Quite a big amount of jobs arrive in an ELP activated queue (from fax line). The jobs shall be distributed to X printers, one after the other, to get them an equal workload.

  1. Setup the ELP activated queue
  2. Setup # more queues, which in first phase are NOT ELP activated. Share name with the Name ELPOUT1, ELPOUT2, ... etc to ELPOUT#
  3. Then simply use this configuration:

[GLOBAL]

; Instead of having this in rule Global you may also put it into a rule with the queue name

; Read the job counter for this printer

JobCounter=#ELP_FORMS_PATH#job_counter_#PRINTERNAME#.var

; Divide the JOB COUNTER by # and add to the rest 1.
; Here we have 4 printers to Counter %4 + 1 -> rotates 1, 2 ,3 ,4 and again 1 ... X, 1..X, 1..X etc.

Counter=#JOB_COUNTER#;%4+1

; Now send the job to the corresponding queue ELPOUT1 ... ELPOUTX and X=4 printers

OutPort=\\#HOSTNAME#\ELPOUT#JOB_COUNTER#

; This queue never prints something. Maybe set even the port of the queue to the local port NUL

NoPrinting=ON


[Prevent JobCounter overflow]

; Primary trigger is true as usually there is always a 1 in the print job

Trigger_Binary=1

; if more then 50000 jobs had been counted then

Trigger_Variable=#JOB_COUNTER#>50000

; simply delete the job counter file

call=del /Q #ELP_FORMS_PATH#job_counter_#PRINTERNAME#.var;OFF

 

Hint: Use Safe Monitored Printing in the final printing queues to ensure that the job is 100% printed. If not do similar configuration to switch automatically the job to the next queue.

Related articles: Rules theory, Add key to rule, Counter