Original post:
>Hello folks,
>Someone here came up with the idea of having more that one plotter pulling
out >print jobs from a given queue, in order to speed up printing (large
maps drawn >from Arc/Info). After looking around in the documentation from
DU's standard >print utilities, I could not find any information on how to
do this. Our >plotters use parallel-to-ethernet print servers, and are
configured in >/etc/printcap as remote (lpr) printers.
>Any hint, experience, or suggestion of a product that can achieve this
would >be appreciated. Thank you!
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This list will always astound me! I received a first answer a mere 20
minutes after posting the question. In all I got 3 answers, all different
and all interesting, from the following people I wish to thank:
Thomas Leitner <tom_at_finwds01.tu-graz.ac.at> suggests:
One simple idea comes to mind: Create a new queue with a filter script.
In the filter script, check which of the two plotter queues contains
the least number of entries and send the current data to this queue.
For creating a queue with a filter script, use this:
lpgs|ps:\
:af=/var/adm/lplog/lpgs.acct:\
:lf=/var/adm/lplog/lpgs.err:\
:lp=/dev/null:\
:sh:\
:of=/usr/local/bin/gsfilter.lpgs:\
:sd=/usr/spool/lpgs:
where /usr/local/bin/gsfilter.lpgs would the the filter script.
In the script do something like this:
#!/bin/sh
n1=`/usr/bin/lpq -P queue1 | /usr/bin/wc -l`
n2=`/usr/bin/lpq -P queue2 | /usr/bin/wc -l`
if [ $n1 -le $n2 ];
/usr/bin/lpr -P queue1 -x -h ;
else
/usr/bin/lpr -P queue2 -x -h ;
fi
Note: This is only an idea and untested.
Hope this helps // Tom
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Bruce Taube <Bruce.Taube_at_InfoAve.Net> answers:
I'm not sure if you can do this with lpr but with LAT you can define
multiple physical devices (plotters) to offer the same LAT service.
You can then set up the print queue to point to the LAT service instead of
just one specific plotter. LAT would connect to an available plotter.
To accomplish this, your enet-parallel device must support LAT. If not,
you could get a cheap decserver (100 or 200) and some serial-parallel
converters. I've also seen decservers that have parallel ports.
Good Luck,
Bruce Taube
Info Avenue Internet
----------------------------------------------
Matt White <whitem_at_bofh.usask.ca> points out:
You might want to look at LPRng (
http://www.astart.com/lprng/LPRng.html).
It is a replacement print spooler system that has many added capabilities,
one of which is to define a "pool" of printers for a single queue. It
runs nicely under DU (and a wide range of other systems as well).
---------------------------------------------------------------------
- Matt White whitem_at_arts.usask.ca -
- Network Technical Support
http://arts.usask.ca/~whitem -
- College of Arts & Science University of Saskatchewan -
---------------------------------------------------------------------
I got into work this morning early this afternoon
Well, my boss-man nudged me, said "Son I've got to talk to you"
- John Michael Montgomery..."Beer & Bones"
--
Charles Vachon -- Administrateur de système
Fonds de la réforme cadastrale du Québec
Ministère des Ressources Naturelles du Québec
cvachon_at_mrn.gouv.qc.ca
Received on Wed May 20 1998 - 16:01:38 NZST