Controlling Printing with NT 4.0

Robert Sullivan SCP_SULLI at sals.edu
Fri Aug 15 12:33:27 EDT 1997


We bought an HP LaserJet 5M (heavy duty, prints a 65-page .pdf in 5 min.) for
our new NT Web PCs.  We plan to put it at a service desk and have money
collected before the printouts are released.  While the honor system has worked
reasonably well for our old dot matrix printers, we are trying to avoid
unnecessary waste from large files ("I didn't want the entire IRS Code!") and
unwanted multiple copies.

First I thought about setting the printer on pause, and releasing it on demand. 
That doesn't give you control over individual print jobs, however.

Then I created Staff and Public queues.  The Staff queue operates normally, the
Public one holds everything until 2 a.m.  By clicking on an item in the queue
and changing the radio button back to "No time restrictions," we could only get
printouts which were really needed and paid for, with minimal effort.

This looked promising, but when I actually tried it, I got an error message
because the virtual printer itself was still set to 2 a.m.  Darn, I thought it
looked too good to be true!

So, is there a way around this?  Or, is there an easy way to redirect
individual jobs from one queue to another?  The explanations of redirection
I've read assume it's intended in cases where one printer is no longer
available.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Bob Sullivan                               scp_sulli at sals.edu
Schenectady County Public Library (NY)     http://www.scpl.org


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