Printer management

Printer management

Any system dealing with some kind of business processing must offer the possibility of creating documents that can be used within the processes in runtime. Documents should of course be printable, but the system must also provide utilities for distributing documents in other ways such as previews (in the portal), e-mail, and writing to file. A document could, for instance, be a sales order confirmation, an invoice, a pick list, or any other document.

Using the document designer in Comflow Studio it is possible to create document artifacts to be used in a workspace workflow or ultimately in a process. These documents must, as mentioned, of course be possible for an end user to print. Enabling and controlling that printing is what this manual is all about.

The printer management in Comflow should be regarded as a printer management framework. The vast array of different printers and other environmental factors may bring that some environments might require somewhat customized solutions.

Enabling and controlling printing

It is important to separate the concept of enabling printers to run with Comflow from the concept of controlling those printers. Enabling printers is just a way to make the printers on the network function with Comflow. Controlling printers is making sure the print job is sent to the correct printer.

The runtime printer configuration (controlling printers) is not effected of which printer setup (enabling printers) that is chosen. The latter is only a way to be able to find and use the printers on the network while the former is all about associating the right print job to the right printer.

Options for enabling printing

There are a number of different ways to enable your printers to work with Comflow:

Table Printer setup options

How to enable printing is covered in chapter 5.2

Options for controlling printing

Controlling printing is mainly done in the runtime environment but a small part is configured in Comflow Studio (design time, described in chapter 5.2.4).

The different printer settings runtime tasks are used for controlling printing in runtime (i.e. to make sure that the right print job is associated to the right printer).

There are, as seen in Figure 234, six different runtime tasks to setup printer control:

Figure 234 Printer settings tasks

How to control printing in runtime is covered in chapter 5.

Task fields

All portlets has a number of fields with descriptive names. The table below is a complete listing of all those fields (except from printer specific fields). Use the list as reference when working with the printer setting tasks.

Task button options

All portlets has a number of buttons. The table below is a complete listing all those buttons. Use the list as reference when working with the printer setting tasks.

Task right click options

All portlets that are part of a task has a number of different options when doing a right click operation. The table below is a complete listing of all those options. Use the list as reference when working with the printer setting tasks

Print setup options

This chapter will cover the different ways of how to enable network printers to function with Comflow.

Enabling printing - Using Comflow IPP Server

UNIX, Linux and Mac OS X operating systems all use the Common UNIX Printing System (CUPS) as a portable printing layer to promote a standard printing solution. CUPS use the Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) as the bases for managing print jobs, queues and printer browsing.

Windows operating systems have their own printing system solution (also using IPP) but from a Comflow point of view this implementation is not fully satisfying and therefore we have created our own implementation of an IPP server which is to be installed on the Windows printer server. Comflow IPP server is also using the Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) to communicate with a printer or printer server.

Comflow IPP Server software installation and configuration

The Comflow IPP Server software is written in C# and can only execute in a Windows platform with .NET 2.0 and above.

1. Download and install .NET 2.x framework.

The IPP Server works best in conjunction with Ghost Script. GhostScript can be downloaded from http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/. Please note that Ghost Script might require a license agreement for commercial use!

Download and install GhostScript.

After obtaining the IPP Server software from Corzia, unpack the software in any folder. The software must be installed as a windows service which is done using a utility packed with the .net framework:

installutil.exe/i IPPServer.Net.Service.exe

Unpack Comflow IPP Server and install it as a service.

After installing the service some changes has to be done to a couple of configuration files before starting the server.

There are two configuration files; one controls the behavior of the server and the other controls the logging.

Alter the server configuration file as below:

The server configuration file is located in

Table 143 Server configuration file attributes

Alter the logging configuration file as below:

type="log4net.Appender.RollingFileAppender">

value="%-5p %d %5rms %-22.22c{1} %-18.18M - %m%n" />

Table 144 Logging configuration files attributes

No other attribute changes are necessary.

Updating sitedef.xml with IPP Server location

In order to establish a connection between Comflow runtime server and Comflow IPP Server a printer entry has to be added to the sitedef.xml (preferably enclosed between and

class="net.comactivity.core.print.cups.CupsPrinterHandler">

The IP address and listener port of the Comflow IPP Server must be specified!

Table 145 IPP Server configuration

Enabling printing - Using site print setup

It is possible to define available printers in the sitedef.xml and then use either LPR, FRP, IPP or JAVA protocol to send print jobs to the printers on the network.

Updating sitedef.xml with site printers

Below is an example of a site printer setup in the sitedef.xml. The entry is preferably enclosed between and

entryType="override"/>

entryType="override"/>

Enabling printing - Using LDAP print setup

With a LDAP print setup, LDAP is used to access an LDAP directory service (in this example an AD) containing printer information.

In the example below a printer entry supporting an LDAP print setup has been added to the sitedef.xml. The print setup entry should, as in the example, preferably be enclosed between and

class="net.comactivity.core.print.ldap.LdapPrinterHandler">

Enabling printing – Using JAVA print setup

Using a JAVA print setup all printers that are installed on the server running the Comflow runtime environment will be available for the end user.

In the example below a printer entry supporting a JAVA print setup has been added to the sitedef.xml. The print setup entry should, as in the example, preferably be enclosed between and

class="net.comactivity.core.print.java.JavaPrinterHandler"

Printer management in Comflow Studio

In the Introduction chapter we discussed the difference between enabling and controlling printing.

Enabling printers is just a way to make the printers on the network function with Comflow. Controlling printers is making sure the print job is sent to the correct printer.

Printer control management is performed in both Comflow Studio (design time) and, mainly, Comflow runtime environment (see chapter 5 ).

This chapter will deal with printer control management in design time.

Show targets property

Documents created in Comflow Studio can be distributed as previews (in the portal), e-mail, writing to file or, which is the scope of this manual, as printable objects. All these different so called targets are associated to a document activity.

Figure 235 Document activity

Here we only deal with the printer target.

Figure 236 Document activity with an associated print target

One very important property for the document activity is the Show Targets property as seen in Figure 237:

Figure 237 The show targets property

When the show targets property is set to “Yes” the end user, in the runtime browser GUI, will (as shown in Figure 238) be able to:

Select which kind of target to use (print, e-mail, file or preview)

Select which of the available printers to use (if choosing printer target)

Figure 238 End user possibility to choose both target and printer

When the show targets property is set to “No”, the print job will immediately be sent to the associated printer as described in chapter 5.

Note!! In two cases the show target property can be set to “Yes” without the end user being able to change printer. These two exceptions are exemplified in chapter 6.1.4 (“show dialog” check box) and in chapter 6.4.1 (property “Locked for users”).

Working with printer aliases in Comflow Studio

Having enabled network printers to function with Comflow as described in chapter 5.2 we can now look at how to configure printer settings in Comflow Studio with the use of printer aliases.

Documents are created with the document designer. These documents are associated to a document activity in a workspace workflow. A printer alias is associated to a specific print target (which is exemplified below).

1. Right click your document activity and choose “Add Target” as below:

Figure 239 Add Target to document portlet

Highlight the printer icon and choose the designer properties tab as in Figure 240.

Figure 240 Print target properties

Select the print tabbed property and press the Select printer alias button as below:

Figure 241 Adding a printer alias I

Press the New printer alias button as in Figure 242

Figure 242 Adding a printer alias II

Enter a printer alias resource name and press OK.

Figure 243 Adding a printer alias III

Select the created printer alias and press OK as below:

Figure 244 Adding a printer alias IV

The created printer alias will now be associated to the document portlet as seen in Figure 245

Figure 245 Printer alias associated to document portlet

Also; a new folder called PrinterAlias will now have been added to the project where the workspace workflow is located (see Figure 246)!

Figure 246 Printer alias folder automatically added to the project

Finally do a deploy action of your printer alias.

To associate your created printer alias to a physical printer see chapter 6.5 below!

Printer management in Comflow runtime environment

When network printers have been enabled to function with Comflow (as described in chapter 5.2) the runtime printer management work can be started.

A document should always be associated with a document activity in a workspace workflow. The document activity can have different targets (preview, file, email and print). If the target is of type print the document must in some way get associated with a physical printer on the network. This printer association can be achieved in a number of different ways. In chapter 5.3.2 we have seen how to create printer aliases in design time. Printer aliases are associated with physical printers using the runtime GUI. Apart from printer alias handling there are many other ways to associate a document to a printer (also configured in the runtime environment). This chapter is all about different ways of how to associate a document (send a print job) to a physical printer.

The four following artifacts (levels) can decide to which physical printer a print job should be sent:

A printer alias can decide which printer should be used (Printer Alias System Level).

A specific document can decide which printer should be used (System Level).

A specific task, i.e. when a document is part of a specific task, can decide which printer should be used. (Task Level).

A specific user, i.e. which user is actually running the printer job, can decide which printer should be used (User Level or User Level Admin).

All tasks associated with runtime printer management are located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown in Figure 247.

Figure 247 The Printer Settings folder

Table 146 Runtime printer management tasks overview

When a document (configured as being a print target) is interpreted in a running workspace workflow an evaluation of which printer should be used for printing the document is performed. This evaluation order is very important to know when configuring printer settings regarding which printer should be used for a specific printer alias/document/task/user.

The evaluation order is performed in nine steps. When an evaluation is evaluated as true no further evaluations are performed.

From Table 147 below you can see that the first four evaluations performed all are on user level i.e. the first check performed when interpreting a document in a workspace workflow (and which printer the print job should be sent to) is to evaluate if the logged in user requesting the print job has any printer settings configured. This user level evaluation is performed on four different levels where the absolute first check is to evaluate whether the specific user is associated to a specific document inside a specific task. If this does not evaluate true then the second evaluation on user level is performed. The second evaluation is a check of if the logged in user is associated to a specific task. Let’s suppose that the second evaluation evaluates true i.e. the document to be printed is part of a task to which the logged in user has a printer setting configured. In this case no further printer association evaluations are performed and the print job is sent to the physical printer defined using the Task/Printer tab in the User Level task in the context of the logged in user (evaluation rule number 2 in the table below).

Perhaps you don’t want to associate specific users to a physical printer? Instead you might want to have a physical printer associated to a specific task? That way all documents that are part of a specific task will be printed to the desired printer. For this you do your configuration using the Task Level as apparent from evaluation rules number 5 and 6 in Table 147.

Table 147 Printer association evaluation order

In the rest of this chapter all printer settings tasks will be described and all possible printer association combinations will be exemplified.

When studying the workings of the different printer settings tasks and their printer association combinations please always keep in mind the printer association evaluation order in Table 147!

User Level Admin

User Level Admin printer settings makes it possible to associate a specific user to a desired printer. It is also possible to associate a specific document, a specific task (or even both) in the context of that user to a desired printer.

The User Level Admin task and the User Level task (see chapter 6.2) are both dealing with the association of printers to users (on user level). User level is the first level that is evaluated when deciding which printer a print job should be sent to. Please see evaluation order in Table 147!

To work with user level admin printer settings first select the User Level Admin task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below

Figure 248 The User Level Admin task

This will take you to the User Level Admin main portlet as in Figure 249.

Figure 249 User level admin main portlet

Table 148 User level task main portlet fields

There are four different options when associating a printer to a user.

Table 149 Options when associating a printer to a user (user level printer association)

Below all the possible associations in Table 149 will be exemplified.

User/Printer association – By example

A user can be directly associated to a printer. To achieve that use this example.

In this example the user “comact” will be associated to a “HP CLJ 3700DN” printer

1. Select the desired user from the User drop down list (here “comact”) as in Figure 250.

Figure 250 Selecting user to be associated with specific printer

Press the “Add” button:

Figure 251 Adding printer to user/printer association

Select the desired printer (here the “HP” printer), complete the form and press “Add Printer” as below:

Figure 252 Confirming user/printer association

The user “comact” will now be associated with the “HP” printer. This means that all documents printed by the “comact” user will be sent to the “HP” printer if not overridden elsewhere (which is actually the case in chapter 6.1.4).

Figure 253 User/printer association overview.

The association can be deleted, viewed and updated using the buttons in Figure 253!

User/Document/Printer association – By example

A user can be associated to a printer in the context of a specific document.

In this example the user “MyUser” will be associated to a “HP CLJ 3700DN” printer when the document is of type “ItemDetailDocument”

1. Select the desired user from the User drop down list (here “MyUser”) and press the “Printer/Document” tab as in Figure 254.

Figure 254 Printer/Document tab

Press the ”Add” button as below:

Figure 255 Adding document to User/Document/Printer association

Press the “Choose Printer” button, select a printer from the drop down list (here the “HP” printer), complete the form and press the “Add printer” button as below:

Figure 256 Adding printer to User/Document/Printer association

Select the desired document (here “ItemDetailDocument” document) and press “OK” as in Figure 257.

Figure 257 Confirming User/Document/Printer association

The user “MyUser” is now associated to the “HP” printer when the document is of type “ItemDetailDocument”! This can be seen in Figure 258.

Figure 258 User/Document/Printer association overview

User/Task/Printer association – By example

A user can be associated to a printer in the context of a specific document residing in a specific task.

In this example the user “MyUser” will be associated to a “PS DriverPCL6” printer when the task is the “Solution task”. This means that the printer association made in chapter 6.1.2 will be overridden when “MyUser” prints a document (even if it’s an “ItemDetailDocument” document) if the task is the “Solution” task!

1. Select the desired user from the User drop down list (here “MyUser”) and press the “Task/Printer” tab as in Figure 259.

Figure 259 Task/Printer tab

Right click the desired task (here the “solution” task) and choose “Create” as below:

Figure 260 Choosing task for User/Task/Printer association

Press the “Add” button

Select the desired printer (here the “PS DriverPCL6” printer) from the drop down list, complete the form and press the “Add printer” button.

The user “MyUser” is now associated to the “PS DriverPCL6” printer when the task is the “solution” task. This setting overrides the setting done in chapter 6.1.2 so that the “PS DriverPCL6” printer will be used if the task is the “solution” task.

Figure 261 User/Task/Printer association overview

User/Task/Document/Printer association – By example

In chapter 6.1.1 we associated the “comact” user to the “HP” printer. In this example we will associate the same user to a “PS DriverPCL6” printer but now in the context of a specific document and task.

In this example the user “comact” will be associated to a “PS DriverPCL6” printer in the context of the “MyItems” task and the “ItemBrowseDocument” document. This means that when a document of type “ItemBrowseDocument” that is part of the “MyItems” task is printed by the “comact” user, the printer setting in chapter 6.1.1 will be overridden!

1. Select the desired user from the User drop down list (here “comact”)

Select the Task/Document/Printer tab as in Figure 262:

Figure 262 User/Task/Document/printer association tab

Right click the desired task (here “MyItems”) and press “Create” as in Figure 263

Figure 263 Choosing task for user/task/document/printer association

Press the “Add” button.

Figure 264 Adding document to user/task/document/printer association

Select the desired document from the drop down list (here “ItemBrowseDocument”) and press “ChoosePrinter” as below:

Figure 265 Choosing printer for user/task/document/printer association

Check or uncheck the “Show Dialog” check box. If “Show Dialog” is checked the user will be available to select any available printer from a list. If “Show Dialog” is unchecked the print job will immediately be sent to the printer used in the user/task/document/printer association.

Select the desired printer (here “PS DriverPCL6”), complete the form and press “OK” as below:

Figure 266 Confirming printer choice for user/task/document/printer association

Finally press the “OK” button as in Figure 267.

Figure 267 Confirming user/task/document/printer association

Now, as apparent from Figure 268, all print jobs performed by the user “comact” where the document type is “ItemBrowseDocument” and part of the task “MyItems” will be sent to the “PS DriverPCL6” printer.

Figure 268 User/task/document/printer association overview

User Level

User level printer settings works in almost the exact same way as User Level Admin printer settings described in chapter 6.1. The only difference is that in the User Level Admin task it was possible to choose the user to which the printer association should apply. When working with the User Level task it is not possible to choose a specific user. Instead the user can only be the logged in user i.e. the user that actually performs the task. This is apparent from Figure 269 where the user performing the task is “comact”.

Figure 269 User Level task main portlet

The User Level task and the User Level Admin task (see chapter 6.1) are both dealing with the association of printers to users (on user level). User level is the first level that is evaluated when deciding which printer a print job should be sent to. Please see evaluation order in Table 146!

To work with user level printer settings first select the User Level Admin task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below

Figure 270 The User Level task

Task level

Task level printer settings makes it possible to associate a specific task to a desired printer. It is also possible to associate a specific document in the context of that task to a desired printer. Please see evaluation order in Table 146!

To work with task level printer settings first select the Task Level task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below:

Figure 271 The Task Level task

This will take you to the Task Level main portlet as in Figure 272.

Figure 272 Task Level main portlet

Right clicking in the task level main portlet will give you the only possible task level administration action; create:

Figure 273 Possible task level administration actions

A right click Create action on a specific task will give you the possibility to either associate that task to a printer or to associate a specific document in that task to a printer. Both will be exemplified below.

Task/Printer association – By example

In this example the task “MyItems” will be associated to a “HP CLJ 3700DN” printer

1. Right click the desired task (here “MyItems”) and select Create

Figure 274 Right click – Create task/printer association

This will take you to the associate task/printer view as below:

Figure 275 Associate task to printer

Press the “Add” button as in Figure 275.

You will now be able to choose the printer that should be associated to the “MyItems” task.

Choose the desired printer (here the HP printer).

Complete the form with the desired settings and press “Add Printer” as in Figure 276

Figure 276 Confirm task/printer association

The “HP”printer will now be associated to the “MyItems” task. This means that all documents handled in that task will be printed on the “HP” printer unless overridden somewhere else!

From the figure below you can also see that the association can be deleted, viewed and updated.

Figure 277 Finalized task/printer association

Task/Document/Printer association – By example

In this example the document “ItemBrowseDocument” that exist in the task “MyItems” will be associated to a “PS DriverPCL6” printer. This means that the generic task/printer association created in chapter 6.3.1 will be overridden when the document to be printed is of type “ItemBrowseDocument” (in accordance with the evaluation order described in Table 146).

1. Right click the desired task (here “MyItems”) and select Create

Figure 278 Right click – Create task/document/printer association

This will take you to the associate task/printer view as below:

Figure 279 Task/printer association view

Choose the “Printer/Document” tab as in Figure 280.

Figure 280 Printer/Document tab

Press the “Add” button as below:

Figure 281 Adding a task/document/printer association

Press the “Choose Printer” button:

Figure 282 Chose printer for the task/document/printer association

Select the desired printer (here the PS DriverPCL6 printer), complete the form and press “Add Printer” as in Figure 283.

Figure 283 Confirm printer association

This will take you to a view where you can choose the desired document for the task/document/printer association. Here we will choose the document “ItemBrowseDocument”

Press the “OK” button:

Figure 284 Confirming task/document/printer association

The “PS PCL6”printer will now be associated to all documents of type “ItemBrowseDocument” that are within the “MyItems” task! This is visible in Figure 285.

Figure 285 Task/document/printer association overview

System Level

System level printer settings makes it possible to associate a specific document (created in Comflow Studio) to a desired printer.

To work with system level printer settings first select the System Level task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below:

Figure 286 The System Level task

This will take you to the System Level main portlet as in Figure 287.

Figure 287 System level main portlet

Right clicking in the system level main portlet will give you all possible system level task administration actions; view, associate printer, update and delete:

Figure 288 Possible system level task actions

Table 150 System level task main portlet fields

Table 151 System level main portlet button options

Associate a document to a printer – By example

In this example we will associate the document “ItemBrowseDocument” to a “HP CLJ 3700DN” printer.

1. To associate a document to a printer then right click the desired document and choose Associate Printer as below:

Figure 289 Right click – Associate Printer

The Associate Printer right click will take you to the Associate Printer portlet.

Figure 290 Associate printer detail portlet

Select a printer from the drop down list (here the HP printer).

This will take you to a configuration view as the one below:

Figure Printer configuration

Complete the form. Note that the fields in the table below vary depending on printer properties i.e. what kind of printer it is!

Table 152 Document to printer association portlet fields

Table 153 Document to printer association button options

Press OK.

This will take you back to the system level task main portlet:

Figure 292 Document associated to printer

As you can see in Figure 292 the document “ItemBrowseDocument” is now associated to the printer “HP CLJ 3700DN”. Such an association can be viewed, updated or deleted with a right click operation!

Printer Alias User Level

In chapter 5.2.4 a printer alias was created in design time (and associated to a document activity). Using the Printer Alias User Level task (or the Printer Alias System Level task in chapter 6.6) the created printer alias can be associated to a physical printer.

The Printer Alias User Level printer settings works in almost the exact same way as the Printer Alias System Level printer settings described in chapter 6.6. The only difference is that on Printer Alias User Level it is possible to choose the user to which the printer alias/printer association should apply. On Printer Alias System Level a printer alias is associated directly to a physical printer (not in the context of a user).

To work with printer aliases on user level in runtime first select the Printer Alias User Level task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below:

Figure 293 The Printer Alias User Level task

This will take you to the Printer Alias System Level main portlet as in Figure 294

Figure 294 Printer alias system level main portlet

Right clicking in the printer alias system level main portlet will give you all possible printer alias administration actions; view, associate printer, update and delete.

Figure 295 Possible printer alias administration actions

Table 154 Printer alias system level main portlet fields

Table 155 Printer alias system level main portlet button options

Associate a printer alias to a printer – By example

In this example we will associate the “MyStockholmPrinter1” printer alias to a “HP CLJ 3700DN” printer for the user “abe”.

1. Select the user “abe” from the user drop down list.

To associate a printer alias to a printer then right click the desired printer alias and choose Associate Printer as below:

Figure 296 Right click – Associate Printer

The Associate Printer right click will take you to the Associate Printer portlet.

Figure 297 Associate printer detail portlet

Select a printer from the drop down list (here the HP printer).

This will take you to a configuration view as the one below:

Figure Printer configuration

Complete the form. Note that the fields in the table below vary depending on printer properties i.e. what kind of printer it is!

Table 156 Printer alias/printer association portlet fields

Table 157 Printer alias/printer association button options

Press OK.

This will take you back to the printer alias system level main portlet.

Figure 299 Printer alias associated to printer

As you can see in Figure 299 the printer alias “MyStockholmPrinter1” is now (for the user “abe” associated to the printer “HP CLJ 3700DN”. Such an association can be viewed, updated or deleted with a right click operation!

Printer Alias System Level

The Printer Alias System Level printer settings works in almost the exact same way as the Printer Alias User Level printer settings described in chapter 6.5. The only difference is that on Printer Alias User Level it is possible to choose the user to which the printer alias/printer association should apply. On Printer Alias System Level a printer alias is associated directly to a physical printer (not in the context of a user). This level is the last of the printer association evaluations in Table 147 on page 204.

To work with printer aliases on system level in runtime first select the Printer Alias System Level task located in System Administration->Printer settings in the Navigator tree as shown below:

Figure 300 Printer Alias System Level task