Changing Pharos Station Properties

Specifies whether this Release Station is a PC Pharos Station or a Network Terminal, and if it is a network terminal, its type and version.

The name that this PC Pharos Station is known by on the network.

A free-form text description of this Release Station, displayed only in Pharos Administrator

A name that uniquely identifies this Release Station in any external authentication and billing systems.

There should be no spaces in the External Name, as this will break the IP Billing Plug-in and gateway.

The Bank that governs the authentication and billing behavior for users on this Release Station. Each device handles only one billing method, so multiple devices must be provided if more than one billing method is offered to users.

If a change is made to the Bank used by the Pharos Station or the Bank is replaced with an existing one, the Pharos Station acknowledges the change on the next Change Control.

If a new logon DLL requires configuration for non-default settings and has never been configured for this station, the Pharos Station must be shut down and reconfigured for the new DLL.

The services provided to users by this Release Station. A Release Station may be one or more of:

• A Print Station, which lists print jobs and releases them for printing once payment arrangements are made at the Station by the user who is the job owner.
• A Reservation Station , which allows users to reserve Computers for use. This service is not supported when in Print Center mode.
• An Account Station, which, depending on configuration, allows users to view their historical transactions, check their Pharos internal account balance, change passwords and other details, or transfer funds. When in Print Center mode, transferring funds and changing account details are not supported; it only shows user's activities.

The Station Functions available for selection depend on the Operating Mode of the Station. For example, the Reservation Station function is only available when the Pharos Station is in "Legacy" mode; it is not available in "Print Center" mode.

The preferred mode for this Release Station. A Release Station can run in either Legacy or Print Center mode.

• Legacy - In this mode, the Pharos Station will use the legacy executable program and will operate as it did before. The user interface and user experience remain the same.

For fresh Uniprint installs, the default Operating Mode is Print Center. When upgrading from older versions, the default mode is Legacy.

• Print Center - Centralized - This is the default and only Print Center mode available if you have only one instance of the Pharos Print Center and the Pharos API running. In this mode, all requests for ALL Pharos Stations will go via the main Print Center implementation(used by users for the standard web interface), as defined in the Print Center Hostname in the System Settings context.

• Print Center - Station's Print Server- This option only becomes available if you have more than one instance of the Pharos Print Center Web Services and the Pharos API.

  In this mode, the Release Station uses an instance of the Print Center installed directly on the Release Station’s controlling Print Server specifically for managing Release Station requests. This is the recommended mode for organizations with widely dispersed sites - those that span across geographic locations. This would keep most of the traffic local to the server and only go off the server to talk to the Pharos database directly or to other servers when required if there are jobs to list on those servers.

Pharos Station: Print Center Mode can only be used when the station configuration does not include Reservation Station or Banks utilizing cash card readers.

When in Print Center mode, you can extend the capabilities of your Pharos Station if you have licenses for Credit Card Gateway and Pharos MobilePrint. Credit Card Gateway license enables users to securely add funds to their Pharos account using their credit card, debit card, or PayPal account via the Pharos Station. With a MobilePrint license, users can change finishing options of print jobs sent via email or web upload.

The station function that is selected by default when users log onto this PC Pharos Station. Selecting "User Select" means that the main menu screen is displayed by default, instead of a specific service.

It is possible to select a service that has not been designated as a Station Type for this Pharos Station. In this case, the default type will be selected from the available types.

The period in seconds of inactivity before the user is automatically logged off from this Release Station. This encourages users to stay focused and complete tasks quickly at a busy Release Station, and provides extra security if a user leaves the release Station without logging off. The default value for this property is 30 seconds.

When an inactive user is logged off, their cash card is automatically ejected.

The services offered at the Pharos Station may have a bearing on the value needed for the inactivity time. Screens like the View Transactions screen on an Account Station or the date and time options on a Reservation Station may require a longer delay before logging off automatically, to ensure that the user has enough time to review all the details.

Inactivity Time used to be referred to as "Auto Logoff Delay"

The password used by administrative users to exit the Pharos Station application.

Whether users can create new User accounts from this PC Pharos Station. This means less work setting up accounts for administrators, and also less control over the account creation process.

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

Whether to prevent guest users from logging onto and printing from this PC Pharos Station.

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

This property determines whether to display the Add Funds button for a user in Pharos Station: Print Center Mode. Selecting Yes enables users to add funds to their account using their credit card, debit card, or PayPal account.

This setting will only be available if all the following conditions are met:

• The Allow Add Funds setting is enabled in the Print Center tab (System > System Settings context).
• The Pharos Station's operating mode is set to Print Center. The Add Funds feature is not supported in Legacy Mode.
• The Pharos Station is set to show only the logged-on user's jobs (i.e. Filter Jobs by setting is set to Jobs Whose Owner = User's Logon ID).
• The group in which the user belongs to does not have Add Funds override. There is an option to control the visibility of the Add Funds link based on Group membership. This feature is managed using the setting called Print Center Add Funds Allowed in the Users > Groups context.

This setting can only be enabled if your site has a Credit Card Gateway license.

In order to protect against potential hardware attacks (e.g. skimming keyboard data), Pharos recommends to only use the Add Funds option on the Pharos Station: Print Center mode in environments with protected hardware, such as kiosk setups or with touchscreen stations.

The Print Server whose print jobs can be released from this Release Station.

A list of Devices that this Release Station can release print jobs to.

Determines which devices to send mono (i.e. Black and White) jobs to when releasing from a Release Station.

This setting only applies when a Release Station has both Color and Black and White device types associated with it.

For a fresh Uniprint install, the default setting is 'Force mono jobs to mono devices only'. For an upgrade, existing Release Stations will continue to load balance across all available devices as before. However, newly added Release Stations on upgraded systems default to Force mono jobs to mono devices only.'

There are two options:

• Load balance across all available devices - Mono jobs will be load balanced across all available devices (associated with the Release Station), including color devices.
• Force mono jobs to mono devices only - Mono jobs will only be printed to available mono devices (where there is a choice between a mono and a color device at a station). The following rules are used to decide where mono jobs are ultimately printed:
  • If both mono and color devices are available, mono jobs always get sent to mono devices.
  • If only color devices are available, then mono jobs are sent to color devices.
  • If only mono devices are available, then color jobs are sent to mono devices.
  • If both mono and color devices are available, color jobs always get sent to color devices.

The following shows the order in determining which device to send mono jobs to. Each step produces a subset of printers to apply subsequent checks/rules.

1. Permissions (i.e. Access Time schedule is set up for a Device)
2. Paper Size check
3. Mono/Color printer type check
4. Other attributes (e.g. Duplex or any other attributes that have been manually changed)
5. SNMP check during release (to check the status of the selected device).

Notes:

• Paper size overrides mono settings - When set to Force mono jobs to mono devices only; mono jobs will normally only go to mono devices. However, if a mono job has a paper size that can only be supported by an associated color device, then the job will be sent to the device that supports the paper size regardless of the 'force mono jobs to mono devices only' setting, in order to support printing on the requested paper size.
• It is recommended generally, but particularly where a color device supports more paper sizes than the other associated mono devices, that device-level-costing is used. Create a Job Cost Method for the higher-cost color device (including an appropriate mono charge) so that any mono jobs which do print on the color device due to paper size can be charged at a cost appropriate to the device.

Before Uniprint 9.1, if there was a choice of color and mono devices associated with a Station, mono jobs were load balanced across color and mono devices.

Whether to show tabs to filter the print job display on this Pharos Station, and if so what to filter by. Options are:

• Document Name - jobs are filtered according to the name assigned to the print job. This is the document name from the application that created the job unless a Popup Question asks the user the name of the document at the time the job is sent for printing.
• Owner - jobs are filtered by owner. The name used to represent the job owner is the Logon ID (user name) unless the user changes this name using Pharos Popups when they print the job.
• None - jobs are not filtered.  

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

This property is used to determine whether users can change the sorting of print jobs on this PC Pharos Station.

By default, the list of print jobs can be sorted by clicking on the titles of each column. The column that jobs are currently sorted by is marked with an arrow, and displayed in a prompt above the job list:

Job sorting can be enabled or disabled, either for the entire list, or for the individual columns separately. The prompts indicating how jobs are sorted can also be customized.

To enable or disable job sorting for the entire job list, select "Yes" or "No" from the combo box in the Show Sort Options property.

If "Yes" is selected, then the properties relating to each job list column become available.

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

Which print job properties can be used to sort print jobs on this PC Pharos Station. Options available are

• Date/Time
• Document Name
• Owner

This setting applies to Pharos stations in Legacy mode only. This property is not available in Print Center mode.

The title to display when print jobs are sorted by date and time.

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

The title to display when print jobs are sorted by the name of the print job.

This setting applies to Pharos station: Legacy Mode only. This functionality is not available in Print Center mode.

The title to display when print jobs are sorted by the owner of the print job.

This setting applies to Pharos stations in Legacy mode only. This property is not available in Print Center mode.

Determines whether to show all print jobs, or only jobs belonging to the user logged onto this Pharos Station.

Displaying all jobs is useful in a non-authenticated environment where users have no way of calling up only their own jobs. All print jobs for all users are shown in the job list on the Pharos Station printing screen. This potentially allows any users to print any job whether they own it or not, however.

Displaying only those jobs whose owner matches the logged on user allows users authenticated at the station to see only their own jobs.

If Pharos Popups is used, users in a non-authenticated environment can protect their jobs from other users by providing a password when they print their job at a workstation. Other users still see the job in the list at the Pharos Station but cannot print or delete it. When the user goes to print or delete that job at the Pharos Station, a dialog box asks for their password, which must be a match before the print/delete proceeds.

To set a Pharos Station to show all jobs on the Printing screen, select "All jobs" from the combo box in this field.

To set a Pharos Station to show only those jobs belonging to the logged on user, select "Jobs whose owner = user's logon ID" from the combo box in this field.

Balance prompt presented to the user on Release Stations indicating that the balance is their actual balance. Note that the number of characters that can be displayed on Network Terminals for this prompt is restricted.

Balance prompt presented to the user on the Pharos Station indicating that the balance is an offline balance and not their actual balance.

Displayed to the user on the Pharos Station if the billing system is unable to retrieve their actual balance and instead returned offline.