Techniques for scheduling and guaranteeing print jobs
View Patent ↗Techniques for scheduling and guaranteeing print jobs are presented. Print jobs are scheduled to process on a selected printer at user-defined dates and times. A print queue for the selected printer is managed to ensure that no subsequent print job begins on the printer when that subsequent print job cannot finish before a scheduled start time of a scheduled print job that has been guaranteed the scheduled start time on the printer.
1. A method implemented in a computer-readable storage medium to process on a server and to perform the method, comprising:
receiving, a print job request with print data from a requestor, the requestor is an automated service that provides automated interaction;
identifying a future date and time requested for the print job request and made by the requestor; and
assuring the requestor that the print job request is to execute on the future date and time after successful inspection of a schedule for a geographic location of other print jobs that are set to print on given dates and times, and ensuring that there are not any of the other print jobs that are submitted for processing to a specified printer that are to run past the future date and time for which the print job request is to start on the specified printer, and wherein the requestor guaranteed that the print job will execute on the future date and time without any interference, the schedule defined in a calendar for a specific printer at the geographical location and the calendar managed by a calendar system and entries within the calendar for the printer represents scheduled print jobs that are to be executed on the printer with each entry showing a start time and end time for a particular print job, and factoring into a determination for the end time an estimation for an amount of processing time to complete the particular print job on the specific printer at the start time.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein receiving further includes converting the print data into a printer driver format for purposes of estimating an amount of processing time that it is to take a printer to execute the print job request on the future date and time.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein converting further includes passing the print data to a printer driver to convert the print data into the printer driver format.
4. The method of claim 3 further comprising, notifying the requestor of the amount of processing time and indicating to the requestor that the print job request is to complete on the printer at a completion time that adds the amount of processing time to the future date and time.
5. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying further includes acquiring the future date and time via a graphical user interface selection made by the requestor that selects a particular calendar entry that identifies the future date and time.
6. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying further includes receiving a specific geographical location from the requestor as to where the print job request is to be processed on the future date and time.
7. The method of claim 1 further comprising, managing a print queue for a printer that is set to execute the print job request at the future date and time by ensuring that there are not any additional print jobs that are submitted for processing to the printer that are to run past the future date and time for which the print job request is to start on the printer.
8. The method of claim 7 , wherein managing further includes notifying a subsequent requestor associated with a particular print job that the particular print job cannot begin to process on the printer at a selected time because an estimate for processing the particular print job puts a completion of that particular print job in conflict with the future date and time when the print job request is to begin on the printer.