METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR MANAGING PRINTING DEVICES IN A LOCAL AREA NETWORK

摘要

A method of managing printing in an environment with a plurality of workstations and a plurality of printers in one or more networks and wherein the network also includes a document server and an identification generator, the method comprising: - polling a workstation when it connects to the network to determine what printers are connected thereto; - determining a unique ID of the workstation; - determining the type of printer; - determining the configuration of the printer from the type of printer and workstation location; - determining an ID code for each printer connected to the connected workstation using the identification generator; - developing a look up table with the unique ID of the workstation; type, configuration and ID code of each printer; - receiving a print request from a workstation at the document server; - identifying the configuration of a printer from the look up table in response to the print request; - sending the print request to the identified printer with the appropriate ID code, as identified by the look up table.