Windows 8 Bible

Managing Print Jobs

The print queue for a printer contains all the documents that are currently printing or waiting to print. Figure 34.2 shows an example where we’ve already told Windows to print two documents. The first document we sent (which happens to be the document listed on the bottom of the list in this example) is currently printing. The other is waiting in line for its turn.

FIGURE 34.2 Sample documents in a print queue

Managing a single document

To pause or cancel a specific print job, right-click its line in the print queue and choose one of the following options from the shortcut menu that appears:

• Pause: Stops printing the document until you restart it.
• Restart: Restarts the paused print job.
• Cancel: Cancels the print job so that it doesn’t print and removes the job from the print queue.
• Properties: Provides detailed information about the print job. You can also set the document’s priority. The higher the priority, the more likely the print job is to cut in line ahead of other documents waiting to be printed.

Managing several documents

To pause, restart, or cancel several documents in the queue, select their icons. For example, click the first job you want to change. Then, hold down the Shift key and select the last one. Optionally, you can select (or deselect) icons by holding down the Ctrl key as you click. Then, right-click any selected item, or choose Document ...