Scenario
With V-Layer, print data is sent from the remote desktop or workstation to the central print server in Windows’ own EMF data format. On the central print server, it is sent from the ThinPrint Output Gateway to the native printer driver. One advantage of V-Layer is that shared printers on the central print server are not connected to ThinPrint Ports and thus do not have to conform to any particular naming convention. Furthermore ThinShare can be used here.
Use the V-Layer component if:
- Non-Windows clients are used or
- Printer drivers are to be centralized on a print server or
- VirtualCopy is required (see below) or
- Specific printer properties, such as finishing options, are required and Management Services isn’t available or not used
Setup
- Install ThinPrint Engine on the central, dedicated print server (see the quick installation guide).
- Install ThinPrint Output Gateway on each remote desktop or workstation (included in the ThinPrint Engine).
- On the central print server, add all necessary printers with their native printer drivers, and share them.
- If you want to send the print jobs using the ThinPrint Engine rename the printers according to the ThinPrint naming conventions – e. g. HP Color LaserJet 4700 and Kyocera FS-C8650DN – and attach them to ThinPrint Ports (it t is recommended to use Port Pooling or to attach each printer to a separate ThinPrint Port). Otherwise attach them to Standard TCP/IP Ports or to LPR ports.
V-Layer configuration
To convert the printers, you use the V-Layer configuration tool, which is a component of ThinPrint Engine. For each (selected) printer, the V-Layer configuration creates a second printer, which uses TP Output Gateway as the driver. Then it moves the share from the old to the new printer. Later, the new, shared printer receives the print jobs (from a desktop session) and transmits them to the second printer of the pair.
- Mark the relevant shared printers and select Enable V-Layer in the context menu. Through this, the Output Gateway object gets the share name of the native printer object.
- Additionally, decide whether only the Output Gateway object is to be shared, or both it and the (old) native printer object as well. Its share name has an _n_ added.
Note! Enabling the V-Layer transfers the name of the native printer object to the Output Gateway object. The suffix _n_ is added to the native printer object at the end of the printer name. For printers that are connected to a ThinPrint Port and whose address information is contained in the printer name, _n_ is inserted before the hash sign (#). To subsequently rename the printer or its share name, use Rename Printer in the context menu.
- If you are already using Citrix Universal Print Server, please disable/uninstall the Universal Print Server component before enabling ThinPrint V-Layer. If both is enabled it could lead to errors.
Please note that the following Output Gateway features cannot be used with V-Layer: Open My Printing Preferences and Print Preview as well as the compression level settings. That way, the compression used by ThinPrint Ports and ThinShare is not affected.
VirtualCopy
With VirtualCopy, documents can be printed to up to five printers (and/or locations) simultaneously. As an administrator you can provide users with the corresponding printer object.
- Select a printer with V-Layer already enabled. Then open the context menu and select VirtualCopy.
- Now you can choose up to four more printers to which print jobs are automatically sent, when this V-Layer is selected. Then click OK.
Note: You can also find the VirtualCopy option in the settings of Output Gateway objects (of V-Layers), either in the printers folder or in Print Management.
If this printer (in the example: HP Color LaserJet 4700) is selected by the users of a remote desktop session, then the printout occurs on all
pre-installed printers simultaneously. The users cannot make any changes to this selection. Only in the printers folder under printer properties can they see which printers were preset by the Administrator.