Printing to a Local Shared Printer When the Network is down

Question

I have some legacy application logic that sends files to an attached printer using a DOS copy command:

copy fileToPrint \myLocalComputerName\printerShareName

The problem is that even though the application is running on the computer that's physically attached to the printer since it's using a network "share" it requires the network be available. If the network isn't available DOS throws a network unavailable error.

How can I code this so I don't have the network dependency? (preferably without re-architecting the entire file based print logic)

Answer 1

Does this work? (Old DOS trick)

type myfile.txt > prn

This should work if the printer in question is the default printer on the PC.

Answer 2

Found the following article which uses a loopback network adapter to access the local share when the network is unavailable.

http://geekswithblogs.net/dtotzke/articles/26204.aspx