User Guide

Understanding Novell Distributed Print Services 25
Novell Distributed Print Services Administration Guide
103-000137-001
August 31, 2001
Novell Confidential
Manual 99a38 July 17, 2001
Where to Place NDPS Managers
Use the following guidelines to determine where and when to place an NDPS
Manager.
 Only one NDPS Manager can be loaded per server. Load this resource
only on servers configured to service print jobs. The only exception to this
rule is any server which has a printer connected directly to it. In that case,
the NDPS Manager must be loaded on that server as well.
 Whenever possible, place the NDPS Manager and the printers it controls
on the same LAN segment for optimal performance.
 Whenever possible, consider assigning your Printer Agents to more than
one NDPS Manager so that the print load will be spread over multiple
servers. This will facilitate load balancing and reduce the possibility of a
single point of failure which would disable all printing on your network.
Understanding Printer Gateways
Gateways allow NDPS clients to send jobs to printers that are not NDPS-
aware (that is, printers that are not equipped with embedded NDPS Printer
Agents). You select and configure a printer gateway when you create a new
Printer Agent.
Gateways translate NDPS queries or commands to printer-specific language
that the physical printer can use. This is possible because gateways are
configured to know the specific type (make and model) of printer being used.
The following diagram illustrates a typical gateway configuration.
Third-party gateways are developed by printer manufacturers to support
printers directly attached to the network. Because these gateways are
Gateway
Third-party gateway
Printer
Agent
NDPS
client
Existing
printer
NDPS
server
GW
PA