Papercut Mf Upgrade

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Sherman Desrosiers

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Aug 3, 2024, 10:18:09 AM8/3/24

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A PaperCut NG/MF system might comprise many software components, such as secondary servers, locally installed User Clients or Release Stations. It is generally not required to upgrade these components along with an Application Server upgrade. However, we do recommend that you upgrade all components as best practice.

If you still use 32-bit workstations in your environment and are upgrading from version 18.3 or earlier to version 19.0 or later, also check out our End-of-life for 32-bit Operating Systems article for an important caveat on 32-bit support.

Schedule appropriate downtime, preferably out of hours since there will be some downtime involved when upgrading. We suggest to choose a time of day with minimal network activity. Also, if there is a large volume of data in the system, take some time to read this article discussing database upgrade times.

As a precaution, we recommend backing up the whole PaperCut directory before you start the upgrade. Existing overnight system backups might have taken care of this task, however, take a few moments to create an up-to-date backup now. For example, on Windows, create a zip archive of the directory:

After the install has completed, allow a few minutes before accessing the system through the web admin interface. The system may need to perform a database upgrade and this will be performed in the background. If you try to access the web admin interface while a database upgrade is in progress, a message with the upgrade status will be displayed.

IMPORTANT: Do not shutdown the application while an upgrade is in progress. Wait for the upgrade to complete.

We make sure that there is basic backward compatibility for secondary servers, user clients, devices, release stations, web print servers etc. This allows upgrades involving a large number of servers, or multiple sites, to be staggered, breaking up and localizing downtime.

However, you will likely not be able to take advantage of all the component-specific new features until those components are upgraded (for example if there is a new feature with a release station or user client, then there is a high chance that the release station or user client would need to be upgraded to make the most of that new feature.

If you encounter unexpected behavior or problems, please upgrade all PaperCut components as soon as possible before troubleshooting further. Should you request support for a problem where mismatched component versions is detected, this will be the first troubleshooting step.

Again, just like the Application Server upgrade or secondary server upgrade, for the Web Print Sandbox Server upgrade you just need to run the PaperCut NG/MF installation package and then follow the Set up Web Print: Sandbox mode directions, to install over the top of your current install on the Sandbox Server.

PaperCut MF users should now follow any upgrade instructions outlined in the embedded solution documentation for their devices. Your PaperCut Accredited Reseller will also be able to provide an appropriate resource to assist with this procedure. You. can find their contact details can be found in the PaperCut admin interface, in the About > Support section.

For perpetual customers (customers with a license installed), when you upgrade to PaperCut MF v24.0 or later, PaperCut MF accesses the license file on your Application Server, uploads it into the Global Entitlements Service, and converts it to a set of entitlements that do not expire.

Be aware that if your site uses more entitlements than the license or subscription covers, when you upgrade some devices will be automatically disabled or some PaperCut MF functionality might be affected.

There is a grace period of up to 30 days to rectify any internet connectivity issues. During this period, the following message is displayed in the admin interface. After this period, access to the admin interface becomes restricted and the following message is displayed.
X days remaining to activate installation. Activation requires connection to the PaperCut Gateway Service [URL]. If installation is not activated, Admin UI will be restricted.

Currently there is no option for offline activation. All servers being upgraded will require an active internet connection during the upgrade process, after which this access can be removed (until the next time they need to upgrade).

The PaperCut Application Server is designed to be backwards compatible, so you can have a newer version of the Application Server being used with older versions of the Secondary Servers, Release Stations, and Clients for the purposes of the upgrade. (Note, Site Servers are not on this list - they need to be upgraded at the same time as the Application Server).

However, we highly recommend upgrading those other components to match the primary Application Server as soon as possible, so that you gain the benefits of upgrading all the components in your environment.

OIT will be upgrading the PaperCut and printing systems on Saturday, July 6, starting at 8:00am. The upgrade should be done by 12pm. During the upgrade, campus printing will be unavailable. Once the upgrade is complete, printing will resume. In rare cases, you may have to reboot your machine to re-connect your PaperCut client with the PaperCut server.

This section describes the PaperCut MF standard upgrade procedure. PaperCut MF supports upgrades using a simple install-over-the-top procedure. Review all steps prior to commencing the upgrade procedure.

A PaperCut MF system might comprise many software components, such as secondary servers, locally installed User Clients and Release Stations. It is generally not required to upgrade these components along with an Application ServerAn Application Server is the primary server program responsible for providing the PaperCut user interface, storing data, and providing services to users. PaperCut uses the Application Server to manage user and account information, manage printers, calculate print costs, provide a web browser interface to administrators and end users, and much more. upgrade. However, we do recommend that you upgrade all components as best practice.

Download the PaperCut MF installer for your platform. In accordance with best practice, archive your install programs just in case you need to reinstall in the future or roll back to a previous version. Take some time to read the release notes for this version as they highlight considerations during upgrades.

Schedule approximately 10 minutes downtime. Select a time of day with minimal network activity. If there is a large volume of data in the system (for example, if the system has been running for more than a year, or there are more than 5,000 users) the upgrade takes longer. With very large installations, schedule an hour or more of downtime.

As a precaution on very large systems, back up the whole PaperCut MF directory. Existing overnight backups might have taken care of this task, however, take a few moments to grab an up-to-date backup now. For example, create a zip archive of the directory:

When the install is complete, allow a few minutes before accessing the system. The system might perform a database upgrade and this is done in the background. If you try to access the application while a database upgrade is in progress a message displaying the upgrade status is displayed. IMPORTANT: Do not shutdown the application while an upgrade is in progress. Wait for the upgrade to complete.

After the install is complete, log in to the system and perform some tests to ensure all is working as expected and the system is monitoring user activity as expected. Sites running on Novell OES Linux are advised to restart their iPrintiPrint is a technology developed by Novell that allows users to install printer-drivers from a web browser and to submit print jobs over the Internet or a local network through the standard Internet Printing Protocol (IPP). Common desktop operating systems such as Windows, Linux, and Mac support iPrint. Print Manager.

To start with: I'm not intending to say that the cause of this problem is due this or this. I only want the iOS users where I work to be able to print the way they was able before 17 and to know what has caused the problem not how to "make it to away".

When a solution to a problem is to "turn it off and on" the problem is doomed to come back until the actual cause is fixed. This might work in a SOHO environment but not in larger organisations where the device count on both iOS/IpadOS devices and printers it counted in hundreds or thousands.

We have thousands of client devices and >1000 iPads in the organization where I work and we immediately blocked upgrade to iOS/iPadOS 17 when we understood that AirPrint stopped working after upgrading to 17.x.

Result: AirPrint worked like before when they did run on 16. Nothing was done on printers (server handled, not SOHO devices), router (large firewall), DNS'es or any other parts of the network. Just downgraded the devices to 16.

How many times shall this be performed back and forth to get statistics if AirPrint works or not until this is seen as something that was introduced / changed (maybe not a real bug) in 17 since the problem isn't in 16.7.2 but in 17.x.?

So after lobbing it back to me I'll lob it back to you, where do you get the idea that it is working for "Millions of users"? Better yet, why do we not need to do all this restarting on 16 and earlier, and why does a config. profile not provide a workaround?

Just spotted that 17.2 is available for my iPhone so am downloading and installing it now, and will report back findings. Of course, the process of installing an update and rebooting tended to give me a day or so of Airprinting before it stopped again, so I would expect to be able to print after the update has been installed.