s902255@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au (A. Vanderstock) (06/20/91)
We use a combination of HP Laserjet IIs and Apple LaserWriter IINTs, with four printers in total. Last year we did not charge for printouts, but with widespread abuse of the system (unnecessary drafts, big printouts that could have been printed on the line printer, etc) we had to introduce a $0.10/page charge. I do not feel that this will recover the costs of purchase, maintance, toner, paper, but simply discourages waste prinouts. We print approximately 3-4 reams of paper/day depending on assignment load. Things that need to be fixed are : 1) better print server. The IBM PC (the sort with 64kb motherboard ram!) is simply overburdened with some graphic jobs. 2) You'll need, if you can get it, large paper feeds that can preferably hold an entire ream. Otherwise you'll be filling them too often. 3) Enough printers to cope with the estimated load. Our printers are rated at 8 ppm, but still our queues are about 5 minutes during the day. We solve this by only collecting printouts every fifteen minutes. 4) Something worked out with Admin to fine defaulters. Otherwise you'll have no legs to stand on to charge for printouts. This is for a lab of, at the moment, 17 Mac SE/30s, and 29 Compaq 386s's. Problems you are likely to encounter : Macs do not print banner pages without the user selecting the "Print Cover Page" radio button in the "Print" menu. Page Maker does not have even this choice. WordPerfect 5.1 will make your life **very** miserable if you do not set it up correctly and inform each and every PC user that uses WordPerfect to ensure that they use "Standard - A4" paper selection. If they use or even have a style sheet from a department that has different settings than you, your printer will go off-line after *every* single page asking for manual feed. My advice : do not install WordPerfect. Especially if you have to help users with the product. It is very badly designed and not very intuitive for casual users, which you'll find most people are. Wait until the Windows version is released. It should fix up most of the problems, for it will be very like the Macintosh version (which I recommend heartily - it is vastly superior to Microsoft Word 4.0d), and be easy to use to boot. If you are going to charge for pages, make sure you have extra toner cartridges available. People expect you to have nice fresh, crisp pages for you, not faded or funny running edges... If you are going to have a line printer - make sure Lotus 1 2 3 users know not to send graphs there. Sorry I couldn't help you with the HP IIIsi series : we do not have any installed. Sounds like a nice printer though. -- Andrew Vanderstock, s902255@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au Student Assistant, Kay House. RMIT These are my opinions and observations. They are in no way RMIT's.
rchui@neptune.nswc.navy.mil (Chui) (06/20/91)
3. How does the IIIsi behave in a mixed environment (Macs and PC's)? Can
it switch between postscript and HPGL automatically?
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I am really interesting this question. I have installed a PostScript
cartridge in HP LaserJet III. I am try to write a output filter file in
C for my
Sun3 os 4.0 system. This output file performed:
1) chech if there any print job on tty## printer port?
2) check if that print file is a postscript file? (this is option)
3) if no print job and is a postscript file, then sent signal to printer to
switch to PostScript mode, print postscript file.
4) Reset to PCL mode.
Here is my C code. After I compiled the file, and modify the /etc/printcap
file.
I try to print by "lpr -h -Pprintername filename". where -h is suppress the
burst page which is not in postscript code.
This program is work to detect the print jobs and set signal to switch to
postscript mode, after that the printer just do nothing, the postscript file
never print. But when run this program by input a file("ofps <
filename), it works fine, it works everything what I want!
Is there anyone out there know why is that?
#include <stdio.h>
#include <signal.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
#include <sys/dir.h>
char *SD="/usr/spool/lpd/hplp";
main(argc,argv)
int argc;
char *argv[];
{
register char *cp;
register int ch;
/* 'of' filters are only passed width and length arguments from lpd */
while (--argc)
{
if (*(cp = *++argv) == '-' )
{
switch (cp[1])
{
case 'w':
/* this filter does nothing with width */
break;
case 'l':
/* this filter does nothing with length */
break;
}
}
}
while (checkq()) /* If there any print job on tty## port? */
system("sleep 20");
printf("\033&l1057.32259J"); /* reset and switch to PCL */
(void) fflush(stdout);
system("sleep 50"); /* printer takes 45 sec to reset */
printf("\033&l5257.1058J"); /* to PS mode */
(void) fflush(stdout);
system("sleep 50");
while ((ch=getchar()) != EOF) {
putchar(ch);
}
exit(0);
}
int checkq()
{
register struct direct *d;
DIR *dirp;
int nitems=0;
if ((dirp = opendir(SD)) == NULL) /* open the lpq directory */
return(-1);
while ((d = readdir(dirp)) != NULL) /* list the files */
if (d->d_name[0] == 'c' && d->d_name[1] == 'f')
nitems++; /* If there are files begin with "cf"
print jobs
*/
closedir(dirp);
return(nitems);
}trump@qut.edu.au (06/20/91)
I am in a situation where I am preparing a report on laser printing in
a student computer laboratories. Here are some some details about the
labs:
- Available 24 hours a day
- Contain PC Connected to Novell Networks
- Present printing is either print queue or stand-alone (draft)
Laser printing services have now been requested for the labs. Has anyone
had any experiences or information to share. I actually have the following
questions:
1. Has anyone used the HP IIIsi with the ethernet interface in the above
environment?
2. Has anyone instigated a cost recovery system? It is reliable, available
24 hours, mechanical or human?
3. How does the IIIsi behave in a mixed environment (Macs and PC's)? Can
it switch between postscript and HPGL automatically?
4. Has anyone prepared a report on offering laser printing facilities?
Any further information would also be greatly appreciated.
Jason Trump
--
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JASON TRUMP E-Mail: j.trump@qut.edu.au
Teaching and Research Support Snail Mail: Locked Bag No2
Queensland University of Technology Red Hill Qld 4059
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