Sleeping Laptops as Print Servers?

Martin Farach-Colton wrote on :

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

The laptop is currently on the network via an Airport Extreme connection, but I can also run ethernet from the Airport if that's going to help wake it up.

Anyone know how to get this behavior?

Thanks, Martin Farach-Colton

Greg Weston replied on :

In article 9a1028df.0306300952.559d9d85@redacted.invalid, Martin Farach-Colton martin@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

They won't. When Macs are asleep they're asleep. Ain't nothing going on in those CPUs.

Let me describe it this way: It's not supported and no-one better try to blame me if they fry a machine trying but in most or all G4 desktops you can hot-swap PCI cards while the machine's asleep because it's not actually hot.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

But they're not going to be able to see it if it's not current present and if the machine sharing it is asleep...uh-uh.

G

foo replied on :

On Tue, 01 Jul 2003 01:10:20 GMT, Greg Weston gwestonREMOVE@redacted.invalid wrote:

In article 9a1028df.0306300952.559d9d85@redacted.invalid, Martin Farach-Colton martin@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

They won't. When Macs are asleep they're asleep. Ain't nothing going on in those CPUs.

Not really - a magic packet can still wake it up, or at least, should be able to wake it up.

Let me describe it this way: It's not supported and no-one better try to blame me if they fry a machine trying but in most or all G4 desktops you can hot-swap PCI cards while the machine's asleep because it's not actually hot.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

But they're not going to be able to see it if it's not current present and if the machine sharing it is asleep...uh-uh.

One could have a virtual printer, and when the packets hit the 'server', it could wake up. Yes, wayyyy too much work for a server (servers should be on, and online) but it's possible...

Neill Massello replied on :

Martin Farach-Colton martin@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

The laptop is currently on the network via an Airport Extreme connection, but I can also run ethernet from the Airport if that's going to help wake it up.

You cannot wake a sleeping Mac with a network packet if its only network connection is via AirPort. It requires a wired Ethernet connection.

Anno Siegel replied on :

Neill Massello nmassello@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

Martin Farach-Colton martin@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

The laptop is currently on the network via an Airport Extreme connection, but I can also run ethernet from the Airport if that's going to help wake it up.

You cannot wake a sleeping Mac with a network packet if its only network connection is via AirPort. It requires a wired Ethernet connection.

Could you elaborate?

A Mac can be configured to wake up on "network administration access". Whatever that is in detail, it doesn't sound as if it depended on the connection being wired.

Anno

Matthew Russotto replied on :

In article p1s1gvkj8p5ak923q3hr106f1suiog2qg9@redacted.invalid, foo foo@redacted.invalid wrote:

On Tue, 01 Jul 2003 01:10:20 GMT, Greg Weston gwestonREMOVE@redacted.invalid wrote:

They won't. When Macs are asleep they're asleep. Ain't nothing going on in those CPUs.

Not really - a magic packet can still wake it up, or at least, should be able to wake it up.

The CPU is still asleep; the magic packet is detected by the Ethernet hardware.

Matthew Russotto replied on :

In article bdrn6f$rcn$1@redacted.invalid, Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

Neill Massello nmassello@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

You cannot wake a sleeping Mac with a network packet if its only network connection is via AirPort. It requires a wired Ethernet connection.

Could you elaborate?

A Mac can be configured to wake up on "network administration access". Whatever that is in detail, it doesn't sound as if it depended on the connection being wired.

It does. Since the AirPort power is turned off when the Mac is asleep, there's no way an AirPort packet can turn the Mac on.

wheat replied on :

Neill Massello wrote:

Martin Farach-Colton martin@redacted.invalid wrote:

I have an old laptop running 10.2. I'd like to use it as a print server, since my HP Officejet g85xi won't talk to my Airport Extreme. When the laptop is on, everything is great. But if the laptop is sleeping (which is how I'd like it to spend almost all of its time), none of my other computers see the printer.

The ideal behaviour would be that my other computers could see the printer, and that the laptop would wake up when I send a print job.

The laptop is currently on the network via an Airport Extreme connection, but I can also run ethernet from the Airport if that's going to help wake it up.

You cannot wake a sleeping Mac with a network packet if its only network connection is via AirPort. It requires a wired Ethernet connection.

I cannot get a G4 to wake. Have tried using a broadcast UDP magic-packet, and a specific IP magic-packet, but neither have woken the sleeping machine. This is on a local lan, running 10.2.6.

I suspect that the NIC has to allow WakeOnLan, and perhaps not all Apple's have such capability? Is there a list? As far as I can tell- the Energy Saver Preference Pane does not have a wake-on-administrative option anymore.

cheers.

Anno Siegel replied on :

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

In article bdrn6f$rcn$1@redacted.invalid, Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

Neill Massello nmassello@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

You cannot wake a sleeping Mac with a network packet if its only network connection is via AirPort. It requires a wired Ethernet connection.

Could you elaborate?

A Mac can be configured to wake up on "network administration access". Whatever that is in detail, it doesn't sound as if it depended on the connection being wired.

It does. Since the AirPort power is turned off when the Mac is asleep, there's no way an AirPort packet can turn the Mac on.

Well yes, that settles that :)

A pity, really... So a client can't reliably wake a server over the network connection. Power-wise it might make sense to turn only the transmitter off, the receiver doesn't (have to) use much power. Then the AirPort could keep listening... But that's probably a bit far out.

Anno

Neill Massello replied on :

wheat harvest-this@redacted.invalid wrote:

I cannot get a G4 to wake. Have tried using a broadcast UDP magic-packet, and a specific IP magic-packet, but neither have woken the sleeping machine. This is on a local lan, running 10.2.6.

Have you tried WakeUp http://www.coriolis.ch/article18.html? You need to know the sleeping Macs MAC (Ethernet hardware) address, not its IP address.

I suspect that the NIC has to allow WakeOnLan, and perhaps not all Apple's have such capability?

I'm pretty sure every G4 does. It's off by default and is not available for a PowerBook that is sleeping on battery power.

As far as I can tell- the Energy Saver Preference Pane does not have a wake-on-administrative option anymore.

Do you have an "Options" tab in your Energy Saver preference panel? The wake-on-LAN setting is "Wake for network administrator access".

Neill Massello replied on :

Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

So a client can't reliably wake a server over the network connection.

Yes it can, so long as the last leg of the network connection to the server is by wire. You could connect the server to the LAN port of an AirPort Base Station and send a wake packet to it through the base station, which never sleeps.

Anno Siegel replied on :

Neill Massello nmassello@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

So a client can't reliably wake a server over the network connection.

Yes it can, so long as the last leg of the network connection to the server is by wire. You could connect the server to the LAN port of an AirPort Base Station and send a wake packet to it through the base station, which never sleeps.

I see. Of course, the LAN port in question serves different purpose now...

Thanks for the advice.

Anno

wheat replied on :

Neill Massello wrote:

wheat harvest-this@redacted.invalid wrote:

I cannot get a G4 to wake. Have tried using a broadcast UDP magic-packet, and a specific IP magic-packet, but neither have woken the sleeping machine. This is on a local lan, running 10.2.6.

Have you tried WakeUp http://www.coriolis.ch/article18.html? You need to know the sleeping Macs MAC (Ethernet hardware) address, not its IP address.

Nope- will do so, thanks. THe others have asked for both the MAC address and the IP or broadcast address. One was in javascript and I could see that it punts with an error if only one or the other is entered.

I suspect that the NIC has to allow WakeOnLan, and perhaps not all Apple's have such capability?

I'm pretty sure every G4 does. It's off by default and is not available for a PowerBook that is sleeping on battery power.

This is a tower, one of several- but the only one that is the old, slow, 400MHz variety- it is the file server, but I want to let it sleep.

As far as I can tell- the Energy Saver Preference Pane does not have a wake-on-administrative option anymore.

Do you have an "Options" tab in your Energy Saver preference panel? The wake-on-LAN setting is "Wake for network administrator access".

Nope, mine has an Options tab but only has: "restart automatically after power failure" with a checkbox... Are we taking about Xserver or reg'lar ol' MacOS X?

cheers.

Matthew Russotto replied on :

In article bdshbb$gsu$1@redacted.invalid, Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

It does. Since the AirPort power is turned off when the Mac is asleep, there's no way an AirPort packet can turn the Mac on.

Well yes, that settles that :)

A pity, really... So a client can't reliably wake a server over the network connection.

It's not a matter of unreliability; it's a matter of simply not being able to do it over a wireless connection.

Power-wise it might make sense to turn only the transmitter off, the receiver doesn't (have to) use much power. Then the AirPort could keep listening... But that's probably a bit far out.

Also not possible because the details of the 802.11 protocol.

Anno Siegel replied on :

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

In article bdshbb$gsu$1@redacted.invalid, Anno Siegel anno4000@redacted.invalid wrote:

Matthew Russotto russotto@redacted.invalid wrote in comp.sys.mac.system:

It does. Since the AirPort power is turned off when the Mac is asleep, there's no way an AirPort packet can turn the Mac on.

Well yes, that settles that :)

A pity, really... So a client can't reliably wake a server over the network connection.

It's not a matter of unreliability; it's a matter of simply not being able to do it over a wireless connection.

Well, as Neill Massello has shown elsewhere in this thread, it is (of course) possible if the server is connected to the LAN port of the base station. The connection may still be wireless.

You are right to say it isn't a matter of reliability. I should have said "unpredictable", from the client's point ov view. It would be nice if we could say, if I can see it (a Mac) over TCP/IP, I can also wake it up. As it turns out, it depends.

Power-wise it might make sense to turn only the transmitter off, the receiver doesn't (have to) use much power. Then the AirPort could keep listening... But that's probably a bit far out.

Also not possible because the details of the 802.11 protocol.

I was afraid there would be protocolary objections against just listening in.

Anno