Printing Files

The desktop can print different types of files, as listed in Table 9-1.

Table 9-1 Types of Data That Can Be Printed (Initial Configuration)

Type of Data	Data Type Requirement	Description
Text file	File name ends with.txt	Text files containing ordinary (ASCII) text data
PostScript	File name ends with .ps, or content is recognized as PostScript data	PostScript files  (requires a PostScript printer)
PCL	File name ends with.pcl,or content is recognized as PCL data	Printer Control Language files  (requires a PCL printer)
Data	Contains text data	The default data type assigned to all files containing ASCII data that do not match other data types

If applications are installed on your system that create other types of files, your system administrator can add printing capabilities for them.

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Note -

Ensure that your destination printer is capable of printing PostScript^TM or PCL files before you try to print them.

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Submitting a File to a Printer

There are many ways to submit a file to a printer:

• Using the Front Panel

• Using File Manager

• Using Print Manager

• Using applications

To Print Using the Front Panel

1. Drag a single file or multiple files from File Manager to the Printer control in the Front Panel or to a Printer icon in the Personal Printers subpanel.

   The system then displays a Print dialog box for specifying print options. A Print dialog box appears for each file you drag to the Printer control.

   

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   Note -

   pscolor will not show on your system. It is only included as an example of a printer that has been added to a system.

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2. Optional. Use the text fields in the Print dialog box to set additional print options. (See "Setting Print Options Using the Print Dialog Box".)

3. Click OK in the Print dialog box to send the job to the printer.

To Print Using File Manager

1. Select the file in File Manager.

2. Choose Print from the Selected menu or the file's pop-up menu.

   The system displays a Print dialog box for specifying various print options.

3. Optional. Use the text fields in the Print dialog box to set additional print options. (See "Setting Print Options Using the Print Dialog Box".)

4. Click OK in the Print dialog box to send the job to the printer.

To Print Using Print Manager

1. Start Print Manager from the Personal Printers subpanel.

2. Drag a file from File Manager to a printer icon in Print Manager.

   In Print Manager, you can submit a document by dropping it on a printer icon or into the jobs list area to the right of a printer.

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   Note -

   If you submit a job to a printer that is down (flag is showing), it may never be printed even though it appears in the jobs list.

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   The system displays a Print dialog box for specifying various print options.

3. Optional. Use the text fields in the Print dialog box to set additional print options. (See "Setting Print Options Using the Print Dialog Box".)

4. Click OK in the Print dialog box to send the job to the printer.

Setting Print Options Using the Print Dialog Box

The desktop displays the Print dialog box when you print text, PCL, PostScript, and data files (see Table 9-1).

When application data files, such as word processor documents, are submitted for printing, they may display their own unique Print dialog boxes.

Use the Print dialog box to set these print options:

Printer	The destination for the print job. The text field initially displays the printer on which you dropped the data file. In this example, the document was dropped on a printer named lj4_n5.
Copies	The number of copies to print. The default is 1.
Banner Page Title	A title to appear on the banner page. The banner page is a sheet of paper that the printer prints before it prints the first page of your document.
Print Page Numbers	Prints page numbers on each page. If page numbering is selected, Print Manager will not display the true name of your document. Instead, the name in the jobs list will be STDIN:XXXXX, where XXXXX is a five-digit number.
Print Command Options	Other options that change the way printing is done. See the next section for more details on using this field.

Print Command Options

You can use the Print Command Options text field in the Print dialog box to set other print options. Type the proper lp command flag in the text field for the print option you want to use. To see a list of the lp command flags, type man lp in a Terminal window.

For example, one of the lp flags is -m. This flag tells the print server to send you a mail message that tells you when it is done printing your document. To use this flag you would type -m in the Print Command Options field of the Print dialog box. Then when your document is done printing, a message appears in your mailbox from the printer.