This article will guide you through the installation and setup of Drop Zone. Drop Zone is an application that is installed on a computer and enables file-drop import and auto print in Ship. 

Go to:

• Downloading and installing Drop Zone
• System requirements
• Initial configuration of Drop Zone and Ship
• Configuration of document printer mapping by using Cloud Print

Downloading and installing Drop Zone

Download the setup file and run the installer. You can run through the installer accepting default settings and installation folders, or you may specify a different directory during the installation. 

• Download the setup file for Windows (run the installation file as administrator). If the file does not download, try to right-click and copy the link and open it in a new window.
  
  
• You can also download Drop Zone when you're logged into Ship. Go to New Bookings > Settings and click Download Drop Zone under Printing Options.
  
  

System requirements

Drop Zone always uses ports 80 and 443 or 8089. It is a configuration choice to use either port 443 with SSL/TLS protocol, or port 8089 without. Port 8089 may be configured to another number.

Note: We have seen issues when customers use Trusted Sites under Internet Options. The workaround is to turn this off or use Chrome.
 

Initial configuration of Drop Zone and Ship

When you launch the Drop Zone application for the first time, all fields will be empty. Once you have made and saved your configuration it will be saved in future versions of Drop Zone.

1. Launch Drop Zone.
   
   
2. Choose which language you want Drop Zone to use by clicking on the Language menu in the top left corner:
   
   
   
   
3. In the Ticket Connection tab, enter your Portal username and password. You can test the connection by clicking the Check Connection button. If the user requires a proxy server to connect to Ship, then the proxy server information must be filled in. Click Apply to save. (Note: you can't use credentials configured for both Ticket and Shipment Server)
   
   
   
   
4. Go to the Printers tab to configure one or more printers. Click New, select a printer, and click OK to add it. (Note: If no printer is configured and a file import is made, all shipments in the file will be listed in Failed Prints.)
   
   
   
   
5. By default, the printer type is set to A4-sized PDF. You can change this once you have added a printer, by selecting the printer and clicking Advanced. In the Settings tab, select another printer type. You can also configure if the printer should be set as default for freight documents or labels. (Note: For freight letters an A4 printer must be selected and Printer type PDF together with a tick in Freight documents). 
   
   
   
   
6. In the Import tab, under the Advanced printer settings, you can define default import keys for each printer, to be able to assign specific printers in the import files. 
   
   
   
   
7. Click OK.
   
   
8. Open nShift Portal and go to New Bookings > Settings. To connect to Drop Zone, click the Search button. Once the connection is established, you will see the version number of your Drop Zone in the top left corner.
   
   
   
   
9. The Label printer type drop-down will now reflect the printers added in Drop Zone. Select a printer and click Save.
   
   

Configuration of document printer mapping by using Cloud Print

The Computer Name field specifies a user-friendly name for the active Drop Zone installation. This is used to specify which Drop Zone installation should receive the documents.

The Check Interval field specifies the frequency Drop Zone checks the document queue. This is a backup mechanism, it should not be set to low values unless it is needed. The main communication to the server side is almost instantaneous and uses push notifications.

The list at the bottom of the Cloud Print tab shows the document printer mapping rules. They are
defined for each actor. The user must select an actor from the Actor drop-down list to get the
list of mapping rules.

Create a new document printer mapping rule

1. To create new rules, click on the New button. Select User name, Computer name, and
   printer from the drop-down lists.
   
   
   
   
2. Filters on carrier, subcarrier, and/or product can be added by selecting the next 3 drop-down lists. If there is no selection the rule applies to all carriers / subcarriers / products.
   
   
3. Select one or more documents on the list if you want to apply a filter to specific documents. If documents are selected, a new rule will be added for each. A rule that applies to all documents is created if no document is selected.
   
   
4. Rules are edited by clicking the Edit button. Clicking on the Delete button will delete the selected rule.
   
   
5. The rules are checked from top to bottom, so the order in which they appear is important. A selected rule can be moved up or down one position by clicking the Move Up or the Move Down buttons.
   
   
6. Click Apply to save your rule. When clicking the Reset button, the current mapping rules are discarded and reloaded from the server.

Note: Drop Zone communicates with the cloud at every selection, some operations might take a
few seconds, especially if the network is slow.

Read our other articles about Ship and Drop Zone:

• Configuration of FTP import for Ship (Drop Zone)
• Configuration of file-drop import for Ship (Drop Zone)
• Configuration of ERP integration for Ship (Drop Zone)