Printer Settings Dialog

This dialog allows you to add printers to the Print Manager, or to modify settings for those already added. The settings differ between printer types, with IPDS printers having more options than other printers.

Each logical grouping of printer setting appears in its own subsection within the dialog. These can be folded up or down (to make them visible, or hidden) by clicking on the blue title bar atop each subsection.

Once the settings are complete, press the Finish button to apply the new settings.

In the case of adding a printer (via the Add Printer option), this adds the newly entered printer to the Print Manager and automatically makes it available in the Printers pane and the Printer Queue pane.

If modifying an existing printer (via the Edit Printer option) the printer settings are then updated throughout the Print Manager.

To test the printer settings, one can run Check Printer Capabilities in the Printer Capabilities pane.

The printer options that can be set include:

Printer Details:

Enable Printer: Check to enable the printer settings.
Printers can be Enabled or Disabled using this check box, or via the Enable / Disable options in the Printers pane.

Printer Type: Select the type of printer to add, from the drop down list.
Name: Enter a name that describes the printer in the list.
IP Address: Enter the IP Address or machine name of the printer.
Port (IPDS Only): Enter the port on which the printer communicates.
LPR (PCL and PostScript Only): Enter the printer queue.
RAW will work as a generic queue option for most PCL and PostScript printers.

Those PCL and PostScript printers that support multiple queues can have multiple entries in the Print Manager. One for each Queue.
Hot Folder subsection: Defines folders from which print output files are automatically captured and sent to the appropriate printer queue.

Enable Hot Folders: Check to enable hot folders. Then enter the folders from which the Print Manager will capture print files automatically and send them to the appropriate Priority queue on the printer. There are High, Medium and Low priority queues available and each can be set here.

Extended Options (IPDS only) subsection: Defines logging of printer activities.

Page Counters: IPDS Printers return counters for various categories, from which you can chose.
The Print Manager will use whichever is selected in this list box to determine when a job is Finished. Once the Counter for this selection equals the total number of pages in the job, the job will be considered Finished and it will display as such within the Printer Queue pane.

What choice you make here is dependent upon the capabilities of the printer. Not all printers will provide all options. For example, some printers will only return when the job is Committed, rather than when it has been Received or Stacked.
The full range of choices available to the Print Manager (but not necessarily the IPDS printer) are:
- Received: The amount of pages received by the printer.
- Stacked: The amount of pages stacked by the printer.
- Jam Recovery: If a paper jam is encountered, the page number at which the printer jam occurred.
- Committed: The number of pages committed to the printer.
- Operator View: This counter contains the number of pages that have passed the view of the printer operator. It increments by the number of pages on a sheet when the last copy of the sheet passes the view of the printer operator.
Ack Pages: The number of pages to send to the printer for printing before sending an acknowledgement request.

Acknowledgement requests slow the printing process down, as the printer needs to process the request and return the information.

The default Ack Pages number is now 10 pages which means the Print Manager will send an acknowledgement request to the printer in increments of 10 pages, until the end of the job. Given the overhead in processing such requests, the smaller the Page number, the slower the printing becomes, but the higher the granularity of the reporting and error correction. If speed is of the essence you might like to increase the number to 100.

We recommend retaining the default value, due to the granularity of reporting and the error correction this allows.
SNMP: Select this option to allow IPDS printer(s) and Print Manager to communicate back and forth.
Not all IPDS printers will support SNMP, but most contemporary printers are likely to.

This option is enabled by default, as it provides the greatest functionality.
Multi Job Mode: Select this option to support near continuous IPDS output, using Multipage PDF containers.
When printing on high volume IPDS printers, it is best if the printer does not pause often. On continuous feed printers in particular, pauses can lead to malfunctions as well as cause delays. It's not just the pause itself, but also the additional time spent whilst the printer slows down and then speeds up again after the pause. The faster the printer, the bigger an issue this becomes.

Most modern IPDS printers support Multipage PDF containers, which can be used in such a way to as remove pauses between print jobs.

Selecting this option and outputting jobs using Multipage PDF containers means high-end printers can be largely prevented from pausing.

This option is enabled by default, as it provides the greatest printing efficiency.
Extended Options: Select this to allow access to further Extended Options.
The Extended Options consist of:
- Create Trace File: Select this to log all communications to a log file.
  The trace file will be sent to the following folder: C:\Users\<username>\Connect\trace\PrintManager
  The <username> would be the currently active user's Windows login name.

End of Job Preferences (IPDS only) subsection: Select from these options to determine job end processing. More than one option can be selected simultaneously.

Edge Marks: Select this to add an Edge Mark to the final page of a job. This is commonly used to indicate job separation in Continuous Form printing.
Stack Receive Pages: Add blank pages to the end of the job in order to push the completed job to the stacker.
Print Buffered Pages: Print any/all buffered Pages. This selection causes the printer to schedule all buffered data for printing prior to sending an Acknowledge Reply.
Buffered data is page data not reflected by the committed page and copy counters.
Eject to Front Facing: For cut-sheet media, this selection causes the next received page to be printed as the first page of the next sheet.

Error Handling Preferences (IPDS only) subsection: Select these to STOP printing upon encountering any of the following errors (more than one option can be selected):

Undefined Character Check: If an undefined character is encountered in the job. For example, the Euro symbol might be present in the job, but missing from the printer.
Report Page Position Check: When printed beyond the edge of the page boundaries. For example, an image that extends beyond the edge of the page.
Handle Errors: Select for how to handle any/all other optional errors. The choices are:
- None - ignore all other errors.
- Auto - allow default error handling.
- Prompt - prompt for operator action on error.

Description subsection: An optional printer description can be entered here, if desired.

Finish button: Click to apply the selected settings to the printer. This applies to both new printers and to update existing printers.
New printers will appear in the Printers pane and the Job Queue pane.

Cancel button: Click to cancel the selection of printer settings. This exits the dialog, without any changes being made.