Configuring a known host in the Mobility Print Admin interface
Mobility Print allows users to discover printers directly from your server, instead of relying on DNS.
This is a great option for complex networks where there is no BIND or Windows Internal DNS server, or they can’t be configured. For a more detailed look, head over to Printer discovery—which method is best for you?
For configuring known host printer discovery, follow the steps below.
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In the Mobility Print Admin interface, you can see which discovery option you’re currently using. To change this, click Discovery options.
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Click Configure known host.
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You’ll be asked to enter the IP address or hostname of your Mobility Server.
Mobility Print provides some suggestions according to what it already knows about your environment, but you can manually update this field.
The IP address/hostname you use:
- must be accessible by the Mobility Print clients via TCP ports 9163 and 9164
- must be a string
- must not include the scheme or port number
- must be in IPv4 format when using an IP address, IPv6 is not supported.
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Either click one of the suggestions, or type your IP address/hostname, then click OK. Verify that the current discovery method now reflects your changes.
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If you’re setting up Chromebooks in a managed environment, you will need to set up Google Workspace and deploy the Chrome extension before you can test printing. Continue on to the Managed Chromebook deployment steps below.
You’re now ready to test printing from each type of client (for example, a Chromebook or iPhone) that your users print from.
You can find more details on this in the Set up and test client printing section of the manual.
How to deploy Chromebooks in a managed environment
For Chromebooks in a managed environment — Deploy the Mobility Print extension to your Chromebooks using Google Workspace.
Google Workspace is a great tool for enabling printing on Chromebooks at scale, allowing you to easily deploy Mobility Print to all your managed Chromebooks — be that 10 or 10,000 — in minutes.
After you’ve configured known host printer discovery, configure the Mobility Print Chrome extension with your known host address and deploy it to your managed devices.
The Mobility Print Chrome extension relies on this information for your users to discover printers, authenticate, and send print jobs when not using DNS discovery.
How to configure the Mobility Print Chrome extension
Before you start, make sure you have Administrator access to Google Workspace.
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From the Google Admin console, expand Devices > Chrome and click Apps & extensions.
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Select the Users & browsers tab at the top of the screen. Then in the left hand menu, select the organizational unit you want to deploy the Mobility Print Extension to. To apply theses setting to ALL users and enrolled devices, leave the top level organizational unit selected.
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In the bottom right side of the page, click the yellow + icon and select Add from Chrome Web store.
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Select View app by ID and copy paste the following app ID in the search box:
ndakideadaglgpbblmppfonobpdgggin
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On the Mobility Print extension page, click Select. The app is now added and displayed in the Apps & extensions page.
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In the Installation policy column, change Allow install to Force install.
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Scroll down and complete the Policy for extensions field by copying and pasting one of the sample JSON configurations below, then updating it to match the known host address of your Mobility Print server(s). Make sure all formatting and parentheses are included, exactly as shown below.
For a single Mobility Print server that you configured for known host in step 3 above:
{
"MobilityPrintServerHosts": {
"Value": ["MobServerIP"]
}
}
For multiple Mobility Print servers, list each known host value:
{
"MobilityPrintServerHosts": {
"Value": ["MobServerIP 1", "MobServerIP 2", "MobServerIP 3"]
}
}- At the top right of the screen, click SAVE
- All that’s left is to test printing from your Chromebooks! You can find more details on this over in the Set up and test client printing section of the manual.
Optional JSON configuration
In addition to the required JSON above, there are some optional customization settings that you can also add to your Policy for extensions field.
Optimize the printer discovery process — Extending printer cache time
After a printer has been discovered, Mobility Print will cache that printer’s information to save it from having to discover it again later. By default, it saves this information for 3600 seconds (1 hour). If your printers are rarely changing their settings, like the IP Address, you can change how long we store this cached information:
"PrinterDiscoveryCacheTTLSeconds": {
"Value": 86000
}Optimize the printer discovery process — Disable unused printer discovery methods
You can disable unused printer discovery methods to optimize the printer discovery process. Instead of attempting all the discovery methods, use the JSON below to use only the discovery methods you’re expecting (For example, known host):
"EnabledDiscoveryModes": {
"Value": ["known_host", "dns", "mdns", "cloud_print"]
}Example configuration of the required and optional JSON policies
Below is an example configuration with all of the required and optional JSON policies. Use this as a template, updating it to match your own values:
{
"MobilityPrintServerHosts": {
"Value": ["192.168.1.100"]
},
"PrinterDiscoveryCacheTTLSeconds": {
"Value": 86000
},
"EnabledDiscoveryModes": {
"Value": ["known_host"]
}
}
How to deploy an iOS profile (optional)
Normally after enabling known host, the administrator shares the setup link with BYOD users. But there is anotherl way to share Mobility Print queues with iPhones and iPads that are enrolled in an MDM such as JAMF, Intune, or Kandji.
Mobility Print queues can be automatically installed on these devices using an iOS profile.
To set up the iOS profile to deploy on managed iPhones and iPads:
- Log in to the Mobility Print Admin web interface.
- Make a note of which discovery option is currently active (mDNS discovery, DNS, or known host) as you might want to revert this setting after obtaining the iOS profile.
- Select Discovery Options.
- Click Configure known host.
- Enter the IP address or hostname of the Mobility Print server, then click OK.
- Under Apple iOS, click Client Setup.
- Click Download to get the iOS profile.
- Lastly, follow the steps for your mobile device management (MDM) platform to push the iOS profile to iPads and iPhones.
Have a look at this article to see how this can be achieved on one example MDM: How to use Jamf Pro to deploy printers on managed iOS devices (iPhones and iPads) .
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