Classroom Queue in Papercut MF
We've recently switched from Ringdale FollowMe to PaperCut MF and I wanted to bring over our classroom queues. Unfortunately the supplier said this couldn't be done, so I did some experimenting and worked out how myself. The idea behind the classroom queue is that a second printer is listed on each PC in the room, so for room 10 the PCs would all show the "PaperCut" printer and also "Room 10". Print to PaperCut and you use your personal code to release, print to Room 10 and you use the room code. This way a class of 24 pupils can all print their work to the Room 10 queue, then the teacher (or a single pupil) can go and release all 24 documents in one go. Loads quicker than a queue forming at the device. To do this I did the following:
function printJobHook(inputs, actions) {
actions.job.changeDocumentName("[" + inputs.job.username + "] " + inputs.job.documentName);
actions.job.changeUser("queue10user");
}
- Create a new printer in Windows Printer Management on the server, creating a new Local Port for this (called queue10). I picked the same driver as the main PaperCut queue for this (we use Sharp MX6050 copiers).
- Share the printer and set the document defaults (I set mine to default to Mono, and double sided printing)
- Log into PaperCut, edit the printer which should have appeared and change it's type to Virtual. Scroll down and tick the devices you want this queue to forward jobs to, and tick the hold/release jobs option.
- Click on the Script tab and add the following:
This will prefix the job name with the username who submitted it, and move it into the classroom queue. - Create a user for this new queue (either a local PaperCut user or an AD account, I did mine in AD) with the same name that was used in the above script (queue10user). Set its release code to whatever you want the class queue to use.
- Now go into each of the physical copiers under the Device menu, and scroll down to the section listing virtual queues. Tick the virtual queues you want to work on the device.
- Now add the printer to your computers using your usual printer deployment method. People should now be able to print to the new queue and release everything with the classroom code.
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