Managing spool documents

Spool Window

From the Spool Window, you can start, stop, view, and delete spool documents. You can schedule documents to print at a specific time, search the document list for text, set the document disposition, and send a document to another program. You can also modify the document attributes for routing documents to spool printers and customize the view by filtering on values and sorting columns.

To perform these tasks, you must have appropriate user access rights.

See also:


Checking for new documents

Most jobs immediately appear in the spool document list when they arrive in the spool. If you copy the folders to the spool from a command prompt or the Windows Explorer, you can check for new documents to immediately find and load the copied folders.

On the menu bar, select Document | Check for New Documents.

Changing the document state

For SYSIN jobs, you can only change the state of the first data set associated with the job. This change will then be applied to the other associated data sets. Alternatively, you can hold SHIFT and right-click any of the job's data sets. All of the job's data sets will then be automatically selected and affected by any changes you make.

Changes to the document state are stored in the documents spool header. To change a spool documents state, right-click the document and select a value from the list.

Routing spool documents

Complete the following steps to route spool documents to printers.

  1. If the attribute you are using as routing criteria is not visible, add the column to the Spool Window.

  2. In the appropriate column, double-click the printer and/or document field. Match the value in each field so the document will route to the specified printer. For example, double-click the Class field and type A.

See the Tips for routing spool documents topic for more information.

  1. Print the document.

Printing spool documents

You can enable spool documents to print by setting the document state to Ready. The document attributes must also match a spool printers attributes for the document to print. Use one of the following methods to print documents.

When a document is in the Printing state, you cannot modify the attributes of that document on the Spool Window.

Stopping spool documents

You can prevent or stop spool documents from printing by setting the document state to Hold with one of these methods.

Viewing spool documents

You can view the text of a spool document with one of these methods.  

When a document is in the Viewing state, you cannot modify the attributes of that document on the Spool Window. To edit the document properties, you must close the Viewer and change the document state to Hold. If you view a SYSIN data set (other than the first data set), the first data set will be changed to the Hold state. This prevents improper routing when data sets within the job are being viewed.

The document text displays in EBCDIC, which is the default display for the viewer.

The selected document displays in the Viewer utility window. For more information about the Viewer utility, in the Viewer window, select Help | Contents and Index.

Sending documents to another program

You can send documents to programs of your choice. Destination programs are stored in \\Program Files\Barr\Spooler\SendTo. If the SendTo folder does not already exist, it will be automatically created when you right-click a document in the Spool Window.

You must be granted the Document - View user access right to use this option.

Once you have established destination programs, they will appear in the Spool Window's Send To list. A maximum of 20 destination programs can display in the Send To list. To set up destination programs, use one of the following methods.

To send a document to a destination program, use one of the following methods in the Spool Window. Files sent from the spool to other programs are read-only. If you want to modify and save a file, use the program's Save As option.

Printing spool documents to multiple printers

You can print a single document to multiple different printers by using an override table. Override tables can route documents to printer groups or specific printers.

Route to printer groups

  1. Create a printer group. Printer groups cannot process SYSIN data.

  1. Create an override table to route to multiple destinations.

  2. Select the documents you want to print, right-click, and then select Ready.

To print all data sets as one complete job, all data sets must be in the Ready state before the printer is set to Ready. Otherwise, only the data sets in the Ready state will be included in the printout.

  1. Select the printers to which you want to print, right-click, and then select Ready.

Route to specific printers

  1. Create an override table to route to multiple destinations.

  2. Select the documents you want to print, right-click, and then select Ready.

To print all data sets as one complete job, all data sets must be in the Ready state before the printer is set to Ready. Otherwise, only the data sets in the Ready state will be included in the printout.

  1. Select the printers to which you want to print, right-click, and then select Ready.

Reprinting spool documents

There are some restrictions to consider when reprinting documents: 1) SYSIN jobs do not support range reprinting. If you need to reprint, you must reprint the entire document and 2) Jobs using the Barr File port cannot be reprinted from the Spool Window. You must reprint them from the Viewer utility. Complete the following steps to reprint documents from the Spool Window.

When using a reprint range to print multiple copies of a document, make sure you set both the reprint starting point and reprint stopping point. If the reprint stopping point is not set, the first copy will start at the specified reprint starting point, but the remaining copies will reprint as the entire document.

  1. Add the BARR_PAGESTART (Page Start) and BARR_PAGEEND (Page End) header fields from the BARR Information section to the Spool Window.

  2. On the Spool Window, select the documents you want to reprint.

You can select multiple nonadjacent fields by clicking a single row, and then holding down the CTRL key while you click other rows. You can select multiple adjacent fields by selecting a single row, and then holding down the SHIFT key while you click the last row.

  1. Click the Page Start column and type the page number of the first page in the reprint range. The document state will automatically change to Ready Reprint or Hold Reprint, depending on the documents original state.

  2. Select the documents you want to reprint again, and click the Page End column. Type the page number of the last page in the reprint range. The document state will automatically change to Ready Reprint or Hold Reprint, depending on the documents original state.

  3. Make sure the documents attributes match the spool printers attributes.

  4. When you are ready to print the file, right-click the document and select Ready.

Viewing spool document properties

Use one of these steps to view a spool documents properties (date, size, and reprint start and stop points) and header fields.

You can also view the document properties from the Viewer utility.

Deleting spool documents

You can delete individual documents or groups of spool documents with one of these methods.

Do not delete Barr spool documents with the Windows Explorer. You must delete documents directly from the Spool Window. Documents cannot be deleted while in one of the following states: Viewing, Receiving, Printing, or Locked.

If you delete a data set in a SYSIN job with multiple data sets, all of the job's data sets will be deleted.

If the document that requires deleting is in the Receiving, Locked, or Viewing state, you must first select Document | Tools | Abort Job from the Spool menu bar to change the state to HOLD Error before deletion is allowed.

Modifying spool document attributes

You can change values for all spool document attributes except for the columns that appear gray in color. The new attribute values are stored in the documents spool header. You can, however, clear the value for the Printer destination field by clicking the either the hand image or the piece of paper image on the far left of the document row.

Fields cannot be edited when documents are in the Printing or Viewing state. If you modify the attribute of a job header field for a multiple data set job, the attributes will be changes for all of the job's data sets.

You can edit multiple nonadjacent fields by selecting a single row, and then holding down the CTRL key while you click other rows. You can edit multiple adjacent fields by selecting a single row, and then holding down the SHIFT key while you click the last row.

Printing a list of spool documents

You can print a list of the documents in the spool folder or write the list to a file. The name of the active spool configuration file and the column headings from the Spool Window are included at the top of the list.

Send the list to a printer

Before you print the spool listing, you can use the Spool menus Print Setup command to set up the printer and the Print Preview command to see how the listing will print.

  1. On the menu bar, select Spool | Print Spool Listing.

  2. Select Document list, and then click OK.

  3. Select a printer from the Name list.

  4. Click Properties to view or change printer properties such as paper size, paper source, page orientation, and duplex printing.

  5. Specify the Print Range. You can print the entire document list or a range of pages.

  6. Specify the number of Copies and whether to Collate them.

  7. Click OK to start printing.

Write the list to a file

  1. On the menu bar, select Spool | Print Spool Listing.

  2. Select Document list, and then click OK.

  3. Select the Print to file check box.

  4. Click OK.

Scheduling documents to print

You can schedule documents to print at a specific time. For example, you can schedule certain jobs to print on a specific day of the week or you can schedule large jobs to print at night. Jobs become eligible to print at the specified time. They might not print at the exact time, depending on how many other eligible jobs are ahead of them in the queue.

  1. Select the documents you want to schedule.

  2. On the menu bar, select Document | Schedule. The Schedule Print Date and Time dialog box displays.

    Schedule Print Date and Time Dialog Box

  3. Use the calendar to select the print Date.

  4. In the Time box, specify the Hour and Minute and AM or PM.

  5. Click OK.

  6. Be sure the criteria of the documents match the criteria of a spool printer, or the documents will not print as scheduled.

When you schedule a document to print, the scheduled date and time displays in the State column after the word Ready. You can resize the State column on the Spool Window to view the scheduled print date and time, or the ellipsis (...) that indicates a scheduled date and time has been set. If you schedule a document that contains a reprint range, Reprint displays after the scheduled date and time.

Selecting documents to include in the diagnostic file

You can select documents to include in the diagnostics file, the next time you run the Diagnostics Utility.

  1. Select the documents to include in the diagnostics file.

  2. Right-click and select Add to Diagnostics, or, on the menu bar, select Document | Add to Diagnostics.

A list of the documents that will be included can be viewed from \\Temp\CustomDiag.txt. When the Diagnostics Utility is used, the documents listed in this file will be included if they still reside in the directory specified or if they reside in the retain folder.

The Diagnostics Utility must be run on the same computer where the files reside.

Searching document list for text

You can search for text strings in the information displayed for each document. For example, you can search for document names that end in the extension .rpt.

Complete the following steps to search for a text string.

  1. On the menu bar, select Document | Find.

  2. Enter the text to search for and select the search Direction.

  3. Click Find Next.

Setting the document disposition

When the retain feature is enabled, documents are retained by default, unless you set their dispositions to Delete. Complete the following steps to change the document disposition in the Spool Window.

To perform this task, you must have appropriate user access rights. If you change a data set's disposition in a SYSIN job with multiple data sets, all of the dispositions for the job's data sets will be changed.

  1. Add the Disposition (BARR_DISPOSITION) column to the Spool Window so you can easily identify each document's disposition and change the disposition on screen using the menu.

  2. Right-click the desired document, or use the Spool Window's Document menu.

  3. Select the desired command.

  4. Delete After Printing – Sets the document disposition to Delete, which will delete documents after they print.

  5. Retain After Printing – Sets the document disposition to Retain, which will retain documents after they print.

You can also change a document's disposition in these locations:

Override table
Create an override table using the NDHBNORD field in the Data Set Internal Custom Section to preset the document disposition field's value to -1 (Delete) or 0 (Retain).

Print Utility
– From the Print Utility's Manual Spooling tab, click Settings and assign a document attribute for the NDHBNORD field.

Valid file name extensions

Documents in the spool queue can have these extensions.

Option

Description

.asc

ASCII format

.bin

Binary (EBCDIC) format

.bnj

Barr NJE format. Files supplied by Barr Systems are in this format: binary format with NJE header information.

(blank)

For channel printers, a blank extension is the same as the .bnj extension. For all other printers, a blank extension is the same as the .bin extension.

.anj

AFP format with NJE headers

.afp

Raw AFP format