In short
The print station is the operator’s end of print requests: a screen showing what is waiting, connected to a real printer through a print service, with one action per job. You start a session, work the queue, and stop the session when the event ends.
The behavior that matters most under pressure is what happens when a print fails. A job is claimed the moment you send it, so no second operator can grab it — but if the printer rejects it, the claim is released again and the job returns to the queue. You never have to work out whether a failed job is stuck to somebody else’s screen, and you never have to reconstruct an order by hand.
On this page
What has to be in place first
The station will not print until three things are true, and it says which one is missing rather than failing obscurely.
- Print requests are enabled for the community, so there is something to print.
- A print service account is connected, by putting its key into the community’s settings.
- A printer is chosen. Refresh the list of printers the service can see, and pick one.
Clearing the key clears the chosen printer along with it, which is deliberate: a printer selected under an old account is not a printer, it is a number that used to mean something. Re-enter the key and choose again.
Sessions
Starting a session marks this screen as the one working the queue. Stopping it ends that. The screen shows how many jobs are waiting and how many have been printed, so a handover between two operators is a glance rather than a conversation.
Stopping a session does not delete anything. Requests that were never printed stay pending and are still there when a session is started again.
Working the queue
The pending list shows each request with its ticket number, the size, the quantity, and a preview of the picture. Anything that can’t reach the community’s Minimum resolution (DPI) at the size ordered is flagged as low resolution, so you can see before you print that the result will be softer than the size implies — and warn whoever is collecting it, which is far better than them discovering it afterwards.
Each job can be previewed as it will be sent. It is worth doing on the first job of a run, once, to confirm the paper and the orientation are what you expect. After that the run is repetitive by design.
Low resolution is measured against the minimum the host set in Customize, not a fixed figure. With the minimum at zero, or with Bypass minimum resolution on, nothing is flagged. A small photo is never stretched to fill a large print: it prints at the detail it actually has.
Claim, print, verify
There is a middle case. A printer that has accepted a job but not yet finished it is treated as success and the job is marked done, with its state shown so you can see it is still working. Only an outright rejection releases the claim. That is the right way round: paper physically emerging is not something the software can wait for.
Auto-print
With Auto-print switched on in the community’s Customize page, incoming requests are sent to the printer without anybody pressing anything. You choose how long to wait first:
| Setting | What happens |
|---|---|
| Off (manual print only) | Every job waits for an operator |
| Instant (no cancel window) | A job goes to the printer as soon as it arrives |
| 30-second, 60-second or 2-minute cancel window | The job shows Auto-print in a countdown, with a Cancel auto-print button, then prints |
A canceled countdown leaves the job in the queue as an ordinary pending request. Low-resolution requests are never auto-printed — they wait for an operator — unless Bypass minimum resolution is on. Auto-print pairs naturally with Open Bar for a station that runs itself.
When there is no printer in the room
Not every job is printed on site. A separate production view organizes the same requests by size, with the finished print file and the original photograph both available, individually or as a bundle per size. That is the route when printing happens at a laboratory, on equipment the print service cannot see, or after the event entirely.
| Print station | Production view | |
|---|---|---|
| Needs a connected printer | Yes | No |
| Working unit | One job at a time | A whole size at a time |
| Output | Paper | Files to download |
| Suits | Prints handed over on the spot | Sending a batch to a laboratory |
Symptoms, causes and fixes
| Symptom | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Not configured for this community | No print service key, or no printer chosen | Add the key, refresh the printer list, pick one |
| The printer list is empty | The printer is off, offline, or not visible to the print service | Switch it on and check it appears there, then refresh |
| The chosen printer disappeared after a settings change | Clearing the key clears the printer with it | Re-enter the key and choose the printer again |
| Rejected the job | Out of paper, an error state, or the wrong paper size loaded | Fix the printer. The job is already back in the queue |
| A job vanished from pending but nothing printed | Another operator took it, or auto-print sent it | Check the printed count and the printer itself before re-sending |
| Prints look soft | The source photograph is small for the size ordered | Nothing to fix here. Raise the minimum resolution if you’d rather refuse such orders |
| Low-resolution jobs are sitting in the queue during auto-print | Auto-print skips low-resolution requests | Print them by hand, or turn on Bypass minimum resolution |
| Nothing waiting although guests are ordering | No session started, or print requests are not enabled | Start a session; check the community’s settings |
| The same job printed twice | It was sent, appeared to fail, and was sent again | A rejected job returns to the queue — check the printer before re-sending |
Things people commonly get wrong
Branded and scannable prints
If the community uses print branding, every print comes out with its branding bar already applied, and scannable prints are marked before they are sent — including with auto-print. If branding or marking fails for one print, that print still goes out — as the plain photo, with white where the bar would have been — and it won’t scan. Print at 100% with no scaling or “fit to page,” so the print keeps its exact size. See Print branding and scannable prints.
Related reading: Requesting a print, Print branding and scannable prints, Uploading media, Operating the gate, and When something is not working.