Tuesday, 19 August 2003 -

The Australian National University (ANU) was founded by the Australian Government in 1946 as Australia's only completely research-oriented university.

In 1960 the University merged with Canberra University College, and began offering both undergraduate and graduate education. More recently, in 1992, the University and the Institute of The Arts amalgamated, widening the University's education to encompass creative arts and music.

The Australian National University offers graduate and undergraduate courses in a variety of disciplines ranging from Arts, to Law and Mathematics, to Science and Women's Studies.

A continuing commitment to information technology is placing ANU in the forefront of modern teaching and research methods. Not only in high performance computing (ANU is home to one of the fastest university-based computers in the world), but also in desktop computing, where IT Services continues to maintain the infrastructure and support which makes the ANU the most computerised campus in Australia.

"Before installation, we investigated the productivity and efficiency benefits of Balance. One of our main print jobs at ANU is course notes for students which can remain the same for years with just occasional changes to one or two pages. We used to have to make the changes to the master copy and reload the job. Now the copy is saved and stored and any changes are made through Balance. Text can be manipulated and images changed online."

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

With ANU moving towards a 'print on demand' scenario in its print room, it required a software-based system that would allow staff to work with machines from different manufacturers, yet control them from one interface.

One of the key elements behind the University's selection criteria was that the software could not be proprietary to any of its printing partners.

As part of its print on demand initiative, the University also purchased two Canon imageRUNNER iR105s - a digital printer capable of network printing at 105 pages per minute, copying and both local and network scanning while source documents can reside in electronic or hardcopy form.

THE ISSUES

- To upgrade its analogue-based print room, ANU required at least two digital printer/copiers to handle high-volume network printing, copying and scanning from both electronic and hardcopy formats.

- ANU also required a non-proprietary system that would allow staff to work with machines from different vendors, yet control them from one interface.

Being analogue-based prior to its hardware upgrade with Canon, print jobs for ANU's print room couldn't be sent directly to the printers via the University network. Instead, jobs had to arrive as hardcopy or if sent through electronic means - such as e-mail - had to be printed to hardcopy for scanning.

"Before the recent upgrade, we were operating an analogue print room here," said Darren Vincent, manager of ANU's print room. "This meant, for example, that we had to physically scan in jobs as hardcopy - at a maximum 22 pages per minute - before we could reproduce them.

"With ANU's print room competing with external print houses for business, this situation was becoming problematic as it meant the University wasn't as cost-effective as its competitors -primarily due to the extra time it would be taking to complete tasks which were unheard of at digitally-based print businesses.

THE CANON SOLUTION

- High volume Canon imageRUNNER iR105 devices were installed to create the foundations of a high-speed digital environment.

- Balance software, created by Electronics For Imaging (EFI), allows ANU's print room to manage its printing equipment, increasing efficiencies.

A common job for the ANU print room is the thesis works for students (which can often run to 300-400 pages each), in addition to the class and study notes for students. It also caters for the widely varying needs of the 5000 staff and 10,000 students of the university; churning out around an estimated 8 million impressions annually.

Accordingly, the Canon devices it installed needed to be high-volume, digital devices. Canon's imageRUNNER iR105 met that need through its highly productive 105 ppm A4 output; integrated Image Server and huge 7,650-sheet paper capacity among other attributes.

Managing these print jobs, meanwhile, is the Balance workflow software application created by Canon's long timedevelopment partner, Electronics For Imaging (EFI). Canon offers this solution with its own range of printing devices,including the award-winning imageRUNNER family.

Balance enables users to dramatically increase efficiency by harnessing the "hidden" speed of their printing equipment(including a large selection of older and 3rd party equipment) by directing print jobs to the most efficient output device at hand, including print output on multiple devices.

For example, a print job sent to Balance comprising multiple colour and black & white pages could actually have these elements printed separately on a colour and a black & white device, before being collated as one document at the conclusion of printing on the iR105, in order to save time and money. Similarly, a large black & white job could be sent simultaneously to three imageRUNNER iR105s resulting in an effective print speed of 315 pages per minute - seriously fast.

"ANU is moving towards 'print on demand' so we needed a system that allowed us to work with machines from different manufacturers yet control them from one interface. The software could not be proprietary," explained James Livingstone, Contracts Administrator, Australian National University. "A member of The University's Computer Information Systems reviewed the different options available and found that Balance was the best solution for what wewant to achieve."

THE RESULTS

- Print room staff at ANU can now easily accept electronic material, in addition to hardcopy, for speedy output through the Canon/EFI solution.

- An average time saving of 10-15 minutes per job rapidly adds up to hours of extra productivity per day for print room staff.

For print room staff, the arrival of the Canon/EFI solution has been a quantum leap from the not-too-distant days where it couldn't print digitally from an image or document stored on disk or sent via an e-mail.

Further, with the Balance software powering its new imageRUNNER devices, in addition to some legacy equipment, the speed with which jobs are produced has been optimised and staff are really noticing appreciable time benefits.

"With thesis work, we can get some colour mixed in with black & white pages. Before we had to scan all of this just to get the job out of the machine," explains Mr Vincent. "With the new equipment, we just load it all into Balance and run the job. Depending on how big the job is, this can save 10-15 minutes.

"According to Mr Vincent, the overall quality of the imageRUNNER iR105s hasn't gone unnoticed, citing it as a dramatic improvement over analogue, and adding that he is very happy with the solution - which originally began as a trial.

"While this initially started as a trial because we were the first people in Canberra to get an iR105 with Balance software, we'll be sticking with it now. We're not going to change," enthused Mr Vincent.

THE CANON DIFFERENCE

The marriage of Canon hardware and EFI software at ANU has created a highly productive environment for staff like Mr Vincent - particularly enhanced by the overall ease of use of both.

"The ease of use of the hardware and software is excellent, considering we went from not being able to send work to our printers from a disk or PC at all to the current environment of network printing through Balance and everyone's picked it up very quickly," said Mr Vincent. "I also have support people I can contact in both Sydney and Canberra at anytime so there is always someone available to help if we need it".