Adding and Changing a Printer

Physical printer setup for Window 95 / 98  and  Windows NT  
NOTE: Please complete reading this page before viewing the physical setup information, as it is crucial
to completing a successful setup of the LARS printer environment.

One of the things that LARS has the ability to do differently from most other Windows programs is the ability to automatically route print jobs to specific printers.  This is because the typical output from a LARS system consists of Binding Tickets, a custom form size in our case, and other reports which typically are printed on 8.5"x11" office paper.  The advantage to this is that it allows the user not to have to remember which printer does what or in a network environment what printer to use.  This is easy to accomplish with a bit of setup work.  All sites start off with this configured for their installation, but it is also inevitable that the configuration will change and adjustments need to be made.  This information is also useful for library IS staff to know when changing a computer or upgrading operating systems.

Understanding the Configuration  

LARS uses the LARS.INI file to define the printers to automatically route the print job to the proper printer.  In a standalone system (non-network) the LARS.INI file is in the same directory as the main LARS executable file (LFWL.EXE).  In a network installation the local copy of the LARS.INI file resides on the local hard drive, usually in the Windows directory.  In a network installation there is another copy of the LARS.INI file that is kept in the same directory as the main executable, this copy does not control printer redirection, the copy on the local drive is the one that defines the printer information only for that computer.  A typical LARS.INI file will contain the following information.

;LARS.INI
[REPORT]
REPORT=HP LaserJet 5P/5MP
TICKET=Epson LQ-570+ ESC/P 2

The first line is a comment defining the report. The second line defines the section of the INI file, in this case there is only one section.  The third and forth lines define which printer a report of a given type will go to.  The REPORT= line defines which printer a REPORT type report will go to, and the TICKET= will route all reports that are of type ticket to the Epson LQ-570+ ESC/P 2 printer.  The way that this works is that the name specified in the line following the = must exactly match the name of the printer in the Windows printer control panel, including spaces and case of the letters. 

Editing the LARS.INI file  

The easiest way to accomplish this in Windows 95 or NT is to open the LARS.INI file with notepad, this can be done by locating LARS.INI using Windows Explorer and then double clicking on it with the mouse.  Next open the Printers setting box by going to the START button then going to SETTINGS, then PRINTERS.   Select the printer you want to assign and right-click it with the mouse, when the menu appears select Rename. Be very careful not to type any characters otherwise you will rename your printer. Next type the following two keys, hold down the CTRL key and then type a C. This copies the name of your printer into the Windows copy buffer. Use the mouse to select the open window with the LARS.INI file that is open, and position the cursor at the end of the line that you want to assign the printer to.

TICKET=|
             ^ Cursor

Next type CTRL+V the same way you just did CTRL+C, this will paste the name of the printer into the line of the LARS.INI file.   You can then repeat this step for other printers or close and save the file.

Alternately you could write down the information for the printer name and re-type it exactly, including spaces and letter case.

Setting up the Printer   

Most standard reports require that you only assign the printer and then they'll print fine, however in the case of bind tickets they are a custom size 7" wide x 5" long and this takes a bit more setup to the printer to get the proper results.  I suggest that the printer that you use be either Epson or IBM emulation compatible, as this will give you the widest range of drivers to choose from should the base driver not work correctly.  I have had good luck with both 9 and 24 pin printers from Epson, IBM / Lexmark, Okidata, and Panasonic.  Some of the older Okidata printers are what is referred to as OEM only, which means they are not emulation compatible, and I have not been able to get one to work successfully with Windows.  Once the printer is installed (follow your Windows system instructions) the next step is to customize the paper size to fit the binding ticket.  I'll explain this in two different sections as it works differently under Windows 95 and Windows NT.