Skip to main content

Direct Printing Session Settings

Session settings for Direct printing control how managed printers behave across user sessions. While Tricerat doesn't provide a default set of Direct printing session settings (the internally programmed defaults work well for most environments), you can create your own Managed Printer Session Settings when you need to customize behavior. This article provides a complete reference for the settings you can configure and how they affect your users' printing experience.

Understanding Managed Printer Session Settings​

Managed Printer Session Settings apply to all Direct printers assigned to an owner. You can't apply these settings on a per-printer basis—when you assign session settings to a user, group, or workstation, those settings affect every Direct printer that owner has access to. This consistent approach simplifies management while ensuring predictable behavior across your environment.

The session settings you create here are separate from the session settings for Endpoint printers, Print Server printers, and Scanning. Each printer type has its own session settings objects, allowing you to tailor behavior appropriately for different printing scenarios.

Creating and Assigning Session Settings​

You'll manage Direct printing session settings in ScrewDrivers Administration, working with the Managed Printer Session Settings folder in the Objects pane. The process follows the same pattern you'd use for other session settings types: create the settings object, configure its options, save it, and then assign it to owners.

To Create New Session Settings​

Confirm the Objects pane is set to Session Printer Settings objects. You might need to click the Session Printer Settings icon on the ScrewDrivers Administration Icon bar.

Before you create new settings, you can expand the Managed Printer Session Settings folder to see what's already been configured, or use the search function to find specific settings objects.

In the Objects pane, right-click Managed Printer Session Settings (or the label might show as "Direct IP Printer Session Settings" in some versions). A dialog opens showing icons for the types of session settings objects you can add. If you hover over an icon, a tooltip displays the object type name.

Click the Managed Printer Session Settings icon. The New Managed Printer Session Settings dialog opens.

Enter a descriptive name for the new session settings, then click Add. The dialog closes and your new session settings appear in the Managed Printer Session Settings folder in the Objects pane.

Select your newly created session settings object. The Information pane displays the Session Settings object form with four tabs. The General tab is open by default, showing all values set to their defaults.

To Edit Existing Session Settings​

If you want to modify an existing set of session settings rather than create new ones, the process is simpler. Select the session settings object in the Objects pane. The Information pane displays the object form with all tabs available and all values set to their current configuration. Make your changes and click Save.

You can also assign existing session settings to an owner without modifying them. Just select the settings in the Objects pane and drag them to the appropriate owner in the Assignments pane.

General Tab Settings​

The General tab contains driver version management options that control how ScrewDrivers handles situations where the driver version on the remote machine differs from the driver version assigned to the printer in the database.

Driver Version Scheme​

You'll choose one of three driver version management approaches. These options are mutually exclusive—you can only select one at a time.

Do not allow driver upgrades or downgrades prevents any driver version changes. If the driver version on the remote machine doesn't match the driver version in the database, the printer won't be built. This strict approach ensures absolute consistency but requires you to manually update database driver versions when you deploy new driver releases.

Allow driver upgrades but not downgrades is the default setting and represents the most common approach. When the remote machine has a newer driver version than what's in the database, ScrewDrivers will use the newer version. However, it won't downgrade to older versions. This setting lets you roll out new drivers without database updates while protecting against accidental downgrades.

Allow driver upgrades and downgrades permits any driver version mismatch to be resolved automatically. Whether the remote machine has a newer or older driver than what's in the database, ScrewDrivers will use whatever version is available on the remote machine. This maximizes printer availability but reduces version consistency across your environment.

Printer Naming Tab Settings​

The Printer Naming tab controls how ScrewDrivers constructs printer names that your users see in their sessions. Getting printer names right is important—users need to identify which printer is which, but excessively long names can be difficult to work with in application print dialogs.

Naming Scheme Options​

You'll choose from three naming scheme approaches: use a default scheme, edit a default scheme with constraints, or create a custom scheme from scratch.

Using a Default Naming Scheme​

The simplest approach is to select one of four predefined naming schemes without modification. Each scheme arranges the printer name, machine name or session ID, and user name differently to suit different organizational preferences.

Printer Name (MACHINE:SESSION) is the default selection. This scheme puts the descriptive printer name first, followed by the machine name and session ID in parentheses. For example: "HP LaserJet 4000 (WKS001:2)". Users see the printer name prominently while still having machine and session identification available.

MACHINE:SESSION (Printer Name) reverses the emphasis, putting the machine and session first. For example: "WKS001:2 (HP LaserJet 4000)". This approach is useful when you're primarily concerned with tracking which machine users are printing from.

Printer Name (USER:SESSION) replaces the machine name with the user name. For example: "HP LaserJet 4000 (jsmith:2)". This scheme works well when you want to identify which user is printing rather than which machine they're using.

USER:SESSION (Printer Name) puts the user and session first. For example: "jsmith:2 (HP LaserJet 4000)". Like the machine-first scheme, this emphasizes user identification over printer identification.

Editing a Default Naming Scheme​

If the default schemes are close to what you need but require some refinement, you can apply constraints to them without building a custom scheme from scratch. You'll enable editing options that let you limit component lengths and replace problematic characters.

Limit name component lengths lets you set maximum character lengths for the Printer, Machine, and User components individually. The default limit is ten characters when you enable this option. Limiting component lengths prevents printer names from becoming unwieldy in print dialogs, especially when you have printers or machines with long descriptive names.

For example, if you've got a printer named "HP Color LaserJet Pro MFP M479fdw" and you set a printer name limit of 15 characters, the printer name component would be truncated to "HP Color LaserJ" in the final printer name.

Character replacement options let you substitute specific characters that might cause problems in printer names. You can replace backslashes, forward slashes, commas, and parentheses with alternative characters. By default, backslashes are replaced with underscores when you enable replacement.

These replacements are useful when printer names contain characters that don't work well in Windows printer names or that might confuse users. You're not limited to the default replacement character—you can change the underscore to any other character that makes sense for your environment.

Using a Custom Naming Scheme​

For maximum control, you can build a completely custom naming scheme. Custom schemes give you precise control over component order, separators, and format, but they require more careful planning to ensure printer names remain functional and comprehensible.

Select "Custom" to enable custom scheme options. You'll specify the format of your scheme using Session ID and one or more of these components: Printer, Machine Name, and User. The scheme can have up to three components in addition to Session ID, but you can use fewer if you want simpler names.

You might use just Machine Name and Session ID for a minimal scheme, or you might include all three components (Machine Name, Printer, and User) for maximum detail. The key requirement is that you must include Session ID in every custom scheme. Tricerat doesn't support schemes without Session ID because users might log into multiple sessions, creating naming conflicts if Session ID isn't part of the name.

You can apply the same refinements to custom schemes that you'd use with default schemes: component length limits and character replacement. Turn on "Limit name component lengths" to set maximum character counts for Printer, Machine, and User components. Turn on character replacement options to substitute problematic characters with alternatives.

Assignments Tab​

The Assignments tab shows you which owners currently have these session settings assigned to them. This view helps you understand the scope of impact when you modify settings—you'll see exactly which users, groups, or workstations will be affected by your changes.

The tab provides filtering and search capabilities so you can quickly find specific owners in environments with many assignments. You can also remove assignments from this tab if you need to unassign settings from particular owners.

Audit Tab​

The Audit tab provides detailed logging of all changes made to the session settings object. You'll see who made changes, when they made them, and what was modified. This audit trail is invaluable for troubleshooting configuration issues and maintaining compliance with change management policies.

The Audit tab is covered in detail in the Data Review appendix of this guide.

Assigning Session Settings to Owners​

After you've configured your session settings, you'll assign them to owners using the standard ScrewDrivers Administration assignment workflow. Select the session settings object in the Objects pane, then drag it to the appropriate owner in the Assignments pane.

If the owner you need doesn't exist in your Active Directory, you can create Network owners in ScrewDrivers Administration to represent groups, workstations, or location-based owner definitions.

When you assign Managed Printer Session Settings to an owner, those settings take effect for all Direct printers assigned to that owner. You can't selectively apply session settings to some Direct printers but not others for the same owner.

Session Settings Best Practices​

Creating effective session settings requires balancing consistency with flexibility. The default driver version scheme (allow upgrades but not downgrades) works well for most environments because it lets you deploy driver updates without immediate database synchronization while preventing accidental rollbacks to older versions.

For printer naming, start with one of the default schemes before building custom schemes. The default schemes have been refined through years of customer deployments and address common requirements. Only create custom schemes when you've got specific requirements that the defaults can't accommodate.

Consider creating multiple session settings objects for different organizational units or user types. You might have one set of settings for general office workers with permissive driver version management, and another set for specialized workgroups with strict driver version control. This targeted approach lets you balance management overhead with user needs.