Patent ID: 8456665

Claim:
A method of printing from a computing device, said method comprising: initiating a print task from an application running on a computing device; receiving a selection of a preferred printing device; sending said print task to a print system component residing on said computing device; checking the status of at least one printing device, comprising said preferred printing device, in communication with said computing device, said checking being accomplished automatically via a direct communication between said at least one printing device and said print system component residing on said computing device; sending said print task from said print system component to said preferred printing device if it is available; and sending said print task from said print system component to another available printing device if said preferred printing device is not available; identifying a printing error on the recipient printing device to which said print task was sent via a direct, bi-directional communication between said recipient printing device and said print system component; checking the status of at least one alternative printing device via a direct communication between said at least one alternative printing device and said print system component, wherein all calculations performed for said checking the status of at least one alternative printing device are performed on said print system component based on data obtained from a Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) Management Information Base (MIB) on said at least one alternative printing device, wherein said data is obtained from said MIB by sending SNMP protocol data units (PDUs) to said at least one alternative printing device to determine device status; and redirecting said print task to said at least one alternative printing device, with said print system component, when said at least one alternative printing device is available.