Printing

Printers

Question 4.1   What printers are available, and which should I use?

There are small printers on every floor, named after the room that they are in. These should be used for small, quick jobs. Documents longer than a few pages should be sent to one of the heavy-duty printers, which can print on both sides of the page. You will have a default printer defined when your account is setup. This will usually be one of small printers. Please pick up the pages from these printers quickly.

Question 4.2   How can I tell which is my default printer?

Just type ``echo $PRINTER'' and hit return.

Question 4.3   How can I print to a different printer?

You need to tell the application you are using which printer you wish to use. Each printer has a name, and multi-function printers have names for each function. For example, the heavy duty printer in room 438 is called mx and for double-sided 8.5 by 11 paper it is mxd. For most applications your just add the printer name, prefixed by -P to the command. Assuming you want mxd, the following examples will do it.

For Netscape, acroread (for .pdf files), and others where pressing the print button gives a window with the print command lpr just add -Pmxd, so the window shows lpr -Pmxd.

For printing dvi files created by TEXor L^ATEX, dvips -Pmxd filename.

There are several methods for printing text files, the best is enscript -G -Pmxd filename which gives nice headers. If you don't want the headers, leave out the -G.

PrinterNames

Question 4.4   What are the printer names?

There are printers on each floor for short documents that are needed quickly. Please pick up printout from these printers promptly.

327

Clearly the printer in room 327.

uff

Also known as puff or Puff or 108, the printer in the main office on the first floor. The short name is so that one can use -Puff.

203

Also known as ljet, this is the printer in the MacLab.

The heavy duty printer in 438 (the computer lab on the fourth floor) has several different names for its different functions. The names all start with mx

mx

Ordinary single sided printing, letter size paper.

mxd

Double sided printing, letter size paper.

mxh

Punched paper, letter size, single sided.

mxhd

Punched paper, letter size, double sided.

mxl

Long Paper, single sided

mxld

Long Paper, double Sided

mxs

Setup to print transparencies. Requires special media.

It is also possible it print on the mainframe's postscript printer, and the printed documents will appear, with some delay, in a box appropriate to your name in the computer centers I/O room in the basement. This is a very good way to print documents that you do not need immediately.

The name of the printer is mfps (Main Frame PostScript), and it has several variants for different functions:

mfps

Form Feed Paper: low resolution, but it is almost bound like a book.

mfpsn

High Quality single sheet, single sided. The n means no holes.

mfpsnd

High Quality single sheet, double sided.