Passthrough printers are associated with printer devices that can print jobs in many different formats, for example, PCL, PostScript, and PDF.
Jobs assigned to Passthrough printers do not have job tickets. TotalFlow Production Manager workflows that are associated with Passthrough printers can receive these jobs in a hot folder or from a print command that uses the LPD protocol. Passthrough printers cannot report job status.
To create a Passthrough printer:
1. Log in to TotalFlow Production Manager as an administrator.
2. In the menu bar, click [Operations].
3. In the objects pod on la left, click [Printers].
4. Do either of these:
• To create a new passthrough printer, 1. Click [New], then select [Passthrough...].
You see the [Create Passthrough Printer] dialog:
• To copy an existing printer, 1. Right-click it in the [Printers] tab.
2. Select [Copy...].
3
You see the [Copy Printer] dialog.
The new printer will have the same property values as the selected printer (except the [Name]).
5. On each page of the dialog, enter or select values for the required and optional properties to match your environment.
Click the page names in the navigation bar to change pages.
1. On the [General] page, the value of the [Command] property depends on the print commands that are available on your system.
• For information about the Windows lpr command, open a [Command Prompt] window and enterlpr ?
• Use the host name or IP address of the printer as the value of the server option of the command.
For example, the Windows lpr command uses the option -Sprinterto specify the server that provides LPD services. In the case of a passthrough printer, this is the printer itself.
• Use the name of the print queue as the value of the printer option of the command.
For example, the Windows lpr command uses the option -Pprinterto specify the printer or print queue where it sends the print file. A typical name for the print queue on a passthrough printer isPASS.
• Use the name of the company department as the value of the department option of the command.
For example, the Windows lpr command uses the option -Jdepartmentto specify the administrative entity that is responsible for the print jobs.
• Use the getFileName or getAbsoluteFileName method to specify the name of the print file.
•
1) For help with specifying file names in the [External command] property, see Specifying File Names in Symbol Notation, p. 307.
2) For help with specifying job attributes in the [External command] property, see Using Job Attributes Symbols in Commands, p. 308.
• Because Passthrough printers cannot automatically determine the values of job properties, you must pass them to the printer as options of the printer command.
2. To enable the printer to keep the state that was set before a restart, select [Keep printer state after restart].
3. On the [Scheduling] page, set the printer assignment properties.
4. On the [Backup] page select a [Backup printer] to be used instead, if the printer you are creating stops for any reason.
5. Then, select the [Recovery triggers], which are the conditions that trigger the recovery mode, and how long the printer should wait before going into recovery mode.
6. The default is that the printer prints separator sheets (banner pages) in the language that you selected when you installed the TotalFlow Production Manager server. To print separator
Creating Printers
3
sheets in a different language, set the [Messages language] property on the [Advanced]
page appropriately:
7. Set a value for the [Command for special instructions] property to enable the Passthrough printer to print a separator sheet with special instructions before the job.
Use the getOperInst method to specify the name of the special instruction file. For more information, seeSpecifying File Names in Symbol Notation, p. 307.
8. Under [SNMP], set the properties to the same values as the corresponding settings in the printer controller:
Printer Property EFI Fiery Printer Controller any one of the values in the list.
3
Printer Property EFI Fiery Printer Controller of this setting for the user specified by the
9. If you create more than one printer to represent the same printer device, specify the [TCP/IP address or host name] property the same way for each printer.
Creating Printers
3
10. On the [PS/PCL Data Replacement] page, set the replacement rules, according to your needs.
This function allows you to substitute or eliminate text from the PostScript or PCL files before processing the print job.
The input text can contain plain text or hexadecimal escape sequences, or any combination.
For example, a data replacement value can contain a hexadecimal escape sequence like this:\x1B, which is the character with hex code 1B (Escape).
The replace method searches a string for a specified value, or a regular expression, and returns a new string where the specified values are replaced. This method does not change the original string.
• In [Attach Before] field, click the the browse icon to enter the full path name of a previously saved file that contains text you want to add as header for the processed file.
• In [Attach After] field, click the the browse icon to enter the full path name of a previously saved file that contains text you want to add as footer for the processed file.
• In the [Replace Data (multi-line)] fields on the left, enter the strings to be replaced or removed.
• In the [Replace Data (multi-line)] fields on the right, enter the text that will replace the strings you entered at the previous step.
If the file you want to attach is not on the server, use the [Upload] button to upload it to TotalFlow Production Manager server.
6. Click [OK].
7. To use the new Passthrough printer, click , the enable button, next to it.
If the workflow associated with the passthrough printer contains the [Transform To PDF] activity, the PostScript or PCL file is transformed into PDF before the data replacement is done. The data replacement is done during the [Print] activity.