Before MPE directly supported TCP/IP printing, you needed
a product like NBSPOOL to talk to the devices.

It does have a number of nice features, however, that may make it worth
keeping. We archive all of yesterdays' spoolfiles daily using the NBSPOOL
ARCHIVE command. This does some data compression, and moves the files into
a single MPE file, yet it still retains useful spoolfile information, so you
can restore files for a given job or something.

Another handy feature is the COPY command. Normally we don't print anything
directly,
but rather COPY is which leaves the original spoolfile around for archiving
or
re-printing. I guess you could get much the same feature by altering the
spoolfile
to SPSAVE mode so it wouldn't dissapear after printing.

Most of the NBSPOOL functions can be accomplished with native MPE commands
now available.
If you don't have advanced needs it might be simpler to just stay with some
good UDCS/command files and the standard spooler. For some of us, the
archiving function
alone is worth the price.



-----Original Message-----
From: Girard, Frank [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2000 2:05 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [HP3000-L] NBSPOOL Question


We have NBSPOOL software, but not installed.  I would like to know from the
users:

Those of you who are using this product, how is it.  How do you like it.
Etc.

Those of you who are NOT using this product, Why / Why Not.  Etc.

We have been paying for support for this product since we purchased our HP
approx. 4 years ago.  I believe this was part of the package when we started
to use Smith Gardener's Mail order And Catalog System (MACS).  The software
was never installed, now the question is for us, do we want to continue and
install the product, or should we let the license and support expire.  We
have been using the "standard" hp spool product and utilities that came with
the box.  What does this gain us?

Thanks for all replies
Frank Girard
J. Baker Inc
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