Starting in AX-3.7, a PrinterRecipient is available in the Recipients folder of the alarm module palette. It is similar to the prior LinePrinterRecipient, but is more appropriate for typical modern printers (such as laser printers) that print out each alarm on a separate page.
Like the LinePrinterRecipient, it applies to Windows hosted stations only. The printer must be “known” to the Windows OS of the host platform, selected from the printer drop down-list (Figure 258).
Figure 258. Example printers known to Windows OS of hosted station, in PrinterRecipient property sheet
The station must have permission to print on any printer chosen (which is typical).
The main differences from the LinePrinterRecipient are the additional “Font” property settings, which allow selection of font type, size, and various style overrides. Combined with the “multi-line” capable alarm message “text” properties in various alarm extensions (starting in AX-3.7), this provides more flexibility for alarm printing (see About alarm extension properties).
An example of the printer recipient property sheet is shown in Figure 257.
Printer recipient properties are described in the following list:
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Time Range
allows you to set a limited period of time during a day for printing, using the following parameters:
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Start Time
a time of day to begin alarm collection, defined by hour, minute and second.
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End Time
a time of day to end alarm collection, defined by hour, minute and second.
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Days Of Week
option boxes allow selection of specific days to print.
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Transitions
option boxes allow selection of specific alarm transitions to print. Only those transitions that are selected will be printed – even though the alarms are still saved into the alarm history.
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Route Acks
when this parameter is set to
true, Acks are routed to this recipient; when set tofalse,only alarms (not Acks) are routed to the recipient. -
Printer
a drop-down list shows printers available for selection. Select a printer from the list, which reflects printers (both locally attached and remote networked) that are “known” to the host platform’s Windows operating system. These are the only valid printer values (see Figure 258).
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Font
Provides a number of controls to select font formatting for printed alarms, including:
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(Type) — Lists the font type (default “Courier New”) with a drop-down
control for selection.
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(Size) — Point size of font (default 12.0) with a drop-down
control for selection.
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Style(s) — Checkboxes for Bold, Italic, and Underline, selectable separately or in combination, or else “Null/Default”. If null/default is chosen, this clears all other font settings, and specifies to use the printer’s native default font.
In the property sheet, a small area to the right of the Font settings displays a “preview” of selected font settings using a text string:
AaBbYyZz. -
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Language
this field provides a place to enter the ISO 639 language code for the language associated with the printer. This is a two letter code (lower-case preferred). Refer to the following link for the complete list of codes: http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_list.php.
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Print Format
This field has the following editable default parameters.
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Source: %alarmData.sourceName%
this parameter sends the source name of the alarm to print on the first line.
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Timestamp: %timestamp%
this parameter sends the timestamp of the alarm to print on the second line
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State: %sourceState% / %ackState%
this parameter sends the alarm state and the acknowledged state to print on the third line
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Priority: %priority%
this parameter sends the alarm priority to print on the fourth line
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Alarm Class: %alarmClass%
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Text: %alarmData.msgText%
For more information about how to format data in this field, click on the help icon 
to the right of the field.
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Alert on Failure
when this parameter is set to
true, an alert is generated if the printer fails to print the alarm. -
Alarm Source Info
contains the usual set of properties for configuring and routing alarms sourced from this component—in this case “alerts” for any failed print attempt (provided that “Alert on Failure” is true).