Frogmore

Print Distributor Scripting

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 13:56:00 +0000

In this post I am going to try and explain the concepts behind the scripting support in Print Distributor. I will cover what it is, how it interacts with your print jobs and what you can achieve with it.

I am going to assume you have some programming experience although you don’t need to be a professional programmer to use the scripting in Print Distributor. If you have ever added a JavaScript alert to a web page or written a batch file that is probably enough. You should also understand the concept of actions in Print Distributor, in particular their sequential operation.

The scripting language in Print Distributor is VBScript from Microsoft a dialect of BASIC. This is the language you may have come across if you have ever written WSH or WMI scripts. I won’t try and document it here as Microsoft has quite good documetation and a Google search will turn up lots of help.

Print Distributor has a Script action that will let you run a script before or after any other actions in your configuration. You can also include it in the global actions if you have a script that needs to run across many virtual printers. VBScript is also used for the expressions you enter for conditional actions.

When a print document arrives at a Print Distributor virtual printer there are two files created, a raw file and a job file. The raw file is the data the printer receives, typically this is a PostScript or PCL file but may be in another format. The job file contains attributes about the document such as the name of the user who printed it and the document name.

Your scripts have access to both of these files to varying degrees. The job attributes are mostly associated with the administration of the printer, these include the user name, document name, priority, machine name, print date, printer name, size, job id and so on. All of these attributes can be modified and on the whole they won’t change the printed job but may change the behaviour of subsequent actions.

A typical example where you might modifiy a job attribute is if you are archiving files by the Document Name field but the formatting isn’t quite right for your requirements. For instance if the application that is printing used underscore characters instead of spaces you could replace the underscores with spaces in your script.

As well as the job attributes there are a number of document attributes that indicate some of the printer settings. These give you access to the paper source, paper size, duplex, colour and orientation. This is read only access as the real printer controls are in the raw file. It can be useful for routing documents or accounting, for instance you may pick out all the A3 / B sized documents and route them to a printer with a large size paper input or route all the colour prints to a colour printer.

It is also possible to read the raw print file in a script. Most PCL and PostScript files will have a header that is plain text and some times you can extract useful information about the document when that isn’t available in the job. A very common use for this is reading the document name when the document has been spooled from a mainframe or UNIX system.

There are also a number of control mechanisms available to a script, it is possible to abort the document, reprint from within the script or send a message to the log. You can also check the status of previous actions, for instance you can check for errors, find the last printer the load balancing action used or the exit code from the Run Program action.

I hope this has given you an idea of some of the capabilities of scripting in Print Distributor. If you want to investigate the scripting in Print Distributor then the help file has further information or if you don’t want to get your hands dirty then contact us and we will do what we can to help.

Print Distributor on Windows 8

Thu, 06 Oct 2011 10:42:14 +0100

Last month Microsoft announced a very early preview for Windows 8. There are quite a lot of changes we are excitied about, in particular the continued journey towards XPS as the default spool file format.

Windows 8 introduces a new printer driver model called v4. These drivers are all based on XPS and will support XPS, PostScript and PCL printers directly without any binary components. Unfortunately they don’t support 3rd party port monitors which is the component we use to route prints from a virtual printer into Print Distributor.

Over the last few releases of Windows Microsoft has been pushing developers away from writing native components for the print spooler. There is good reason for this, the quality of some printer software is attrocious and any instability in a printer driver or port monitor can cause the spooler to crash.

This leaves us with quite a lot of work to do to make Print Distributor compatible with Windows 8. The first thing we have done is create a prototype to prove we can achieve what we need, this is running fine. As usual we expect to have a test release available when Microsoft makes their release candidate available, probably some time next year.

Print Distributor 5.2 Release

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 15:06:19 +0100

We are pleased to announce the release of Print Distributor 5.2.

This release contains a number of new features including:

Improved performance, if you are writing very large print files then the performance has been improved significantly.
Installer and un-installer performance is improved along with the reliability.
The log window now supports hyper-links and highlighting. You can now click on a write file entry in the log and as long as Windows has a file association the document is opened automatically.
Virtual printers now have a context menu that lets you set the printer properties, configure the default settings, edit the printer, delete the printer and print a test page.
Test pages now produce the Windows default page instead of the simple text test.
Adding and changing virtual printers is now transactional, if the operation fails for some reason any previous changes are automatically rolled back.
Driver information is now passed through to actions when they are created and configured, this has allowed us to introduce a number of usability improvements.

As well as the new features there are a number of bug fixes and general enhancements.

Print Distributor 5.2 is a free upgrade for 5.0 and 5.1 owners. 3.xx and 4.xx users can upgrade at www.frogmorecs.com/upgrades

A free trial of Print Distributor 5.2 can be downloaded from www.frogmorecs.com/upgrades

Mail Print Release

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 00:00:05 +0100

We have just released an update to Mail Print, build 3031. This release fixes a number of minor bugs and includes an update to the PDF printing library. It can be downloaded from http://www.frogmorecs.com/content/downloads and is a free update for version 3.0 users.

Print Distributor 5.2 Beta 2

Thu, 04 Aug 2011 09:54:43 +0100

We have just uploaded the second beta of Print Distributor, this fixes a number of minor bugs in the first beta. It can be downloaded from http://www.frogmorecs.com/content/legacydownloads

We are still expecting the final release towards the end of August, that is assuming no major problems are uncovered during the beta test.

Print Distributor 5.2 Beta

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 11:16:00 +0100

We are pleased to announce the first beta release of Print Distributor 5.2.

This release is largely focused on usability improvements and performance, including:

A new rich log view now has clickable links to files you have written.
The Write File action is much faster for large files.
The Send Mail action now supports secure SMTP including GMail and Google Apps for Domains.
Virtual printers now have a context menu, right click to get easy access to edit, delete and test printer as well as setting document defaults and printer settings.
Test print page now uses Windows default printer test page.

There are also a number of bug fixes detailed in the readme file.

The beta version can be downloaded from http://www.frogmorecs.com/content/legacydownloads

This version will be a free upgrade for version 5.0 and 5.1 customers, an upgrade is available for version 3.xx and 4.xx customers. The final release date is dependent on the beta test feedback but should be towards the end of August.

Print Distributor and Mail Print Coupon

Sun, 03 Jul 2011 14:25:00 +0100

Use the coupon code EVERYONE to apply a 5% discount to any online order for Mail Print or Print Distributor.

Why are we doing this? Well not surprisingly, when people see a field in our order page to apply a coupon, they search Google for a coupon code.

The problem is there are a number of affiliate web sites that optimise their pages for search terms like “Print Distributor Coupon” or “Mail Print Coupon”. These sites offer a discount that isn’t available, if you click on their discount link they really set an affiliate cookie at our e-commerce partner, Plimus. This doesn’t work for them as we don’t use affiliates but that doesn’t stop their spammy sites appearing in Google.

So hopefully, given some time, this post will appear above them in the search rankings and your surfing can remain clean and wholesome.

XPS Support for Print Distributor

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 10:16:00 +0100

We have just released an XPS passthrough printer driver for Print Distributor.

The driver allows you to create a virtual printer that saves XPS files directly to file without any user intervention making it ideal for server based applications.

The driver is compatible with most of the Print Distributor actions* and is compatible with Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008 and Windows 7. Both 32 and 64 bit platforms are supported.

The driver can be downloaded from http://www.frogmorecs.com/download/setup-xps-passthrough.exe and is free of charge.

Further details are available at http://www.frogmorecs.com/xps

* Currently the driver does not work with the Accumulate action. The Reprint action requires an XPS compatible printer.

Mail Print 3.0 Release

Wed, 04 May 2011 09:19:00 +0100

Mail Print 3 is now available for download and purchase.

This is a major release and includes a number of new features over version 2.4.

We have split the mail queue into two different types, one for IMAP and another for POP3. This has allowed us to add new actions that are specific to IMAP. It also makes it easier for us to support different queue types in future releases.

IMAP email accounts support multiple mailboxes, these are usually displayed as folders in your mail client. You can now specify which mailbox Mail Print monitors for new messages. There is also a new action that moves messages to a different mailbox. A good use of this would be to move processed messages to a completed folder after all the other actions have run.

The new Forward Message action lets you reply to and forward messages, ideal for receipt confirmations.

Previously there were two editions of Mail Print, standard and professional. Nearly everyone purchased the professional version so we have decided to drop the distinction. There is now only one edition of Mail Print.

Mail Print 3 runs on Windows XP, Vista, 7 and Server 2003 and 2008.

There are also a number of bug fixes and performance enhancements.

The free 30 day trial of Mail Print can be downloaded from www.frogmorecs.com/content/downloads

The upgrade is free for customers who purchased on or after 1st April 2011, customers who purchased before then can upgrade for 50% of the full price.

Mail Print 3.0 Test Release

Fri, 01 Apr 2011 08:26:53 +0100

The beta test release of Mail Print 3 is now available for download. There are a number of new features as well as changes under the covers to allow more code sharing with Print Distributor.

The new features include:

Different queue types, when you create a new queue you select whether you want an IMAP or POP3 queue. Selecting IMAP adds extra options and actions. This also allows us to add new queue types in the future.
New Forward action forwards or replies to messages.
The templating system has been extended with new variables and filters to support the Forward action.
You can now specify which mailbox you want to monitor for IMAP queues.
New Move Message action lets you move messages to another mailbox. This is ideal if you want to save messages after they have been printed but don’t want your inbox overflowing.
PDF printing has been improved.
Password storage uses a more secure mechanism.
We will be scraping the standard and professional versions, the final release will have just one version.
There are also a number of small bug fixes.

You can download the beta release from here.

Print Routing based on the day of the week

Mon, 17 Jan 2011 15:27:00 +0000

When I added support for conditional actions in Print Distributor I thought most customers would want to test on the size of the document and maybe the document name. I was quite wrong, you have been finding all sorts of interesting applications for conditions.

To set a condition on an Action select the action then click on the Condition button. A window will open that lets you enter an new expression or remove an existing expression. These expressions are tested before the action is run.

The expressions are based on VBScript, you can enter boolean values (true or false), tests (<, <=, <>, >, >=, =) and even call functions such as InStr to search for a string. All the document information is available including fields like UserName and DocumentName.

One request we have seen regularly comes from large restaurants, many of them will close down part of their kitchen in quiet periods. What they want is to route their customers orders to different printers during those quiet periods.

The logic is something like this:

Virtual Printer 1:

Print to physical printer 1

Virtual Printer 2:

If is weekend then print to physical printer 2

If is weekday then print to physical printer 1

The first printer should be straight forward, lets look at how we setup the second virtual printer with the conditions. The first stage is to create our virtual printer and add two Reprint actions, one pointing to printer 1, the second to printer 2.

Select the first action then click on the condition button and enter the expression:

WeekDay(PrintDate) = 1 Or WeekDay(PrintDate) = 7

The PrintDate field contains the date the print was generated and the WeekDay function extracts the day of the week from the date. The result of WeekDay is a number from 1 to 7 corresponding to the days Sunday to Saturday. This example is going to be true for weekends.

Next we need to add the opposite expression to the second action:

WeekDay(PrintDate) <> 1 And WeekDay(PrintDate) <> 7

You should end up with your actions looking like this:

The help file contains details on all the fields and functions available, if you get stuck then send us a message and we will happily walk you through the process.

Supported versions

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 10:55:00 +0000

We have had a few questions about how long we support our software for so I thought I would clarify the policy.

The policy is to support the current version and the previous two major versions. Right now the current version of Print Distributor is 5.1 so this means we will support any 5.xx version and 3.xx and 4.xx versions but not any 2.xx versions.

So what does it mean to support a version? We will provide advice and guidance, test any issues you report and fix bugs. Once a version is no longer supported it doesn’t mean it will stop working, just that we will not do any further work on it.

Our operating system support is tied to Microsoft, so as long as Microsoft is supporting a version of Windows we will continue to test and support it in our products. Once Microsoft has declared the end of life of a Windows version then we will do the same in the next major release. For instance earlier this year Microsoft stopped supporting Windows 2000 so the next major release of Print Distributor will also drop support for Windows 2000.

Should you keep up to date with the current release? You don’t have to but you will probably find it easier to upgrade when new versions are released rather than wait until you are forced to.

Minor upgrades are free of charge (ie from 5.0 to 5.1), major upgrades (i.e. from 4.3 to 5.0) are available at 50% of the full product price.

Print Distributor XPS Support - Beta Release

Thu, 18 Nov 2010 13:00:34 +0000

We are getting close to launching XPS support for Print Distributor. This installs as a passthrough printer driver allowing you to save your documents directly to an XPS file.

If you would like to join the beta program send us an email.

A print server with 4,000 printers installed

Fri, 15 Oct 2010 13:01:00 +0100

We get quite a few questions about scaling Print Distributor, usually asking how many printers or users it will support. Recently one prospective customer told me they wanted to setup 3,500 printers on a single server. Although there are no inherent limits in Print Distributor I thought it would be a useful exercise to setup a server with a huge number of printers.

Obviously I didn’t want to manually configure so many devices, fortunately Print Distributor 5 has a backup and restore capability which I could use. I created a simple application with a single virtual printer and wrote a Ruby script to expand that out to 4000 printers, I used the names of the top 4,000 US cities by population for the printer names.

The first restore started well but seemed to slow up for every new printer added, we made a small adjustment to the restore code and all was well. It took Print Distributor about an hour to create all the printers. The application is pretty simple, it just sends a print job from one printer to the next until it has worked around the whole group.

There are still questions for customers with such a large number of printers, particularly in terms of scaling. The print server writes spool files to disk, sometimes these files can be large. What I am happy about is Print Distributor is able to cope with such a large configuration without difficulty.

Generic PCL and PostScript Printer Drivers

Mon, 27 Sep 2010 11:45:51 +0100

I was just browsing through the list of printer drivers on Windows 7, as you do, when I noticed it now contains generic PCL and PostScript drivers. If you select HP in the manufacturer field then there are options for the HP LaserJet Family Driver PCL5 and HP LaserJet Family Driver PS. The PCL5 driver looks like it is PCL5e with a full range of paper trays, finishing options and paper sizes, I haven’t tried the PostScript yet but I suspect it is the same.

We often get asked which driver to use with Print Distributor when customers have a mixed printer environment, these two drivers look like good generic PCL and PostScript options.

Setting up Print Distributor with many printers

Tue, 17 Aug 2010 14:08:00 +0100

One of the tasks that used to be rather unwieldy in Print Distributor was setting up multiple virtual printers with each printer pointing to a physical printer. This is quite a common requirement for customers who need to archive everything that goes through a print server. With version 5.1 we have introduced global actions which make the task easier.

Typically you would configure and test the physical printers first, in this case we will name them _Paris, _London and _Madrid. These printers aren’t shared, they will only be printed to by Print Distributor.

Now we can define our virtual printers in Print Distributor, this time labelling them Paris, London and Madrid. We won’t add any actions to the printers at this stage. These printers will be shared and will be what the end user prints to.

Finally using the Tools->Global Actions->Before Actions we can add our actions. We can’t use the standard RePrint action as it won’t expand variables (yet) so we will handle the reprint using the Script action, just add a Script action and paste in the following code:

RePrint PrintFilePath, "_" & PrinterName, DocumentName

You can add any other actions you need to run for every printer such as Write File to save an archive of the raw file or Distiller to write a PDF.

The order of processing is:

Run global before actions
Run printers own actions
Run global after actions

Hopefully this should save you a lot of work if you have many printers on your print server.

Payment types

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 13:25:33 +0100

Since we started selling software products online we have directed all our sales through an e-commerce company, starting with SWReg then as we needed a more professional store switching to Plimus. This has worked well for us, Plimus handle the main payment types like credit cards or PayPal as well as direct wire transfers and cheque payments.

Unfortunately, as Plimus have grown they seem less able to support wire transfers, cheques and purchase orders well so we have decided to start handling those directly.

There is quite a bit of work for us to do on our web site to integrate this into our systems, while this is going on if you need to raise an order directly with us feel free to contact support for a quote and payment instructions.

Print Distributor 5.1 Release

Tue, 22 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Print Distributor 5.1 has been released.

New features in version 5.1 include:

The new Failover action lets you target one printer and failover if it is unavailable or offline.

Global actions run before and after an individual printers actions make configuring Print Distributor much easier if you have many printers.

The Run Program action lets you pipe stdout and stderr to the log, this makes it much easier to diagnose problems.

There are also many small cosmetic changes and bug fixes.

The trial can be downloaded from http://www.printdistributor.com/content/download

Version 5.0 customers can upgrade for free, upgrades are available for purchase for version 3.xx and 4.xx customers.

Site and Enterprise licenses

Thu, 20 May 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Frogmore Computer Services Ltd are pleased to announce the availability of Site and Enterprise licenses for Print Distributor 5.

Until recently Print Distributor had to be licensed per machine, with different licenses for workstations and servers. These licenses are still available for smaller sites, for larger customers they are joined by Site and Enterprise licenses.

A Site license covers installation on as many workstations and servers as you need at a single address.

The Enterprise license covers installation on as many workstations and servers as you need within a single organisation and any wholly owned subsidiaries.

The Site license is available for $3995 USD, €3195 EUR or £2995 GBP.

The Enterprise license is available for $7995 USD, €6395 EUR or £5995 GBP.

Print Distributor 5.0 Release

Mon, 05 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Print Distributor 5 has been released.

New features in version 5 include:

The new RunAs action allows you to run actions under the context of another user. This means you can save files on remote servers and print to remote print servers without changing the service account.

Live logging shows you logs on the server as they happen making debugging easier, this is particularly useful if you are writing scripts using the script action.

We have dropped the trial wrapper software we were using in previous versions and replaced it with our own less aggressive code. This will make Print distributor more robust and keycode entry easier.

The Tools menu now has backup and restore items to help with migrating projects to new machines.

There are also many small cosmetic changes and bug fixes.

The trial can be downloaded from http://www.printdistributor.com/content/download

Upgrades are available for version 3.xx and 4.xx customers. If you have a current software assurance agreement then you will receive your new key codes in the next week or so.