User Guide

Understanding Novell Distributed Print Services 13
Novell Distributed Print Services Administration Guide
103-000137-001
August 31, 2001
Novell Confidential
Manual 99a38 July 17, 2001
1 Understanding Novell Distributed
Print Services
Novell
®
Distributed Print Services
TM
(NDPS
®
) is the default and preferred
print system in NetWare
®
. It is designed to handle the increased complexity
of managing printing devices in any type of network environment, ranging in
size from small workgroups to enterprise-wide systems. NDPS allows you to
use iManage, Novell’s Web-based management tool. You can also designate
those printers for automatic installation on user workstations, without any
action by your users.
NDPS replaces the existing queue-based printing technology. You don't have
to set up print queues, printer objects, or print servers, and link them together.
Instead, all of your management tasks are focused on the printer itself, which
can be configured as an eDirectory
TM
object.
To better understand how NDPS works, read the following sections:
 “Overview of NDPS” on page 13
 “Comparing NDPS with Queue-Based Print Services” on page 19
 “Understanding NDPS Printers” on page 20
 “Understanding the Architecture of NDPS” on page 21
Overview of NDPS
NDPS is the default and preferred print system in NetWare. Novell's legacy,
queue-based print system is also fully supported, which allows your users to
continue printing as they always have until you complete the transition to
NDPS. NDPS provides full support for IP-based as well as IPX
TM
-based
printing, giving you a wide variety of system configuration options to fit your
organization's specific needs.