There are thre e user tools supplied with PaperCut ChargeBack :

  1.PaperCut ChargeBack Client ¨C a background application that runs on users' workstations , monitoring print jobs. When the user prints a document to one of the PaperCut ChargeBack monitored printers on the network, an account notification window pops up, prompting the user to select the account for the document.

  2.User Inquiry tool ¨C so users can check their printing balance

  3.Reports Generator ¨C collates the job log information from all the PaperCut servers into a single database, from whic h reports can be obtained.

PaperCut ChargeBack Client

The PaperCut ChargeBack Client runs silently in the background. It is set to start when a user logs in, and its icon (a folder with a printer in front of it) will appear in the system tray (Figure 11)

The client can also be launched manually from the Start menu, under "Start menu. Programs. PaperCut ChargeBack Client".

When the application starts, it contacts the PaperCut primary server to obtain a list of printers and secondary servers. The client then monitors each of these printers. Double click ing on the PaperCut icon in the system tray will also display window in Figure 19.

Press ing the Refresh Printers button forces the application to refresh the list of printers it's currently monitoring. The button should be press ed if a printer server has been rebooted or turned on since the application was started. A printer list will automatically refresh every hour

The Popup window

When a user prints a document to one of the monitored printers, the popup window shown in Figure 20 will prompt the user to select an account for the print job. The application remembers the last selected ac count, and highlights this account by default.

Users are also able to searc h by typing in the Search textbox. The searc hing functionality allows us ers to search for accounts in two ways:

  1.By main account: typing a string that appears in any main account will cause that main account and all its subaccounts to be displayed in the list. For instance, this allows narrow the list to accounts belonging to a partic ular client by typing the client's name in the search textbox.

  2.By account name directly: typing a string at appearsin any account will cause the ac count to be displayed. If it is a main account, then rule 1 applies. If it is a subaccount, then both the subaccount and its main account will be displayed.

To make account selection faster, users c an also set up their own personal list of perferred ac counts by selecting their preferred accounts (in the list on the All accounts tab) and c licking Add selected account to preferred list. The acc ounts will then appear in the preferred lis t, as shown in Figure 21. They can also be reordered and removed as need be.

The user can also a history of the previously selected accounts in the Recent selections tab.

The user also has the option of cancelling the job by pressing the Cancel Job button. If no account information is received within 5 minutes of the job being printed, the server automatically deletes the job. This prevents situations where many users print documents without selecting their account (which will cause congestion on the printer queues)