2 Reasons Why PCL Is an Important Consideration When Choosing a Bar Code Label Printer Ease of Integration and lower total cost of ownership 7/20/2011 Table of Contents HP PCL Background ....................................................................................................... 2 Bar Code Label Printing .................................................................................................. 3 Why HP PCL Is an Important Consideration for Bar Code Label Printers ....................... 4 1. Ease of integration. ............................................................................................ 4 2. Lower total cost of ownership. ............................................................................ 4 Summary ......................................................................................................................... 6 1 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 7/20/2011 2 Reasons Why PCL Is an Important Consideration When Choosing a Bar Code Label Printer HP PCL Background The Hewlett Packard Corporation developed its printer command language (PCL) in 1984 for its first LaserJet printer. The purpose PCL was to control printer features across a wide variety of print devices. PCL commands are compact escape sequence codes embedded in the print job data stream. PCL continued to evolve since its introduction, but each PCL update included all of the previous PCL version functionalities, so that backwards compatibility was ensured. HP LaserJet III, HP PCL5 Printer In 1990 HP introduced the LaserJet III, which featured HP PCL5 and included GL/2, the control language that provides vector graphics support. PCL5 with GL/2 supports fonts of any spacing, scale and design including mono-spaced and proportionally scaled fonts, rotated, scalable, filled/shadowed/mirrored, as well as downloaded predesigned forms and overlays. The flexibility of PCL5 revolutionized the word processing market. The success of PCL5 vaulted Hewlett Packard to the leadership position in laser printing and established PCL as the de facto industry standard printing language. Today HP PCL is the most widely-used printer command language in the world. 2 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 7/20/2011 Bar Code Label Printing First introduced to the market in the late 1940’s, thermal printing technology has unquestionably earned its reputation as a reliable and durable technology. It truly found its niche when bar code labeling became widely used across many industries and functions beginning in the 1970’s. Thermal printers can have very fast print speeds, provide sharp printed image edge definition and are highly reliable. Thermal transfer images are greatly resistant to smudge and the right combination of ribbon and media results in a very durable, scratch- and solvent-resistant image. Consequently, thermal printers are the printer of choice for a wide variety bar code label printing requirements. However, thermal bar code printers had a significant disadvantage. There was no standardized printer command language used for thermal printing communication and control, as different brands of printers used proprietary printer command languages created by each manufacturer. Users spent significant amounts of time and money integrating proprietary thermal printers into their information systems. These integration efforts included the development of proprietary printer drivers, writing custom integrating programming code or the purchase of expensive middle-ware to link legacy data to the printers. In addition to the integration difficulties, these customized solutions add downstream maintenance costs as the customized solutions must be verified every time there is an operating system upgrade. And the customized solutions locked users into a single printer manufacturer, which creates a high cost barrier to change. 3 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 7/20/2011 Why HP PCL Is an Important Consideration for Bar Code Label Printers There are two significant reasons why HP PCL should be considered when choosing a bar code label printer: ease of integration and lower total cost of ownership. 1. Ease of integration. A PCL bar code label printer answers the need for seamless integration into a wide range of information systems and eliminates the requirement for a custom integration of proprietary printer languages. Most operating systems have PCL drivers already integrated, which makes setup quick and easy. Because PCL drivers are standardized to the operating system, users can print to a PCL printer from a wide variety of software applications running on the OS. Because PCL supports scalable fonts, any print job can be easily processed without concerns about font substitutions, such as those from proprietary printers that have fixed font sizes. 2. Lower total cost of ownership. Integration of proprietary bar code label printers, especially with legacy data or systems, often require the effort and expense of (A) writing a custom printer driver or (B) of writing custom programming code to integrate the printer with the system data or (C) the purchase of an expensive middle-ware software application to integrate the printer with the necessary system data or (D) a combination of the above. 4 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 7/20/2011 Once these proprietary bar code label printer installations are implemented, they demand down-stream maintenance and support for the life of the solution. When an operating system is upgraded or when a new hardware platform is imlemented, custom and proprietary solutions typically require recertification, adding to total life cycle costs. And if the proprietary solution is not upgradeable to the new system, a new solution must be implemented, which negates the original investment and adds incremental cost. IntelliBar PCL = Lower Total Cost of Ownership Command Custom Code Custom Code Middleware Middleware Cumulative Total Language Development Maintenance Purchase Maintenance Cost of Ownership Integration IntelliBar ¢¢ 0 0 0 0 ¢¢ HP PCL Proprietary $$$$$$$$$$$$ Command $$$ $$$$$ $$$ $$$$$ $$$ $$$$$$$$$$$$ Language Any and all of the preceding solutions for a proprietary bar code label printer have a comparatively high cost compared to a PCL printer. Because the PCL bar code label printer uses the worldwide standard HP PCL printer command language, integration is simple and very low cost with no down-stream maintenance and support. Cost savings are realized because there is no disruption or relinquishment of existing software applications or operating systems. PCL bar code printers work across all OS platforms: Windows, Macintosh OSX, UNIX, Linux, OS400 and others. If a system can 5 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 7/20/2011 print to an HP LaserJet or any other PCL printer, it can print to an HP PCL bar code label printer. Summary In summary, the PCL bar code label printer solution can simplify system integration requirements, eliminate maintenance costs and provide significantly lower total life cycle cost ownership when compared to proprietary printer integrations. IntelliTech International, Inc. manufactures IntelliBar bar code label printers that use HP PCL5 as their printer command language. If you can print to a LaserJet, you can print to an IntelliBar. 6 www.intellitech-intl.com 978-212-7200 .