Creating and deploying Managed Printer lists for the Universal Print Driver with HP Web Jetadmin 8.0 for use with the Active Directory Administrative Templates. May 10, 2007

IntroductionIn enterprise environments where print policy is managed using Microsoft Active Directory, the HP Administrative Templates, and the Universal Print driver, a means to create Managed Printer lists is needed. A method to create and deploy Managed Printer Lists (MPLs) using HP Web Jetadmin is described in this paper.

Operation Overview

Create Device List

With HP Web Jetadmin

Export Device list as UPD MPL

Store MPL on Web Server

UPD reads MPL from Web ServerFile Save

Group Policy Settings

UPD reads MPL Location from Group Policy

Settngs

UPD applies Polcy Settings and Printer List

AdministrativeTemplate

HTTP Get

1. Create & Store MPL

2. Create Group Policy Settings

3. Print

1. The Managed Printer List (MPL) is an XML file that is created and exported by HP Web Jetadmin and placed on a web server somewhere on the enterprise network.

2. The URL where the XML file is located is entered by the print administrator into the Administrative Template, and is stored in the windows registry on the computer where the UPD is running.

3. At print time, the Universal Print Driver (UPD) performs an http get to the server to download the XML file.

Software Requirements• HP Web Jetadmin Version 8• Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) or some other HTTP web server

software running on the same server as HP Web Jetadmin.• HP Universal Print driver version 4.0.0.0 or later• Microsoft Active Directory environment running on Windows Server 2000 or

later

Assumptions

It is assumed that the reader already knows how to discover printers using WJA and how to create WJA printer groups, so no further instructions are given

Figure 1 shows a Device Group named Bonus Room which contains two devices.

Exporting Device Groups as XML Managed Printer Lists

Create a custom View that will contain all the device information required by UPD. Do this by clicking on the button next to the View: drop down box.

Figure 2 shows the Edit Views screen. From the Available Columns list, add the following columns to the Columns to Show list:

Required:

• Device Model• IP Address• IP Hostname

Optional: • Custom Field 1 – Will hold the friendly name of the device• Custom Field 2 – Other general comments about the device• Description – Other information about the device like physical location• Duplexer• Total Disc Space (MB) – Used to indicate if the device has an internal disc drive.• Hardware Address• System Name

Click Save As… and enter in a name for the custom View. In this example UPD MPL is used as the name of the view.

Close the Window

Select Device Management->Device Cache->Export Parameters

Create an addition to this page or a new plug in. Create a new page.

Append date time to file name: unchecked

Export Directory: C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\hpmplThis must be the name of a directory on the hard drive of the server where Web Jetadmin is installed. HP Web Jetadmin cannot access network shares. If Microsoft IIS or some other HTTP web server is installed on the same server as HP Web Jetadmin, then this directory should be one of the directories that are accessible via HTTP from a the clientrunning the HP Universal Print driver.

Format: XML

View: UPD MPL This is the view that was created earlier that exports the required UPD information

Device Group: Name of the WJA Device Group that you want to export into an MPL.

Click Export Now.

The name of the device group XML file will be the Group Name concatenated with the View Name with the extension XML. All spaces will be replaced by the underscore (‘_’) character. All characters will be lowercase. In this example, the resulting file will be named:

bonus_room_upd_mpl.xml

Note: If Append time to file name was selected, then on April 26, 2007, the resulting file name would be:

bonus_room_upd_mpl_20070426_211341.xml

Sample Exported WJA Managed Printer list file<Devices>

<Device><CustomField1 /> <IPAddr>192.168.1.51</IPAddr>

<Port>1</Port> <IPName /> <IPXName>NPI91EC00</IPXName> <Model>HP DeskJet 990C</Model> <Desc /> <CustomField2 />

</Device><Device>

<CustomField1 /> <IPAddr>192.168.1.50</IPAddr> <Port>1</Port> <IPName>NPI9EC116</IPName> <CatIpx>Yes</CatIpx> <IPXName>NPI9EC116</IPXName> <Model>HP Color LaserJet</Model> <Desc>Bonus Room laser printer</Desc> <CustomField2 /> <CAP_DUPLEX>No</CAP_DUPLEX>

</Device></Devices>

Configuring the Administrative Templates

Custom MPL Count: Enter the total number of MPL’s that you have configured

Name: Recommended to be the same as the WJA Device Group name, but can be anything that you want displayed in the UPD UI to identify this printer list.

Path: http://192.168.1.99/hpmpl/bonus_room_upd_mpl.xml This is the network path or URL that points to the file that you saved earlier. Some things to note:

• The protocol used is http. If the directory is secure and requires https, the MPL load will fail.

• Either the IP address of the WJA server or the server name can be used if DNS or some other name resolution service is available.

• The name of the file follows directly afterwards. The network path to the file is different from the local drive path that you entered in WJA.

Type: Web Jetadmin XML MPL

Verification

Select File-> Print from any application

Select the HP Universal Printing driver.Click OK

In the Find a printer section, you should see the name of the printer group that you entered into the Administrative Template. In this case the name is Bonus Room.

Double click the printer group that you created.

You should see all the printers listed that were in that WJA group, and were in the exported XML file.

Troubleshooting

Problem:Printer list is empty.

Searching for and using Network Printers may be disabled in the Group Policy. Verify that Network Printers in User Search Capabilities Properties in the administrative template is checked.

Problem:Policy is not enabled in the UPD.

The UPD needs to be installed using the install.exe utility and with the command line option /epfhkcu

With 4.0 the policy enable/disable is only affected when using the install.exe. So if you install a UPD via Add Printer Wizzard then policy is on by default. If you install UPD using install.exe and do not use the enable or policy option, then policy is off by default.

Problem: Administrative Template settings are not being applied.

Are the other Administrative Template settings being applied? Check the registry key to verify that the key,

HKCU\Software\Policies\Hewlett Packard\HP Print Settings\ADSPrintPolicy is present.

HKCU\Software\Policies\Hewlett Packard\HP Print Settings\ADSPrintPolicy

Problem: Wrong settings in the registry

• Verify that the registry settings are as you intend them to be. In particular, inspect the key CustomMPLPath0. If the path is not the same as the one entered in the Administrative Template, or if the key is missing, your group policy settings are not being applied.

• Verify that the CustomMPLCount is correct.• Verify that the CustomMPLType0 is 0x00000001.• Verify that you are logged into the domain• Contact your IT administrator for further assistance.

Problem:The WJA server is on a different subnet than the UPD and is not reachable.

To determine if the WJA server is reachable from the client PC, user the ping command to see if the WJA server responds.

Open a command window

Problem:MPL file cannot be downloaded.

Once it has been determined that the server is reachable, the next step is to see if the desired MPL file is there and can be retrieved.

Open a browser and in the address bar enter the same Path that was entered in the Administrative Template, Managed Printer List settings Properties

If your browser display is similar to the one above, this means that the UPD should be able to reach the WJA server.

If the browser is saying that the page cannot be found, then:• If you are using the hostname of the WJA server, try using the IP address instead.

If this works, then you have a DNS or name resolution issue on your network. Contact your network administrator

• Make sure that the URL is correct. Verify that you are using http, the correct hostname/IP, and the correct file name with .XML extension.