Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!rutgers!ames!ucbcad!ucbvax!cbatt!ihnp4!aicchi!ignatz From: ignatz@aicchi.UUCP (Ihnat) Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions Subject: Re: Multi-Spoolers Message-ID: <887@aicchi.UUCP> Date: Wed, 7-Jan-87 03:25:49 EST Article-I.D.: aicchi.887 Posted: Wed Jan 7 03:25:49 1987 Date-Received: Wed, 7-Jan-87 22:40:23 EST References: <161@ndmath.UUCP> <99@ems.UUCP> <126@tdi2.UUCP> Reply-To: ignatz@aicchi.UUCP (Ihnat) Organization: Analysts International Corp; Chicago Branch Lines: 27 Keywords: spoolers Summary: John Collins' spool package may help A fellow named John Collins, over the 'Big Water' (in England) distributed a spooler over net.sources a couple of years ago that we've been running ever since on the office machine. It offers multiple printer support, along with forms support, printer initialization, a simple accounting mechanism, a fairly nice control interface (allowing suspension and cancellation of jobs on a per-job basis), etc. It uses only vanilla signals to communicate between processes that comprise the spool package, and doesn't use 'signal- answerback' signalling, so it is (rather rarely) subject to lost-signal hits; but it's proven to be the best package we've found for the features offered. I haven't spoken with John for a year or so; I really should give him a call, as he indicated that he was then planning some enhancements that would be 'nice'. I understand that h is (or was then!) marketing it in the UK, but released it in the US because he didn't care for the hassles of trying to defend it overseas. (don't ask me about legality; I'm just the bitbeater in this instance.) I agreed to be willing to be a source and semi-support on this side of the ocean, but I suspect I ought to talk to him again. In any case, the package as released at that time is available through me (I think its distribution predates mod.sources); Caveat Utilitor. Bug reports accepted, action as possible. Enough interest, and I'll try to track John down... -- Dave Ihnat Analysts International Corporation (312) 882-4673 ihnp4!aicchi!ignatz || ihnp4!homebru!ignatz