Which properties are inherited?
There’s one last step after installing and configuring the ThinPrint Engine on the remote desktops (terminal servers or virtual desktops): setting up printers on the ThinPrint Ports.
Which protocol?
If you are working with several ThinPrint Ports, each with a different protocol, then check port configuration before printer installation to see which ThinPrint Port supports what protocol.
Simplifications
Templates
What are templates?
With ThinPrint, a template is a printer in the server’s printers folder from which the client or session printers created with AutoConnect inherit their properties (see AutoConnect).
The _#ThinPrint Output Gateway template appears in the server’s printers folder after installation of ThinPrint Engine.
Which properties are inherited?
Among other things, client printers that are created by AutoConnect in the remote desktop session’s printers folder inherit the following properties from templates:
- Number of copies, orientation, preview options, compression settings and page adjustment (scale to fit or adjust margins); these are inherited always from the templates.
- The other properties (e. g., paper trays, paper format, color, print resolution, and print on both sides (duplex) are retrieved from the ThinPrint Client. These will be also inherited from the templates if sending properties from the ThinPrint Client to the ThinPrint Engine is disabled.
- (Native) printer driver or Driver Free Printing (TP Output Gateway)
- Printer port and thus:
- Bandwidth
- Print protocol (TCP/IP, ICA, RDP, PCoIP)
- Printing with or without the ThinPrint Connection Service
- Printing with or without print data encryption
- Port pooling
- Naming convention for ThinPrint printers
Template names
| Network protocol | Names of printer objects (for templates) |
| TCP/IP, ICA, RDP, PCoIP | Either:_#printer Example: _#Kyocera FS-850 Or:_#class Example: _#HPLaser |
Printers can be connected via a template with a specific name (e. g., _#printer) if their printer name or class name corresponds with the template name (after the #). Using class names is sensible if printers with different names shall use the same template (this is possible if the driver in the template is appropriate for the different client printers). The underscore (“_”) marks the template as such and is replaced with client-specific information for the automatically created printers.
Manually created printers
If you let AutoConnect automatically create all client printers in the sessions, then you only need to create templates and select the naming convention in the port configuration (see Advanced tab) once. If you also want to create printers on the server manually, though, please also refer to the following information.
For simplicity’s sake, only standard addressing is considered here; reversed addressing can be found in the chart in Naming convention, and addressing ThinPrint Connection Service Ports is explained in detail in ThinPrint Connection Service. It is irrelevant to a ThinPrint printer name whether the object represents a traditional (native) printer driver or the Output Gateway “printer driver”. The ThinPrint printer name is composed according to the network protocol in use:
Printer names
| Network protocol | Names of printer objects |
| TCP/IP | Either: printer_name#client_name:printer_ID Example: Kyocera FS-850#client1:3 Or: printer_name#IP_address:printer_ID Example: Kyocera FS-850#191.168.1.17:3 |
| ICA / RDP / PCoIP | Either: printer_name#user_name:printer_ID Example: Kyocera FS-850#administrator:3 Or: printer_name#:printer_ID Example: Kyocera FS-850#:3 |
| LPD | Either: printer_name#client_name Example: Kyocera FS-850#printer1 Or: printer_name#IP_address Example: Kyocera FS-850#191.168.1.18 |
client_name
Client name with TCP/IP and LPD means the real name of the client in the network (= host name). Alternatively, the client’s IP address can be used; this is especially necessary when there are difficulties with name resolutions
Note! With TCP/IP it is possible to send print data to any client computer running a ThinPrint Client – independent of the remote desktop session.
printer_ID
At the client (i. e., a Workstation, a thin client or terminal, a ThinPrint Hub or a local print server), the ThinPrint Client automatically assigns every installed printer an ID. The printer_ID can be omitted if there is only one printer installed on the client, or if printing should take place on the ThinPrint Client’s current printer.
printer_name
The printer name can be anything you like. It is nonetheless recommended that it is the same as the printer name at the client.
Example for TCP/IP
Client:
| client name | client1 |
| IP address | 192.168.1.17 |
| printer designation | HP LaserJet 1200 PCL |
ThinPrint Client assigned this printer ID 2.
Server:
| printer name | HP LaserJet 1200 PCL#client1:2 |
| or | HP LaserJet 1200 PCL#192.168.1.17:2 |
Example for ICA/RDP/PCoIP
The ICA, the RDP and the PCoIP protocols assume all communication with the client, including the client’s unambiguous identification. The print jobs are sent automatically to the client from whose remote desktop session the print data was created. The printer name must therefore only contain a designation of the printer and of course its ID.
A Kyocera FS-850 should print via ThinPrint with ICA. For example, if multiple printers have been installed and the ThinPrint Client has assigned ID 3 to the printer, the printer name could be:
Laserdrucker#:3 (“#” before “:”)
orKyocera# :3 (blank before “:”)
orKyocera FS-850#_:3 (underscore before “:”)
If the Kyocera FS-850 is the current printer (in the ThinPrint Client), then this is sufficient: Laserdrucker