Device Management Procedures

You use the device management procedures to create devices, and specify the paper types and fonts for the printouts.

With the main steps in the device management procedures, you can create a range of devices that can be used to view or print data that is processed by LN.

Ensure that the physical printers are installed on your operating system. If the printers do not exist on the operating system, see the appropriate installation manual for your operating system.

A printer in an LN environment must have a printer information file or printer device driver, which will contain the printer commands, for example, <Esc>, and <Ctrl>. The printer information file also contains the sequences for fonts, reverse video, underlining, and bold.

The most important steps in the device management procedures are described here. For detailed instructions on how to specify data in the sessions that are mentioned in the procedure steps, see The Device Management sessions.

Before LN can print the processed data, you must create the devices and the associated data:

  1. Create paper types

    You must define the characteristics of the paper that can be loaded in a physical printer in the paper type. You can define specific paper types for every type of output. For example, if you want to print paychecks, you must define the characteristics of the preprinted checks that must be loaded in the printer.

    LN reports can be printed on different types of devices, for example output files and printers. A printer is always linked to a certain paper type. You must define for each paper type the specific fonts that are applicable for the printout.

    1. Start the Paper Types (ttaad3110m000) session.
    2. Click New.
    3. In the Paper Type field, select a paper type, for example A2, and in the Orientation field, type or select Portrait or Landscape.
    4. Click Save and exit the session.
  2. Create the fonts for the paper types

    You must define the fonts to use per paper type. The fonts define how many characters can fit on one line and how many lines can fit on a sheet of paper. You must also define the width and height of the sheet of paper. LN uses these dimensions to check whether the report fits on the selected paper type

    1. Start the Fonts by Paper Type (ttaad3111m000) session.
    2. Click New Group.
    3. In the Paper Type field, zoom to the Paper Types (ttaad3110m000) session and select a Format.
    4. Click New.

    5. Specify this information in these fields:

      • Font field: specify or select a font type.
      • Paper Width field: specify the number of characters that must fit on one line.
      • Paper Height field: specify the number of lines that must fit on one page.
    6. Click Save and exit the session.
  3. Create devices

    You must create the devices to which LN can send reports. These devices can be physical devices such as printers or logical printers, but a device can also be a file.

    1. Start the Device Data (ttaad3500m000) session.
    2. Click New. The Device Data (ttaad3100s000) session is started.
    3. Specify the device data. The properties that you must enter differ per Device Type . See the session's online help for details.
    4. Click Save and exit the session.
  4. Optionally, create logical printers

    You can group printers in close proximity into a logical printer. When a user sends a print request to a logical printer, the printer daemon checks the paper type of each printer in the logical printer, and automatically directs the output to the first printer in the logical printer that contains the required paper type.

    1. Create a device ( Device Type = Logical Printer) for the logical printer. See the previous step, "Create devices", in this procedure.
    2. Start the Logical Printers (ttaad3101m000) session.
    3. Click New Group and select the logical printer device.
    4. Click New.
    5. Specify the printer(s) in the Physical Printer field, to include the printer(s) in the logical printer.
    6. Click Save and exit the session.