPrinter prints it, while the front end wraps it all up into a user-friendly script.

The Not-As-Cool Server-side Magic

The server really only consists of an FTP server, which hosts the PDF files on the computer.

Why I Made This Project

Well it's a few years before college, I might as well start making some preparations. I decided I'd use my PowerMac G3 as my main computer and bring my desktop for gaming and to keep some servers I run operational. Sure, I could just use my desktop, but I just really want to use my PowerMac. So I will. One thing I know I'll have to do is print documents. However, I realized that its gonna be hard and expensive to find a printer that has drivers for Mac OS 9.2.2, so I needed a different solution, and that's when I made OTN.

Installation and Usage

PowerMac Instructions

Note: Be sure you have a way to get the computer on the internet. There are many ways to do this because it has built in ethernet. For example, you can use your laptop ot desktop as a wired hotspot with Connectify.

1.) On the server computer (the PowerMac) download the files on the latest release. You may need to use a CD to get it on it.

2.) Download the client files to your modern desktop

3 (Optional).) Press "Win+R" and type in "shell:startup". Make a shortcut of the Frontend and copy the shortcut into the startup. This will make it run on startup.

4.) Start it. The client is now running and is ready for a connection!

5.) Install the RDP Client that is included in the server pack. You may also need to install the Java MRJ which is included just in case.

6.) Install the FTP Server and set the username and password to what you want. Change to home directory to the folder that contains your documents.

7.) Start the FTP Server. Both the server and the client are now set up!

Windows 9x and 2000 Instructions

Coming Soon!

Usage

To print a document, convert it to PDF. Most office applications can do this. Then, connect to the modern computer via the RDP client. Input the required information, and the modern computer will automatically print the file on its primary printer.

Note: If you want to be able to print from anywhere in the world, you need to open the port the client's RDP server and the server's FTP server.

! UNDER CONSTRUCTION !

Instructions may be inaccurate and are not finished

© Innovation Inc. 2019, © SparrDrem 2019

Made by Sam :)