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Print Smart: Print Smart Mac Guide

Learn about printing at Madison College

Print Smart Mac Guide

Exploring the PaperCut Window

  • A Macintosh system with PaperCut installed on it will have an icon that opens when a user logs into a lab Macintosh system. The icon will appear in the Macintosh dock.

papercut icon showing in the program dock

  • Once the dock is populated with the PaperCut application, the actual PaperCut window will appear in the lower right corner of the dock window. Click the icon to open the PaperCut window.

papercut balance window showing a $0.00 balance

  • Close the browser window. Now go back to the PaperCut window as seen in step 2 above. Click on the Details button…
  • You will be presented with a login window. Enter your College username and password. Click on the OK button to proceed.

Mac papercut login

  • Once you have clicked on Log in or pressed return, the detail page will appear in the web browser explaining details of your account. Begin exploring the options on the left side of the window. In the following screen shot, we are seeing the recent print jobs for this account.

screenshot of recent print jobs in the online papercut interface


Printing with PaperCut

  • When you are ready to begin printing, we need to follow the same process for all Macintosh printing. The process has not changed. With your document open…

screenshot of an open document

  • Click on the print link either in the file menu or pressing the command-P combination to invoke the print command.

screenshot showing the print window open

  • When you click on the Print button the first time on an a Macintosh workstation, it will hold the print job until you have authenticated the actual printing process. The printer icon may bounce in the dock or appear with a yellow caution symbol on the printer icon in the dock, see the picture below.

screenshot of printing icon in the program dock

  • If you have already printed on this workstation before, the printer may not hold the print job for authentication. If it does, simply click on the printer icon to open the printer window.

screenshot of the printer queue

  • Click on the circled arrow next to the X button in the printer window to verify authentication or resume printing. The computer will ask you to type in your network ID and password again. You have the option of saving this information to your keychain so you don’t have to enter this again in the future.

screenshot of username and password authentication

  • Once you have clicked on the OK button, the printer will begin sending your print job to the printer. At this point, the PaperCut application will intercept the print job.

screenshot of papercut print confirmation popup

  • When you verify this is the correct document you wish to print and it is going to the intended printer, click on the Print button.  Here is where the cost associated with printing to any specific printer will appear, this window will show the cost. Again, you would click on the Print button to accept the charges. When the print job is finished, the dialog window for printing will show no current documents listed for printing.

 screenshot showing an empty print queue

Launching PaperCut / Print Smart

If the PrintSmart / Papercut window does not appear automatically on a MAC, check the Dock for the PC icon and click to launch, or use Finder to locate PCClient under Applications. Click to open and launch PaperCut/PrintSmart. The balance window should appear, and printing can proceed.