Ranger Print Manager: Release Information

Ranger Print Manager v2.6

New Features:

A Recharge Voucher option has been added to allow students to purchase a voucher then update their own balance via the Windows or web clients.

Automatically delete print jobs remaining in the queue after a time period.

Disable the Close option in the Client.

Added options for the Payment Manager for those few customers still running it.

New reports and report options:

• Added a department usage by printers report.
• Added a Detail/Summary option to Department Printers report.
• Added a Detail/Summary option to 'Jobs per printer' report.
• Added a report option to filter out failed jobs.
• Added a date range to printer and copier usage graphs.

The Administration program has been updated to:

• Add extra columns to the print jobs lists to display colour and/or duplex status.
• Add Graph buttons to the User and Dept Print Jobs and Internet tabs.
• Extend the service account name that was previously limited to 20 characters.

Fix program access security that was denying access for all groups when both groups and users were defined.

Fix the extract print jobs option that sometimes failed to extract all jobs for all printers in the range.

Add /multi command line switch to allow multiple instances for terminal services.

Printing

• A new option has been added to require the user to confirm each job using the client.
• A new option has been added to delay the client popup until the job has been analysed so the full details and cost can be displayed before the user selects a department to charge or confirms printing of the job.
• The job cost is now shown in the notification for a failed job.
• All printers that spool in Windows standard EMF format are fully supported.
• Most GDI and host based printers are now supported provided they report their job attributes correctly to the Windows spooler.

Print jobs remaining in the queue after a set time period can be automatically deleted.

Modifications to support PCL6 version 3 used by the HP LaserJet 3500.

The number of printers supported per server has been increased from 60 to 1024 making it virtually unlimited for large schools and universities.

The service will start as many processes as necessary to monitor all printers. A consequence of this, however, is that the service must be restarted when new printers are added.

When the services start, any log files greater than 1MB are renamed to .old and a new log started.

4 new paper sizes can now be detected.

Clients

A new web client has been provided that allows users to perform an account inquiry, enter a recharge voucher, transfer funds between balances and change their copier PIN. This client replaces the previous separate balance inquiry and PIN change modules.

Administration and Client web pages have been improved with the addition of images from the new Images folder.

The windows client has been enhanced to provide inquiry, recharge voucher, PIN change and transfer functions.

The windows client now has a help file.

Added a web interface

Added a reference to describe the balance adjustment or receipt.

Added an option to inquire on a department from the web administration page.

Added a parameter to specify a department for inquiry. Gpbalcgi.exe?dept=mydept

New command line parameters:

fullname= and userid= for adding users
ref= for adjustments and receipts
/move to move users to another group
/export and file= to export users information to a csv file.
Extra columns have been added to the print jobs lists to display colour and/or duplex status.

Graph buttons have been added to the Printing and Internet tabs.

Fix problems where department codes being typed in were not being validated correctly.

When hiding the department list, codes had to be typed in uppercase.

Close all network connections when it is idle and check for a network connection before all database access. This is in response to users who unplug their laptop without closing the client or logging off.

Miscellaneous Bug fixes

• Modifications to support PCL6 version 3 used by the HP LaserJet 3500.
• Modifications to allow the release station to operate with the dual queue monitoring method.
• Modifications to continuously retry when client communications are interrupted.
• The command line interface sometimes reported errors when updating balances during busy Internet charging periods.
• Fixed web balance inquiry and reports.
• Improved print and copier reports, copier PIN extended to 8 digits, cosmetic screen changes, another paper size.
• Fixed printing to HP2100 (Postscript) from Macromedia Freehand and checking of ISA 2004 log files.
• Added paper size detection for Kyocera and others using non-standard PCL6 paper sizes.
• Fixed existing jobs in queue being deleted when the print service starts.
• Fixed the /move command line parameter.
• Fixed the User Name Summary report when selecting by balance.
• Fixed deleting of Printed jobs.
• Detection of multiple copies in Office 2000 on Windows XP SP1. SP2 does not have the problem.
• Spurious logging of Send Message error 123 in the Print and/or Net logs.
• Release Station: Entering of license, monitoring of jobs and removed spurious error message.
• Paging for the Department Transactions per User summary report.
• An issue that could cause all print jobs to pause if the service encountered a malformed EMF spool file.
• Fixed the currency symbol on the printed receipt.
• Modifications to continuously retry when client communications are interrupted.
• Fixed charging to user when the printer was set for no charging but the page cost table contained charges.
• Fixed costs on department charging transactions when the default printercharge was set to zero.
• Jobs were charged but remained in the queue when using the monitored/output monitoring method.
• Page size and colour detection was not correct for some PCL5 drivers.
• Charging was unreliable for the monitored/output monitoring method under Windows 2003.
• N-up printing for EMF spooling when the n-up was set in printer properties instead of the application was not always detected.
• New users were being added to the database regardless of the "Auto Add" option.