I would never have thought that printing would become a spectator sport but it has! It is not a popular sport however, and I hope to eradicate it quickly.
The problems with printing (it has always been slow when processing lengthy jobs and ones with a lot of graphics) were intensified when we added two new services to our public print workstation. Both are welcome additions but the consequences were much greater than we had anticipated.
One new service is that grad students can print their free $300 per year printing quota at our public workstation rather than having to go to the William Small Lab on the other side of the campus. While this is great news of course, we didn't anticipate that students would regularly be sending printing jobs of 100 pages to the printer. One person actually wanted to send a 1000 page print job but the referee called a time-out.
The second new service is that all students can now send print jobs from their laptops with some exceptions, via the wireless connectivity in the Library. To learn more about this service please read the York Remote Printing web page and note especially what's not supported
- Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 8
- 64-bit Operating Systems
- Apple Mac OS X 10.6 "Snow Leopard"
I have ordered a second printer and although it has arrived I am awaiting the installation of a network drop. The second printer should be available shortly.
Although the addition of the second print release workstation will help to alleviate the wait time, we are asking that if you have graphic laden print jobs (even 6 pages will take over 5 minutes to print) and if you are sending more than 5 pages of a pdf or PowerPoint or if you are sending more than 25 pages of a Word document that you choose the second printer which is located in the reference room behind the circulation desk. This will allow students who need to print their assignments for class or who have smaller print jobs to get their printing done quickly.
And don't forget that if you are a Schulich School of Business student and intend to pay using your YU Card you can use the B&W printing service available in the SSB Lab located in S337. The hours are 8 am to 11 pm, Monday to Friday and 10 am to 6 pm, Saturdays and Sundays.