Need Software/pseudo printer to redirect print jobs to other printers and keeping copies of said jobs

Question

I need a virtual printer capable of doing this at the same time:

1. Print to PDF (automatically placing PDFs in some user accessible folder, without asking the user).
2. Forward the print job to another -configurable, could be remote or local - printer.

I.E., some virtual printer that routes print jobs to another printer and keeps PDF copies of said jobs.

I don't care if there are more than one software involved. For instance, a virtual printer that send each job to multiple printers at once could do the job too. (I could then install 2 printers, the "routing" one and a PDF printer, and configure the routing one to send the job to the real printer and the PDF printer at the same time)

any ideas? (Free software is a bonus)

Answer 1

i haven't used it for a long time but as far as i know PDFCreator is capable of this and some more:

• automatic saving
• opening, mailing or printing PDF after creation
• script-execution before and after creating the PDF
• create (and also im- & export) profiles for different settings
• translated into 25+ languages
• it is at least partly FOSS
• and many other features...

but take care during the installation, because reportedly the installer tries to install some adware!

Answer 2

You can do stuff like this really easily on Linux.

Set up a Linux box, install and configure Samba, use a PDF creation script to generate a PDF file and put it in their home directory (and/or anywhere else you want, perhaps a permament-ish archive?) and then in the same script pass it off to some other physical network printer via the local printing system (cups, lpd, etc).