SUMMARY: More on printer accounting

From: Phong Co (phaedrus%triples@Triples.Math.McGill.CA)
Date: Fri May 28 1993 - 17:59:25 CDT


I sent a [short] summary awhile back asking about printer account. After
that a couple more suggestions came in.

My original question:
We have a small network of Sun 3s and Sparcs connected to two printers: a
SparcPrinter running NewsPrint, and a QMS 810. I'd like to set up
accounting for both printers, so that I can get a list of users and #pages
printed. Are there any free/share/pay-ware programs that can take care of
this easily?

The original reply, from Mark J. McIntosh <Mark.McIntosh@engr.UVic.CA>
> Well, Newsprint 2.x produces an accounting file list username and
> pages printed for each job. Something like Newsprint or Transcript
> driving your QMS should do the same thing.

> Are you looking for a package to do the billing summaries?

To which I replied:
Thanks, Mark. We have been thinking of getting the new version of
NewsPrint, but since this entails an OS upgrade, will sit back and
evaluate some more.

The new suggestions:
===========================================================================
from Mark J. McIntosh <Mark.McIntosh@engr.UVic.CA>:
> You should have mentioned which version of NeWSprint you were running.
> There are instructions available on how to add page accounting support
> to NeWSprint 1.x. I can't remember where they are right now. It's
> something you can do yourself, without paying Sun anything.

from Nick Nickerson <nick@dsd.es.com>:
> I may be missing the point or some detail, but we have done this
> with the "pac" on the 4.1.x systems. It has worked aon all printer types or
> anything feed through the printcap file.
>
> However we are not using NewsPrint, but if it uses the /etc/printcap
> file, it should be workable. (see "af" description from pac man page.)

from Gustavo Vegas <gustavo@ece.concordia.CA>:
> There is a PD package called lwkit . It is a bit crude, worked
> out half in perl, half in C, and needs hacking to get it to work, but
> it does the job. It can only maintain printer accounting on PostScript
> printers. There is also psf, whose latest version can be convinced to
> do printing accounting. Sorry I did not see your question before. To
> get a hold of this packages, consult your friendly archie site.

===========================================================================

Of these, Nick's suggestion of using pac seems to be the way to go. I
didn't manage to get it to work, but the man page indicates it's what
I need.

Thanks all!

-- 
=========================================================================
Phong T. Co		phaedrus@Math.McGill.CA		McGill University
Computer Coordinator					Montreal, CANADA
Department of Mathematics				(514) 398-8448

A CONS is an object which cares. -- Bernie Greenberg.



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