10.5 Managing the Driver Store

Although the default settings lets users print without additional configuration, you might want to modify some settings so that you can manage your printing resources most effectively.

10.5.1 Creating Additional Driver Stores

Although you can create additional Driver Stores, you only need one for your iPrint system because the Print Manager saves the downloaded drivers files to disk. If the Print Manager does not have a requested driver, it copies the driver from the Driver Store and then saves it to disk. This process is relatively quick, even for the first user to request a printer driver. We recommend that you maintain only one Driver Store, so you do not need to track which Driver Store contains what printer drivers. Periodically, the Print Manager checks the Driver Store for updated printer drivers.

If you configure multiple Driver Stores that run on the same server, they all point to the same repository of printer drivers. This can be useful because each Driver Store has its own eDirectory object, and you can distribute the objects in your eDirectory tree.

To create a driver store:

  1. In iManager, click iPrint > Create Driver Store.

  2. Specify the Driver Store name you want for the Driver Store object.

  3. Specify the container name where you want the Driver Store object to reside.

  4. Specify a DNS name or IP address of the target server where you want the Driver Store to reside.

  5. Specify an eDirectory server that you want the Driver Store to communicate with.

    For fault tolerance, you can specify more than one eDirectory server from the same tree. For more information, see Changing the eDirectory Server Assignment.

  6. Click OK.

To modify the Driver Store properties or to add printer drivers, click Manage Driver Store, then select the Driver Store you want to modify.

10.5.2 Understanding the Driver Store Configuration File

When you create a Driver Store, a configuration file is created in /etc/opt/novell/iprint/conf. The filename is idsd.conf. Each time you use iManager to create a Driver Store object and assign it to the same server, a separate entry is added to idsd.conf. Although you can have several Driver Stores assigned to a server, all printer driver files are stored in one file structure on the server. For information about the entries in the configuration file, see /etc/opt/novell/iprint/conf/idsd.conf.

10.5.3 Changing the eDirectory Server Assignment

If you need to change the eDirectory server assignment for the Print Manager or Driver Store, edit the Driver Store Server1= entry in the corresponding configuration file, print_manager_name.context.ipsmd.conf or idsd.conf, located in /etc/opt/novell/iprint/conf.

NOTE:As many as two additional servers can be specified, using Driver Store Server2 and Driver Store Server3. Driver Store Server1 is considered to be the primary eDirectory server. Driver Store Server2 and Driver Store Server3 are considered to be secondary servers.

10.5.4 Loading or Unloading the Driver Store

You can start and stop the Print Manager in two ways:

Using the Command Line

The Driver Store uses systemctl scripts for starting and stopping the daemon. To load the Driver Store from the command line, enter systemctl start novell-idsd.service

The following systemctl script actions are also valid:

Table 10-2 Driver Store Actions

Action

Description

reload or force-reload

Stops and then starts the daemon.

start

Starts the daemon.

status

Displays the status of the daemon and the name of the Driver Store.

stop

Stops the daemon.

Using iManager

On the Driver Store Control property page, you can view the Driver Store’s status and unload or load the Driver Store daemon.

  1. In iManager, click iPrint > Manage Driver Store.

  2. Browse to and select the Driver Store you want.

  3. Click Driver Store Control > Shutdown to stop the Driver Store process.

  4. Click OK.

10.5.5 Updating Printer Drivers

  1. Add a new driver.

    For more information on adding a new driver, see Managing Printer Drivers.

  2. Associate the printer to the driver.

    For more information on associating a printer to the driver, see Step 3.

NOTE:Only the new iPrint Clients auto-update the drivers. For the existing or old Print Clients, you need to manually install and associate the drivers.

10.5.6 Deleting Printer Drivers

  1. In iManager, click iPrint > Manage Driver Store, then browse to and select the Driver Store you want.

  2. Click Drivers, then select the client platform you want to work with.

  3. Select the driver you want to delete.

  4. Click Delete.

  5. Click OK.