Pharos Blueprint Enterprise 3.1 Hot Fix 11

Pre-install

This Hot Fix is compatible with Pharos Blueprint Enterprise 3.1.

Note: If this Hot Fix is to be used for Trackers on NT4 workstations, contact Pharos Support before applying it.


Installation

This Hot Fix applies to all Blueprint components. It should be run on all Blueprint servers (Collector and Analyst) and any PCs running a standalone Blueprint Administrator, and also distributed to all Tracker workstations.

To apply and distribute this Hot Fix:
  1. Run the supplied Blueprint3.1ServerPatch3455.exe executable on all Blueprint server(s) and Administrator PCs.
    Note: During the installation of the Hot Fix, you will be asked for the location of the file Pharos Blueprint Enterprise.msi. This file is located in the root directory of the Blueprint CD. If you do not have access to the Blueprint CD, contact Pharos Systems for a copy of this file.
  2. Use Blueprint Administrator to create an install or upgrade package containing the new Print Tracker components.
  3. Distribute the package as you normally would.

Note: When installing Tracker packages in certain conditions, you may see the error message: "The application or DLL C:\WINNT\system32\OLE32.DLL is not a valid Windows image." If this error occurs, cancel the install, then find and delete the file wodFtpDLX.dll (located in WINNT\System32 or Windows\System32). You should then be able to re-run the installation. See Pharos Knowledge Base article #1274 for more details.

After applying this Hot Fix, the version number of affected components will be 3.1.3455.

Details

This Hot Fix addresses the following Server issues:

  • If a LogicalPrinters.xml file contained invalid data for the Last Transaction Time, the batch file would be rejected. PrintJobs.xml files containing invalid job times would also be rejected. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that batch files with invalid time data are corrected and imported.

  • This Hot Fix includes the following enhancements and fixes that increase support for Novell environments:

    • Logical Printers created by iPrint would fail the normalization process and be listed as Disconnected Logical Printers. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that such printers normalize correctly.
    • The normalization process has been modified to handle IPP URLs in server names (Novell iPrint Services) as server share connections. Connection matching for Novell NDPS server share connection types has also been improved by dropping unc port names from connection record.

  • This Hot Fix includes improvements to the period close process, making it faster to avoid timeout errors.

  • After performing an interim close on the first reporting period, all printers would have their connection type set to Standalone. (Full closes always produced correct data, as did interim closes after the first period.) The application of this Hot Fix ensures that device connections are correctly assigned when performing an interim close on the first period.

  • Occasionally, performing a clipboard operation (e.g. Cut or Paste) in Blueprint Administrator causes the application to crash. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that this problem no longer occurs.

  • In situations where users' Building locations were imported from an HR feed, with Floor locations specified using Blueprint Administrator, subsequent imports would reset the changes made in Administrator, leaving users with only a Building specified. The application of this Hot Fix means that a feed that contains only Building information will not reset existing Building > Floor details.

  • If the Analyst server is turned off for a long period (or if the TaskMaster service is stopped for a long period), the background task to keep the Blueprint database partitions current does not execute, which could result in check constraint violations when attempting to import data or close periods. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that any partitions in need of being reset are reset when the TaskMaster service starts up.

  • The application of this Hot Fix prevents exception errors on the Workstations screen that arose due to the mismatch between client and server versions of the platform enumeration.

This Hot Fix addresses the following Tracker issues:

  • When two Trackers with the same name tried to connect to the Analyst a number of exceptions were thrown. This usually happened when Workstations were renamed and the names used to belong to other machines with Trackers on them. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that if a Tracker with the same name exists then the second Tracker will be renamed by adding (1), (2), etc to the end of its name.

  • This Hot Fix includes the following enhancements and fixes that increase support for Novell environments:

    • When using NDPS printers in a Novell environment where the printers have been pushed to client workstations and have port names such as \\NDPS01, \\NDPS02 etc, the printers were reported in Blueprint using their port names instead of the printer name. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that the Tracker will report the printer name as seen by the user in the Printers window on the client workstation.
    • This Hot Fix ensures that the Tracker correctly retrieves Novell printer driver names and other Novell information correctly, and fixes problems when other software unhooks the Tracker, e.g. Novell client update.

  • This Hot Fix includes fixes to the spooler crashing in the following cases:

    • When using printer drivers with a bi-directional language monitor on Windows XP or later.
    • Using 64-bit Windows.

  • This Hot Fix adds support for extracting the port hostname/IP address from the "Lexmark Enhanced TCP/IP Port" registry key.

  • If an error occurred in the Tracker during the batching of print jobs, the Tracker would abort the batch process. If the error related to a problem on the Tracker, it would occur again during the next attempt to batch, which would hold up the job sending indefinitely. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that such errors do not hold up the batching process.

  • If the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem\NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation was set to "1" and the Tracker was not installed in the default location, page counting operations would fail. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that pages are counted correctly in this situation.

  • Slow processing of print jobs on a server or client machine with the Tracker installed. The problem is caused where there are restricted permissions to Program Files\PharosSystems\OutputManagement\PrintTracker\Spool or temporary directories on the machine. The problem can be identified by a large number of zero length psp*.spl files collecting in one of these directories.

  • The ComTaskMaster service consuming high CPU and memory resources within minutes of starting up. The problem was caused by the way that older Blueprint 3.0 jobs were processed and sent to the server. This issue only applies to sites which have upgraded from Blueprint 3.0.

  • This Hot Fix includes the following fixes and enhancements to the Blueprint Diagnostic Tool:

    • The Hot Fix includes stability improvements to the Diagnostic Tool.
    • In the presence of certain printer drivers, the Blueprint Diagnostic Tool would fail with an error message when run on Tracker workstations. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that the Diagnostic Tool runs correctly on Tracker workstations.
    • The Blueprint Diagnostic Tool would fail with an error message when run on Tracker workstations using a French locale. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that the Diagnostic Tool runs correctly on Tracker workstations.
    • If the Blueprint Diagnostic Tool was left running, or the process stopped unexpectedly, diagnostic gathering would not be turned off, which used up system resources. This Hot Fix ensures that diagnostic gathering will be stopped after 2 hours.

  • Previously, the Tracker could pagecount jobs incorrectly when printing PDF documents to certain printers. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that such jobs are counted correctly.

  • If a Tracker was unable to contact its Collector for a long time, it would attempt to send all stored print jobs in a single, potentially very large batch file when contact was re-established. Application of this Hot Fix ensures that Trackers will never send a batch larger than the Maximum Batch Size property (configured on the Tracker > Settings screen in Blueprint Administrator). Jobs will be grouped into multiple batches smaller than this size if necessary.

  • This Hot Fix adds a command line option to the Tracker installer, so that you can specify an install directory:
    InstallPackage.exe /dir="c:\install\directory"
    (Note the quote marks, and no space between the /dir= option and the install directory path.)

  • The application of this Hot Fix improves error handling, error reporting and robustness of the Tracker when the server is under load.

  • The Tracker now supports Lexmark C770 and C772 printer drivers.

  • This Hot Fix improves the Tracker installer's detection of the Windows operating system.

  • After applying this Hot Fix, the Tracker no longer makes use of the following registry keys: AlwaysSpoolToRaw, FilterDataTypes and JobAnalysis, as they are no longer necessary.

  • The Hot Fix adds the ability to define the location of the Print Tracker spool directory, should it be necessary. Contact Pharos for more details.

  • In situations where a Tracker was unable to communicate with its Collector for some time, and a large number of job XML files built up in the outbound jobs store, attempts to send a batch to the Collector would still fail when communication was restored. The application of this Hot Fix ensures that batches can always be forwarded when communication is possible.

  • Attempting to upgrade the Tracker on a busy print server (with print jobs continually coming through) would sometimes result in an incomplete upgrade, where not all of the required files were updated. This Hot Fix ensures that Tracker upgrades always succeed.

Need Help?

If further assistance is required, contact your Pharos Authorized Reseller.