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Question

Printer help

Jul 26, 2016 12:08PM PDT

How could you set your printer up so that you need a smartcard to operate it. And your computer logs the users details. Thanks

Discussion is locked

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Answer
There are print metering systems.
Jul 26, 2016 1:00PM PDT

I'd go to those companies and see if they do this now or something I can use.

Creating this from scratch? Well, that's going to take a while.

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Answer
Re: printer
Jul 27, 2016 12:29AM PDT

Yes, we have such at work. I need my smartcard (the same smartcard as I need to enter the building) to login into the printer to be able to access my spool files on any "follow me" printer.
That's a Canon system, but I'm sure that all big companies (like Minolta, Ricoh, Xerox, Oce) offer such.

What you need:
- hardware to read the smartcard integrated with the printer
- server software to handle (a) the logon, (b) the spool files. For (a) it needs access to the central database that contains the smart card data (the same database as is linked to the devices at the entrance for us) and for (b) it needs to be linked to Windows, so the printer driver on my PC knows what server to send the spoolfile to and how to link it to my smartcard id. Additional services for such server software could be billing and restricting access (such as only allowing color prints to certain smart cards).

If you know what you want: go shopping.