Is it magic, or just dumb?

Breaking news from the North Kansas City Public Library: You can now send print jobs from your laptop to one of their printers via Wi-Fi.

Or can you?

Unless this is being achieved by supernatural means, or unless there's something important they've left out of their announcement blurb, I'd have to say that you can't-at least not yet. You see, there's no mention of your having to install the printer's driver on your machine-always the first step in setting up a printer. No matter how wishfully they may think it, there's no way printing will work "automatically" before the printer has been added to the client computer and the client's operating system told where and what kind of printer it is. And I'd hazard a guess that not many of NKC's patrons have ever had to wrestle with setting up a network printer themselves. Take it from someone who often has-it ain't exactly plug-and-play simple, folks.

And does NKC think every laptop in the world uses the same version of the same operating system? How about the kid with the hand-me-down Windows 98 rig? Or the Linux geek? Or our colleague Macenstein, for that matter? Macs do not like using peripherals such as printers over a network. They can do it, but they just don't like it-and they show their disdain by not making it easy to do. And, of course, they need Mac drivers in any case. Connecting a heterogeneous mix of computers to the same network via established protocols is one thing. Providing that motley crew of clients with the plethora of drivers they will need to use a single peripheral-assuming there even is driver support for them all-is quite something else.

Methinks the library hath bought itself more headaches than anything else with this.

Besides, even if you believe this is something worth paying for-you didn't think they were giving away that ink and paper, did you?-and feel you can manage to get it working, I'd recommend you not do it-at least not for anything you wouldn't want someone else to see. Remember how that print job is getting from your laptop to the printer? Right-it's going over an open, unsecured wireless link in the clear. So, even though you can safely do your online banking at the library provided your bank's website is fully SSL protected (and if it isn't, please put your money in another bank whose site is!), you can't safely print out receipts and statements there without risking interception.

That said, I am curious about this setup. If any of you get a chance to play around with it, come by and let us know what you find.

This. Isn't. Good.

Finally got around earlier today to checking out the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art at 45th and Warwick Boulevard, which has long been listed as a local free hotspot, something I found intriguing, to say the least. An art gallery wouldn't necessarily come to mind-well, at least not to my mind-as a place you'd expect to find free Wi-Fi. Which is why not finding it there when I booted up (Memo to self: Plug that stinking finder in and charge it the night before next time so you don't have to boot up to do the initial signal search, dummy!) wasn't altogether surprising. After all, we've been led astray by the local listings before.

However, the nice young lady in the information booth assured me the place really was lit up-or at least was supposed to be. She was even able to tell me what the SSID should have been. So, on the outside chance that someone playing with the access point had inadvertently turned off broadcasting the network name, I fired up again and played around with every permutation of the identifier I could think of. Still no joy, and no signal. (And no hidden SSID, either, as verified by my finder once it was charged enough to make a check.)

Well, the only place I saw that would have been suitable for sit-down surfing, had things been working, was a small bench outside the entrance to Cafe Sebastienne across from the main entrance. I can only guess, but I got the impression that the bench is really there for cafe patrons arriving early for their reservations, so its availability for other purposes may be limited at times. Power outlets? Get outta here. There might have been some in the cafe, but I didn't look. And the aforementioned nice young lady advised that there may be more seating in the galleries, but she didn't know either if there are outlets nearby or if plugging into them is even allowed-and I didn't venture into any of the galleries to check.

You know, it's bad enough when a place like a laundromat advertises free wireless and can't deliver the goods. When people expected to know what they're doing fall down on the job, it's unconscionable. My suspicion is that this network is an important resource for students at the adjacent Kansas City Art Institute, and probably gets some traffic from Rockhurst, UMKC and the community colleges as well, so here's hoping it gets the TLC it needs-fast.

As it turns out, there's a very good reason...

...that Macenstein didn't find that Latte Land down in the Power and Light District last week. Namely that, as yours truly observed when I drove past the site this afternoon, the building it's going into isn't finished yet.

Don't feel badly for Mac, though. After all, the 3G iPhone should be out any day now.

Either reason and rationality have prevailed...

...or the blocking of Port 119 on the KCMO Public Library's network was just a temporary glitch.

I'm at the main library downtown and all my Usenet groups are coming in just fine.

My guess is that since we never heard back from our original informant, the library hasn't responded as to why this happened. There hasn't been any mention of it on the website.

Just one of those things, I guess.

By the way, I cruised through the Power & Light District on the way down, and wasn't there supposed to be a Latte Land location opening there somewhere? Didn't see any evidence of one. I've heard their other locations are lit up. Anyone know for sure?