Now You re Speaking My Language: New Standards for Enterprise Thermal Printer Management

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1 Innovative Printing Solutions. Now You re Speaking My Language: New Standards for Enterprise Thermal Printer Management Table of Contents About This Whitepaper PCL Overview Advantages of PCL5 Linux Overview About Source Technologies SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT

2 About This Whitepaper Open-source software development modules give technology administrators freedom to define how the printers will operate within their organization. When Source Technologies set out to design its Performance Series thermal transfer printers for the retail, hospitality, healthcare, distribution, warehousing, manufacturing, transportation, public service, government and financial industries, it focused on superior print quality and end-user experience. The printers 300 dpi printheads and full-color, LCD touch displays have turned heads in the marketplace since being introduced in mid 2011; but their greatest improvement lies not in what s on the outside, but in the groundbreaking application of a standard printer language and open-source software development modules that give technology administrators freedom to define how the printers will operate within their organizations. Information technologists charged with managing and maintaining extensive printer networks within global enterprises will appreciate the flexibility they now have at their fingertips to extend the value of their printer networks to save employees time and money. This whitepaper explains how Printer Control Language (PCL) and Linux make that possible. SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 2

3 PCL Overview In 1984, Hewlett-Packard introduced PCL to provide an open, economical and efficient language for application programs to control a range of printer features. Unlike most technology solutions, thermal printers have not used an open standard programming language for communication and print control. Printer manufacturers developed their own proprietary language because it was easy to develop, required a minimal investment to enter the market and there were no incentives to standardize a printer language in the thermal printing industry. Over the years, the lack of a standard printer language in the thermal printing industry has created problems for system integrators by: Keeping administrators locked into one printer manufacturer for their printing needs Preventing companies IT infrastructure from evolving due to slower advances in thermal printing technology Requiring staff to learn many different proprietary languages Incurring higher costs to maintain existing applications Having no portability of label template libraries Having limited or no support for international labels. In 1984, Hewlett-Packard introduced PCL to provide an open, economical and efficient language for application programs to control a range of printer features across a number of printing devices. PCL is a command based language using control sequences that are processed and interpreted in the order they are received. At the consumer level, PCL data streams are generated by a print driver. PCL output can also be easily generated by custom applications. Today, PCL is the de facto industry standard printer language. PCL commands follow consistent specifications to control common printer features: font and graphic layouts, label macro management, rendering, and label resolution. These commands operate independently of the underlying hardware resolution specifications for the printer. By keeping operation and resolution commands separate, administrators have the flexibility to create openarchitecture environments that maximize the printer s technology and improve the end-user experience: saving organizations both time and money. SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 3

4 Advantages of PCL5 PCL gives system administrators flexibility to customize and integrate thermal printing into a variety of hosted environments. In 2011, Source Technologies introduced the first fully integrated PCL5 thermal printer. There are several advantages to using PCL on thermal printers: Advantages of PCL5 on a thermal printer: PCL communicates with virtually all computer systems, which makes it the ideal language to adopt in the thermal printing industry. PCL extends the functionality of thermal printers by offering an expansive menu of feature commands not found in thermal printers. These commands open the way for the thermal printing industry to develop new and exciting applications. PCL gives system administrators flexibility to customize and integrate thermal printing into a variety of hosted environments. PCL allows for seamless integration of international language capabilities including Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean 1. 1 PCL supports text formatting for these languages, however, the fonts must be added as an option or provided by the user in TrueType format SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 4

5 Linux Overview More than 90% of today s top 500 supercomputers run some variant of Linux. Linux s large base of developers have developed many tools and services beneficial for enterprise thermal printing configurations in large, global organizations. Along with incorporating PCL into its printers infrastructures, Source Technologies has remained committed to using open-source development tools. Source Technologies chose Linux as the operating system to drive their Workstation, Performance and High Performance Series of thermal printer product lines. Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system developed under the General Public License (GPL) model of free and open-source software development and distribution. The defining component of Linux is the Linux kernel, first released October 5, Linux was originally developed as a free operating system for Intel x86-based personal computers. It has since been ported to more computer hardware platforms than any other operating system. It is a leading operating system on servers and other big iron systems such as mainframe computers and supercomputers. More than 90% of today s top 500 supercomputers run some variant of Linux, including the 10 fastest. Linux also runs on embedded systems (devices where the operating system is typically built into the firmware and highly tailored to the system); such as, mobile phones, tablet computers, network routers, televisions, video game consoles, Android mobile devices and now thermal printers. Linux has established itself as a reliable and capable operating system that allows companies that want to develop their own printer-based applications, a large, established and stable development environment in which to work. Linux s large base of developers have developed many tools and services beneficial for enterprise thermal printing configurations in large global organizations. Source Technologies thermal printer products rely on the following tools and feature modules to extend their functionality for global enterprise print management: Network Time Protocol (NTP) Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) SSH (Secure SHell) HTTP (HTTP Web Server) Telnet SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 5

6 Network Time Protocol (NTP) Simple Network Management Protocol allows network devices to be managed from a central location. All of Source Technologies Linux-based thermal printers are shipped with Network Time Protocol (NTP). When enabled, this service allows printers to synchronize to a common-time server on the network. This ensures all printers are synchronized to the same time and that all print jobs have this time stamp recorded on the final printout. This feature helps global organizations keep an accurate record of how and when information is being shared within the company. Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) Another vital Linux add-on for enterprise print management is the Simple Network Management Protocol for Remote Printer Management. SNMP is a widely used protocol designed to facilitate the management of networked devices from a central location. Designed originally for the management of devices such as routers and switches, its usage has grown rapidly to encompass the monitoring of nearly any electronic device. SNMP is the method that allows administrators to manage or monitor all of their equipment running on an Internet infrastructure throughout the world. It allows for the monitoring of traffic flowing through the equipment, institutes a trigger when faults occur and changes the configuration of equipment remotely. SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 6

7 To work with SNMP, network devices utilize a distributed data store called the Management Information Base (MIB). All SNMP-compliant devices contain a MIB which supplies the pertinent attributes of a device. Some attributes are hardcoded in the MIB, while others are dynamic values calculated by agent software running on the device. SNMP allows printers to be remotely administered under password-protected credentials. Monitoring of the printers may be performed at any time, without interruption to printing. Administrators have the ability to monitor or manage: Printer status via remote access Notification alerts to the operator of paper or ribbon levels, locally and remotely Printer firmware updates alerts on printer health Cold or warm restart Master/slave setups, Hot swap print jobs Managed Print Services capabilities Enterprise network management software, such as Tivoli and HP OpenView, also uses SNMP commands to read and write data in each device MIB. Get commands typically retrieve data values, while Set commands typically initiate some action on the device. For example, a system reboot script is often implemented in management software by defining a particular MIB attribute and issuing an SNMP set from the manager software that writes a reboot value into that attribute. SSH (Secure SHell) This add-on is a network protocol for secure data communications between a host and the printer. This ensures that all data over the wired Ethernet or Wi- Fi connection is encrypted using public-key cryptography to authenticate the remote computer. SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 7

8 HTTP (HTTP Web Server) All Source Technologies printers have their own HTTP server that provides remote configuration capabilities using a standard web browser. Telnet With this Linux module, administrators may log into all network printers remotely for low-level administrative activities. All access can be controlled through standard Linux access control mechanisms. For more information on thermal printing with Source Technologies Thermal Series printers please call: or visit us on the web: com SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 8

9 About Source Technologies For over 25 years, Source Technologies has engineered reliable and easyto-use specialized printing solutions helping organizations streamline operations. True workhorses of the industry, ST thermal printers perform effortlessly in some of the harshest settings and are based on the industry standard language PCL, allowing for seamless integration into any environment. Our mobile label and receipt printers are rugged and dependable enough to keep workforces moving. MICR laser printers from Source Technologies are renowned for their security features and ability to print negotiable documents on-demand, inclusive of all variable data using blank stock in a single printer pass. Laser barcode and secure document printers produce shipping labels, invoices, order forms and time and information sensitive documents. Clients include Fortune 1000 companies as well as nine of the TOP 10 U.S. Banks and many of the world s largest security organizations. Printing solutions from Source Technologies improve processes in a wide range of business environments including warehousing and distribution, transportation and logistics, healthcare, hospitality, retail and finance. SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT 9

10 Innovative Printing Solutions. To Learn More About Our Printing Solutions: Source Technologies 2910 Whitehall Park Dr. Charlotte, NC (800) (704) Sourcetech.com SOURCE TECHNOLOGIES WHITE PAPER THERMAL PRINTER MANAGEMENT