Hi, I'm pleased to announce the immediate availability of PyKota v1.20 BETA.
PyKota is a GPLed print quota and accounting software for CUPS and LPRng written in the Python language. This software can store its datas either in LDAP or in a PostgreSQL database, and features both hardware and software accounting. Hardware accounting supports SNMP, PJL, Netatalk, or any other method you may create yourself. Software accounting natively supports PostScript, PDF, PCL3, PCL4, PCL5, PCLXL (aka PCL6), and ESC/P2 but here too you can use your own accounting software if you prefer. In fact its great extensibility allows you to plug your own software at most strategic points, giving an unprecedented versatility. PyKota is available either in the form of 20 US$ yearly subscriptions to Official packages (tarballs, .rpm and .deb), or for no fee through the use of CVS. Learn more about PyKota or download it from : http://www.librelogiciel.com/software/PyKota/action_Presentation List of changes in 1.20BETA compared to 1.19 : ---------------------------------------------- - Added internal handling of SNMP and PJL_over_TCP/9100 queries through the magic "hardware(snmp)" and "hardware(pjl)" accounter directives' values. This tremendously lowers the CPU usage because no subprocess has to be launched, and is generally much more reliable than using an external script. The use of external scripts is still allowed though, but internal handling is now the preferred way if your printer supports this. NB : For SNMP you need to install the http://pysnmp.sf.net module. - Introduction of the new dumpykota command which can dump PyKota's datas in the following formats : - comma separated values ; - semicolon separated values ; - tab separated values ; - XML. Importing datas in a spreadsheet can now be done through a data dump and import, in addition to using the PostgreSQL ODBC driver. This allows people who use the LDAP backend to create nice reports too. - Introduction of the new autopykota command to ease the automation of user account creation on first print when the limiting factor is their account balance's value : this commands takes care of a special case not directly handled by edpykota. - Introduced the notion of PyKota administrators (e.g. members of the lpadmin group) to delegate priviledges to non-root users. This is now enforced in dangerous commands like pkprinters, edpykota, as well as in the data dumper who could otherwise reveal private informations. The reporting tool and user warning tool accept to be run in extended mode by non-root users if they are PyKota administrators. - Numerous fixes for charset encoding. All textual fields are now stored as UTF-8 encoded strings. - Improvements in LPRng printer's hostname detection code. - An md5 checksum of each job's datas is now computed and exported to subprocesses as an environment variable. It will be added to the database schema in the future, this will allow the admin to refuse duplicate jobs through a configuration directive. - Added the winbind_separator configuration directive to automatically strip out the Windows/Samba domain name when printing. - Added the --hardreset command line option to edpykota to also reset users' life time page counters to 0 in addition to the actual page counter. - Added full support for PCL3 and ESC/P2 in software accounter. More than 60 GhostScript devices are now supported and checked when running the testsuite. Supported Page Description Languages are now : - DSC compliant PostScript ; - Binary PostScript ; - PDF ; - From PCL3 to PCL5 ; - PCL6 (aka PCLXL) ; - ESC/P2 ; - Improved the software accounter to correctly handle the number of copies if set in the job's datas (not PJL yet though). - All command line tools' help is now internationalized, as well as all manual pages. NB : For this BETA release only the English, French (and Belgian French), and Spanish help and manual pages are complete. - Added the German and Belgian-French translations. - Lots of small fixes all over the place. Comments are very much welcome. Thank you for reading. Jerome Alet ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- YOU MUST BE A LIST MEMBER IN ORDER TO POST TO THE LPRng MAILING LIST The address you post from or your Reply-To address MUST be your subscription address If you need help, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] (or lprng-requests or lprng-digest-requests) with the word 'help' in the body. To subscribe to a list with name LIST, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with: | example: subscribe LIST <mailaddr> | subscribe lprng-digest [EMAIL PROTECTED] unsubscribe LIST <mailaddr> | unsubscribe lprng [EMAIL PROTECTED] If you have major problems, call Patrick Powell or one of the friendly staff at Astart Technologies for help. Astart also does support for LPRng. Also, check the Web Page at: http://www.lprng.com for any announcements. Astart Technologies (LPRng - Print Spooler http://www.lprng.com) 6741 Convoy Court San Diego, CA 92111 858-874-6543 FAX 858-751-2435 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
