Method of and apparatus for controlling the printing of documents from a computer

Signals representing a document are supplied by a computer to a printer having a printer processor. The computer supplies to the printer processor (1) instruction data (such as page description language) and (2) resource information indicative of printer processor resources required by the printer at different document printing stages. The printer processor schedules printer processor resources for the different document printing stages in accordance with the resource information, and causes the printer to print the document with the printer processor resources as scheduled. The resource information is provided as comments in page description language located in page headers so the printer learns, in advance of receiving pages of a job, how its resources should be scheduled to prevent printer stalls.