Spacing a printer

Things to remember:
  • You can only space a printer that uses the PSF Destination Support System (DSS) and one of these attachment types:
    • PSF TCP/IP
    • PSF BSD
    • PSF Other
    To see what DSS your printer uses, do this:
    1. Select the printer in the tree view of the Main window of the InfoPrint Manager GUI.
    2. See if the Type column appears in the details view. The Type column displays the DSS that the InfoPrint printer uses.
    3. If you do not see the Type column, use Add/Remove menu items to add it.
  • You can only space a printer after a job has already started to print.

    To only print a section of a job (such as page 11 to page 20), or to start printing from a page other than the first page of the job, use the Change Page Range to Process task in the InfoPrint Manager GUI.

  • Spacing works better on high-speed printers than on low speed printers.

    While spacing is supported on all printers that you print to using the PSF DSS, it is very difficult to space printers that print 40 pages per minute (ppm) or less. Spacing works adequately on printers that print between 60 and 100 ppm, and works very well with high-speed InfoPrint printers that are configured correctly.

  • The InfoPrint 3000, InfoPrint 4000, and InfoPrint 4100 printers require additional configuration for spacing to work efficiently.

    See the Setting up high speed printers for spacing topic for instructions on configuring your printer.

  • Page numbers refer to pages of the print job, not necessarily to any page numbers in your document.

    For example, in a book, the first page of chapter one is usually "page 1." However, it might be page 15 of the print job, because of the title page, credits, and table of contents.

  • You cannot space to the back side of a sheet of paper.

    If you are printing a duplex job, you will always print both the front and back sides of the sheet of paper that you space to.

To space a printer, do this:

  1. Start the InfoPrint Manager GUI.
  2. In the GUI, find the InfoPrint printer that you need to space.
  3. Select the InfoPrint printer by clicking on it, then click Printer → Stop.
    Note: If you do not see Stop in the menu, useAdd/Remove menu items to add it.
  4. In the Stop printer_name dialog, select Pause and Now, and click OK.
    Even though you selected Now, the printer will keep printing for a while because it has to get to a point in the job where it can stop. For InfoPrint 3000, and InfoPrint 4000 printers that are configured correctly, you shouldn't have to wait more than 10 seconds. For other printers, you might have to wait longer.
  5. Once the printer has stopped printing, look at the last sheet that printed. Write down the number of that sheet of the job.
  6. Figure out what sheet of paper in the job you want to space to. Write down the number of that sheet of the job.
  7. Figure out the number of sheets of paper you need to space.
    • To forward space the printer:

      Subtract the number of the sheet that printed last (from step 5) from the number of the sheet that you want to skip to (from step 6), and then subtract one. Like this:

      (number from step 6) – (number from step 5) – 1 = number of sheets to skip

    • To backspace the printer:

      Subtract the number of the sheet that you want to go back to (from step 6) from the page that printed last (from step 5), and add one (for the current page). Like this:

      (number from step 5) – (number from step 6) + 1 = number of sheets to back up

  8. Determine the number of "sides" to space the printer.
    • If you are printing a simplex job, the number of sides is the same as the number of sheet from step 7.
    • If you are printing a duplex job, multiply the number from step 7 by two to get the number of sides. (number from step 7 x 2 = number of sides)
  9. In the InfoPrint Manager GUI, find the printer you want to space and select it.
  10. With the printer selected, click Printer → Space.
  11. In the Space printer_name dialog, select Backspace or Forward space and type the number of sides you found in step 8.
  12. Click OK.
  13. Make sure the printer is still selected and click Printer → Resume to start the printer again.
Parent topic: Moving backward or forward in a job that is currently printing