As with the Print dialog, Print Organizer allows you to select either a Bentley printer driver or a Windows printer driver. Bentley printer drivers are typically used for printing to a file, such as PDF, TIFF, JPEG, or PSCRIPT. The Windows printer driver is used to print to a physical printing device.

If you use the Print dialog to select and configure printer driver configuration files, you will find it just as easy to perform the same tasks with Print Organizer.

Print Organizer and the Print dialog are similar in several ways:

• They both use the same printer driver configuration files and the same utility to edit them.
• They both use the configuration variables MS_PLTCFG_PATH and MS_DEFAULT_PLTCFG_FILE for locating printer driver configuration files and selecting a default printer driver configuration file, respectively.
• They both use the same procedure for determining how the default printer is selected.

Printer driver configuration files are stored in the ..\MicroStation\Default\Pltcfg folder. Two printer driver configuration files, printer.pltcfg and interplot.pltcfg, are designed to print directly to the default Windows system printer. All of the other printer driver configuration files (cals.pltcfg, hpgl2.pltcfg, hpglrtl.pltcfg, jpeg.pltcfg, pdf.pltcfg, png.pltcfg, pscript.pltcfg, and tiff.pltcfg) are designed to print to a file on disk.

If the Print Organizer dialog has never been opened before, the Windows printer driver (printer.pltcfg) is picked as the default printer driver configuration file, assuming that this setting has not already been overridden using configuration variables. This printer driver selects a default Windows printer name, paper size, and tray name. Normally, this information is obtained from the Windows default printer, but may be overridden using either the printer driver configuration file or the following configuration variables.

• MS_PLT_SYSPRT_DEFAULT_PRINTER specifies the printer name that is selected when a system printer is opened.
• MS_PLT_SYSPRT_DEFAULT_FORM specifies the paper size name that is selected when a system printer is opened.
• MS_PLT_SYSPRT_DEFAULT_TRAY specifies the tray name that is selected when a system printer is opened.

If the above configuration variables are not defined, you can specify the default printer, paper size, and tray names using the properties in the Windows printer driver configuration file. You can edit a printer driver configuration file using Print Organizer's Printer Setup dialog (File > Printer Setup). Selecting the Edit icon on this dialog opens the Printer Driver Configuration dialog.

Print Organizer stores the active printer driver configuration file in the user preferences file. When Print Organizer opens a new print set file, the most recently used printer driver is selected by default. This behavior may, however, be overridden using the following configuration variable.

• If MS_DEFAULT_PLTCFG_FILE is set to a fully qualified printer driver configuration file, that printer driver configuration file is used instead of the most recently used file when Print Organizer is opened.