Patent ID: 8262196

Claim:
A method for managing ink flush operations in an ink-based printing system, the method comprising: defining, based upon user input, a flush pattern to be applied to a page to print by the printing system; presenting an option to a user to change a location of the flush pattern from a default location to a user-defined location on the page to print; selecting, based upon user input, the user-defined location for placement of the flush pattern on the page; analyzing a sheetside image corresponding with the page to determine if placing the flush pattern at the user-defined location conceals printable content on the sheetside image; prompting the user to select another user-defined location for placement of the flush pattern on the sheetside image such that the other user-defined location does not conceal printable content on the sheetside image; adding the defined flush pattern to the sheetside image at the other user-defined location to generate a modified sheetside image; and imprinting the modified sheetside image on a printable medium to thereby flush ink in the printing system by imprinting the selected flush pattern.