We get a few “can PaperCut….” emails each week, most are simple to answer but some are a little quirky. Below you will find the pick of the week!

I want to give unlimited Black&White print/copy job(but still deducted from the account for reporting) and limit the colour jobs with a quota.

This is fairly easy to do using the advanced charging tab on the printer configuration, and setting the grey scale discount to 100%. That makes every black and white job discount the entire cost of the job, and does not deduct from the users quota. Colour jobs will still be charged at the full price, as it is configured in the printer configuration.

Colour copies versus black and white copies should work the same way, although it may not show before the copy job is completed, depending on the copier manufacturer. Because PaperCut doesn’t have complete information until the entire copy job is completed the cost may not be appropriately updated until the job is completed and processed.

How well does PaperCut work on Novell?

Good question, I think this video says it all. I wonder if the guy who won the server was upset about having to take it on a plane home

I am running PaperCut MF on a Sharp MFD, if I do not have any pending print jobs can I skip straight to the copy function?

11.6 should allow the print release screen to be skipped if the user has no jobs pending. This will not be on by default.

I want SSO (Single Sign On) between my embedded apps – Can you help?

Yeah SSO would be nice, often used with scanning applications like Drivve, Scan2Oneself and GlobalScan. Currently SSO works fine on the Sharp OSA platform but other platforms are a little trickier. If you need SSO let us know.

Does PaperCut work with ***Insert Name of Online Payment Provider***?

The full list of supported payment gateways is available on the PaperCut website here.
If the service you use is not listed then there are options to integrate using the PaperCut web services API if the provider is interested, further details are available here. The last few weeks we have had a lot of emails about ParentPay, we suggest you discuss this with ParentPay, PaperCut have provided all the tools a payment provider needs.

Does PaperCut run on NetWare?

Nope sorry – NetWare is old! Organizations that are currently running NetWare are however able to easily deploy PaperCut. We suggest setting up a separate OES Linux server (or VM) and use this to host the print queues and PaperCut. That way the impact is minimal as your file and directory services can remain on your existing server, and it’s just the print queues that move across to the new OES Linux system.

I have Riso Machines can PaperCut track “copy jobs” ?

Riso have been working hard to get a Copicode IP working with their hardware. This solution should be ready to roll out by the end of the year.

I am having copy count issues with my Lexmark X792 and X954 running PaperCut embedded.

Duplex and large copy jobs do not seem to work as intended- Lexmark have released new firmware to fix this. Contact Lexmark for a fix.

Another load of questions from this week’s emails.

What is the difference between Xerox JBA and Xerox Secure Access?

It’s easier to say what XSA can do over JBA:

• The Ability to use network card readers (fast release)  for authentication at the device
• Improved user login workflow and messages

As time goes on Xerox will (hopefully) improve the SDK so we can make it as feature rich as our other solutions.

What languages are available on the Xerox Secure Access solution?

At this time it is only available in English, the XSA solution has some issues with character sets (even the Euro can upset it). Hopefully Xerox will make changes to the SDK (please!)

I have a HP machine running OXPd can I install PaperCut?

Nope sorry. OXPd just isn’t up to the task, OXPd is a lightweight framework for very basic data collection. It doesn’t offer the feature set PaperCut need to do authentication, access control, copy tracking, etc, etc.

I have a HP machine running the new embedded platform called “Jedi”, when will PaperCut have an embedded solution?

It takes time to develop, test and release an embedded app. Expect a HP Jedi application in early 2012.

I want to run Doc Q Manager from ATI and PaperCut together – Any tips?

The DQM integration was all done by ATI so they are the best people to ask. Our only advice is never ever install DQM and PaperCut on the same machine they both use the spool file and it will only upset both systems.

If I delete a user in AD and tell PaperCut to remove deleted users from PaperCut what happens to that users history?

Don’t worry, that users print history is still lurking around for reporting etc. The information is left for historical reasons, but you can’t change settings for that user from the Users tab. It doesn’t count against the license, and will not even show in a report if the time period is after the time that they were deleted. You can go and find the user again by looking through shared account job logs or printer job logs and then clicking the users name.

I have a Canon machine, can I have PaperCut embedded installed?

We’d love to be able to develop for the Canon platform, we get a fair few emails/calls about it each week but unfortunately Canon will not grant PaperCut permission develop a MEAP solution. We hope in time they will be allowed to create an app as currently people with Canon machines and PaperCut are missing out. We strongly encourage any Canon customers or resellers to request permission on PaperCut’s behalf.

I installed a Copicode IP and need to change the RS232 reader to output in Decimal.

Go to the devices tab in PaperCut, select the Copicode and choose the config editor option. Look for the “ext-device.vendor.reader-type” and change this value to 5.

 Just a month after the release of PaperCut version 10 we now have a new version to play with.

Version 10.1 brings us some great new features including advanced scriptting, custom printer fields, an update to the mac client and new reports.

The biggest news here is the Advanced scripting feature. Your script can do a whole host of things including checking details of the job and influencing what happens to it. Some examples:

• Displaying a pop-up message if a user forgets to select duplex on large jobs.
• Showing statistics on the environmental impact on large jobs via a fancy popup dialog.
• Prompting the user to confirm large jobs before printing.
• Automatically routing large jobs to more efficient high volume printers.

Plus those of you using a Copicode IP can now allow users to associate a new card with their PaperCut account or replace their existing card (I know some of you have been waiting for that)

You can find the newest download links on our product demo pages.

25 February 2010 – PaperCut MF 10.1 (Build 9802) New features:  

Enhancements:  

• CSV reports with date and time representations will now be automatically recognized by popular spreadsheet applications.
• Support for monitoring locally attached printers on Novell networks. Remote queues mapped via IPP are now ignored so only locally attached printers are detected.
• The “Microsoft Office Document Image Writer” virtual printer is ignored by default on secondary server installs.
• Improved documentation on how to set up PaperCut in a Novell cluster.
• Improved the PDF version of the user manual – smaller font, less paper! (But you weren’t going to print it, were you?)
• Improved error message when server-command is attempted to be run with non-elevated privileges under UAC on Windows 2008/Vista.

Fixes:  

• Fixed issue where the user client may in some situations consume excessive CPU if the –minimized option was turned on.
• Fixed a problem in Web Print where PDF files produced by OpenOffice may timeout with unknown error.
• Eliminated the “stale session” error that may have occurred when administrators attempted to log in using Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Printer compatibility improvements:  

Copier / Device Integration:  

Did you know the Copicode IP can be configured as a Print Release only terminal?

The default behaviour then becomes:

• A user sends their job or jobs to the Find Me or any printer set up as a hold release queue.
• The user then authenticates at the Copicode-IP (usually with a swipe reader or proximity card)
• All print jobs are then released and the Copicode-IP display returns to the Logon Screen.

This mode is useful if you only require the print release function and ideally suited to swipe or prox release environments.

Got a Copicode IP and want to test it out? then select mode 6 when installing.

Any questions just ask.