Set up Tasklet PrintNode

Description

PrintNode is a third-party cloud service providing connections to local and network printers.

The Tasklet PrintNode connector enables direct printing from Business Central, no matter if the print is initiated from the Web Client or Mobile WMS.

Overview

Install the PrintNode client

PrintNode is free up to a certain number of prints per month.

However, printing more requires a paid subscription. See https://www.printnode.com/pricing

Step 1: Create a PrintNode account

Most Business Central companies need a Single Account and a single PrintNode client - no matter the number of mobile devices and printers.

You create a PrintNode account by registering at https://api.printnode.com/app/login/register

Step 2: Install the PrintNode Client

A PrintNode client needs to be installed on a local server with the printers installed to make them available for the PrintNode service.

Please follow this guide to install the client https://www.printnode.com/docs/installation 

Step 3: Create an API Key

To give Business Central access to the PrintNode account, you will need to create an API Key.

You create an API Key while logged into your PrintNode account in the top-menu by pressing API Keys:

Or right here: https://api.printnode.com/app/apikeys

Set up the Tasklet PrintNode in Business Central

You need to grant Business Central access to PrintNode.

Step 1: Go to "Tasklet PrintNode Setup"

Step 2: Paste the API Key from PrintNode.com

Step 3: Enable Tasklet PrintNode

If the connection has been made, you can select "Enabled".

Add Printers

Before using PrintNode printers, the printers need to be added to Business Central.

Step 1: Go to "Tasklet PrintNode Printer Management"

Step 2: Add PrintNode printer

From the Tasklet PrintNode Printer Management page you can add PrintNode printers to the list of available printers.

• Add all PrintNode printers
  All available PrintNode printers will be added to the Printer Management page with a default name unless they are already in the list.
  
  
• Add a PrintNode printer
  You will be shown an empty Tasklet PrintNode Printer Settings page.
  Here you should click the assist edit button next to the PrintNode Printer ID field to be shown a list of available  PrintNode printers:

  

  
  
  
  
• This will populate the Name, Description, PrintNode Printer ID, and Client Name fields. 
  • You can change the Name and Description to make them more descriptive for your needs.
    
    
• Select the correct Paper Size

Tip: You can add a PrintNode printer multiple times if you need to have the printer available with different settings. 

Step 3: Configure printer settings

Clicking the printer name in the Printer Management page opens the Tasklet PrintNode Printer Settings page.

In most cases, you should simply select the Paper Type and maybe the Paper Tray. Then PrintNode will use the default settings for the rest.

The lists of available Paper Types and Trays are received from the printer driver via PrintNode.

Many printers show more Paper Trays than are physically available. It can therefore sometimes require a bit of trial and error to discover which Printer Tray name refers to which physical printer tray.

It can therefore be useful to name the printer with the description of the physical name of the tray if you have multiple instances of the same printer.

Step 4- Test printing

You could i.e. print the Inventory Top 10 List or similar to test the connector work as expected.

On the request page, you should be able to select the newly configured PrintNode printer.

Clicking Print will print the report without the need to preview the report first.

Optional Configuration

Printer selection

To get BC to automatically suggest a specific printer for specific users and/or specific reports you will need to configure Printer Selections.

This is also necessary to print during posting and other automated processes initiated from either a mobile device or a web client.

More info: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/business-central/ui-specify-printer-selection-reports

Post & Print from Mobile WMS

To get "Post and Print" functionality from Mobile WMS you can follow the Printing and Set up Report Print

The Tasklet PrintNode printers are not related to the Cloud Print solution using Interform. This means setting "Print on Sales Order Pick" or "Print on Warehouse Shipment Post" in Mobile Print Setup requires Cloud Print Service and cannot use the PrintNode connector.

Troubleshooting and advanced printer settings

Different printers and different versions of printer drivers can behave differently and sometimes make printing a bit difficult.

Before you start making complex changes to the printer settings it is important to understand how the PrintNode connector works.

When a report is printed to a Tasklet PrintNode printer BC is instructed to create an internal PDF file with the Height and Width defined in Printer Settings. These are the only parameters from the printer settings that are used for the PDF creation and are placed in the Page section of the Printer Settings page.

Next, the PDF is sent to PrintNode with additional printer settings. This includes the Printer ID but also the Paper Type, Paper Tray, and Paper Rotation (if not automatic). These fields are all placed in the Paper section. The width and height are never sent to PrintNode but are indirectly specified in the PDF file.

If for instance, you increase the height and width directly without changing the Paper Size field the result depends on the printer. Some printers scale the PDF to the actual paper size, resulting in a smaller output on the paper. Other printers might try to print the full-size PDF using multiple pages.

If for instance, the paper tray does not match the paper size, some printers ask the user at the printer which tray to use but other printers ignore the paper tray and other printers ignore the paper size.

Similarly, the Paper Rotation setting can be interpreted differently. Many printers treat 270 degrees as 90 degrees and 180 degrees as 0 degrees.

This hopefully explains why you might experience unexpected behavior when changing printer settings and why it might require some trial and error before the printer settings result in the desired output.