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Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Colour Printing, Transparencies and Special Formats
You can print A4 black and white pages from any computer in the Information Commons. All locations have access to at least one high speed, high quality, duplexing laser printer. Paper is provided, and the entire print system is constantly monitored to ensure that the printers are always in working order.
There are two ways to pay for a print job:
Your Print Quota - a standard allocation of printing that each student receives twice a year.
A Library Copy Card - a card to which you can associate monetary value to pay for printing outside of quota. If you do run out of quota,
In both circumstances you simply print a document in the normal way.
Remember the Information Commons is a shared facility: always collect your printed documents promptly, and check that you haven't picked up anyone else's documents by mistake.
Twice a year students will receive a modest printing quota.
Your Print Quota account is topped up in January and July of each year. There is no accumulation between semesters.
There are two easy ways to stretch your quota.
Choose duplex (sometimes called double-sided or two-sided) printing. While the printers are default set to single-sided printing, you can opt for double-sided. It saves trees; it saves printing quota. To set your printing job on double-sided, go to the print menu and:
For Mac: Choose Layout from the drop-down menu and select Long-Edge Binding.
You can also print more than one page per sheet. Go to the print menu and:
For Mac: Choose Layout from the drop-down menu and select 2 from the Pages per Sheet drop-down menu.
For PC: Select 2 pages from the Pages per Sheet drop-down menu.
Your Print Quota can only be used from Information Commons computers. Other locally maintained computers and printers around the campus are outside this system. A list of Information Commons locations is available online.
How much is my Print Quota? See printing quota.
When your Print Quota runs out, the Information Commons printing service can accept payment for extra printing through a library copy card. This is the same card you use to pay for photocopying in library buildings.
When the Information Commons printing service finds your Print Quota balance at zero, it then checks whether you have a copy card registered for use with the print system. If it finds one, it debits the monetary value of the print job from your library copy card account.
So there are two prerequisites to printing outside of quota:
Having a library copy card with enough value (money) on it to pay for your print job.
Registering that copy card with the Information Commons printing system.
Details on both these steps are given below.
Library Copy Cards are primarily used to pay for photocopying in library buildings, but can also be used to pay for other services in the library as well as library fines. You buy a card and "load" money onto it from time to time. The IC print system can also debit against the balance of one of these cards to pay for printing.
Library Copy Card dispensers (Autoloaders) are located in Chifley, Hancock, Menzies, Law and Music Libraries. Alternatively cards can be purchased over the counter in Art, Chemistry, Earth Science, Medical Science, Music and Physical Science Libraries.
Library copy cards can (and should) be protected with a PIN (Personal Identification Number). This will protect the money associated with the card from being used fraudulently by someone else.
As soon as you have activated a library copy card, you can use it to pay for photocopiers and fines in the Library, but you can't use it to print without first registering it with the Information Commons print system. Registering is a 30-second procedure done online.
That card is then registered under your name (your Uni ID) with the Information Commons print system. This means you can also use the money on that card to pay for printing documents in the Information Commons.
You can only ever have one library copy card registered under your name in the print system. You are free to buy as many copy cards as you like to pay for photocopying or library fines. But at any one time you can only ever have one such card linked to the Information Commons printing system.
For security reasons there is no online process for un-registering a registered card. If for any reason you want to de-register a card and register another, you will have to come in person to a library circulation desk. Library staff will check your identity and unregister the card for you.
The charges for printing outside of quota are available online.
There is a colour printer on L2 of the Chifley building and L1 of the Hancock building. Please be aware that 1 colour page is equivalent to 36.6 black and white pages of printing quota. Transparencies can be printed on L3 of the Chifley building; the cost (in quota consumption) of printing a transparency or overhead sheet is roughly equivalent to 13 black and white pages. There is an A3 black and white printer in the Music Library. Special charges apply to these printers.
The default printers on all Infomation Commons computers are black and white. In some locations where a colour printer is close by, you can choose to print to a colour printer from within the print dialogue boxes. The whole document is charged at the colour rate, even if certain or all pages only use black and white.
If for some reason your Library copy card is 'charged' for printing which was illegible or unreadable (i.e. there was a problem with the printer), you are able to apply to be reimbursed for that charge. Simply submit an online request for printing reimbursement.
The Information Commons is managed by the Division of Information.
If you have any comment on the new printing system, please e-mail
<icprinting@anu.edu.au>.