Run mode differences
Grafikhuset Publi PDF runs it's queue monitors in two very different modes:
Attended mode
Queues run in »attended mode« are allowed to prompt a user for a file name, job options etc. In attended mode the user can change conversion specifications on a job-by-job basis, and this way have jobs run with a setup that differ from the queue default.
Queues with the »Is Attended« flag set is run within the scope of current user. Hence, even though the queue is shared across a network, it will only monitor and respond to jobs created by the same user or session that started the queue monitor (such as PubliClient.exe). This is in particular useful in environments where all processes are run on a Terminal Server, where both the queue itself and each monitor session is run on the same CPU for all users.
Attended queues can NOT be monitored by PubliPDF.exe (which is a NT Service), but can be run/monitored by PubliClient.exe or any other specialized application that control QueueMonDLL.dll via ActiveX (i.e. a custom implementation).
Unattended mode
Queues run in »unattended mode« can NOT prompt the user for anything. Such queues will automatically name the output file on the basis of the document title, write it to the folder specified for the queue and in all make the conversion according the queue configuration. Everything that happens after the user has pressed the print button in the front-end application is performed silently (even if an error occur).
Unattended queues will service jobs from all users (when run on a server). Such queues are very useful in corporate environments, because it's easy to set-up any number of purpose-specific queues, each with it's own properties. If, for example, the Publi PDF Stamper plug-in is installed you can configure a queue to automatically apply »Page 1 letter head paper« to page 1 and »Page 2 letter head paper« to all pages that follow – without having the user do anything else than print to this particular print queue.
Unattended queues are monitored by PubliPDF.exe (that wraps NT Service functionality around the QueueMonDLL.dll component).
Last revised: 28-11-2008.