JP2001028652A - Communication device its method and storage medium - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a communication device by which a document at a transmission destination can easily and secondarily be utilized and to provide a method. SOLUTION: A relay destination is discriminated in relay transmission (S201), and when an opposite device is a PC, a document analysis output format DAOF file is generated by applying area division or the like to a received image (S204), and the file is transmitted according to a file transfer protocol (S205). When the relay destination is not the PC, the opposite device is discriminated to be a facsimile terminal and the file is transmitted by a facsimile protocol (S206).

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

The present invention relates to a communication device and a method for relaying data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As a means for easily sending document information to a plurality of remote locations, a relay function of a facsimile apparatus is widely used. In such a relay, a relay image is transmitted from a facsimile to ITU-T Recommendation T.30. The image is temporarily stored after being received by a facsimile procedure such as 30 and transmitted to a predetermined destination. For facsimile image data, a pixel image is defined by ITU-T Recommendation T. MH method, M specified in 4
The data is compressed by the R method, the MMR method or the like and transmitted to the partner device. The partner device decompresses the received compressed data into pixel data and prints it with a printer.

In recent years, computer terminals such as personal computers have been equipped with facsimile modems,
It is possible to perform facsimile communication. Therefore, the transmission destination of the relay image is often a computer terminal. In the computer terminal, the received relay image is stored in a hard disk or the like, and is displayed or printed on a CRT as appropriate by an operation of an operator.

[0004]

However, the above-mentioned prior art has a problem in terms of secondary use of the received document on the side receiving the relay image. For example, in order to use a document received by the facsimile procedure on a computer terminal, it was necessary to re-input while looking at the receiving paper, or to read the received image to the computer terminal with a scanner and apply OCR processing .

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and has as its object to provide a communication apparatus and a communication method capable of easily secondary use of a document at a transmission destination.

[0006]

In order to achieve the above object, a first invention of the present application is a communication device for relaying received image data to a predetermined relay destination, and comprising a device type of the relay destination. Determination means for determining the area of the image data, a conversion means for converting the image data into a data format subjected to processing according to the attribute of each area, at the time of relay transmission, based on the determination result of the determination means, Control means for controlling whether or not the image data is converted by the conversion means.

According to a second invention of the present application, in the first invention of the present application, the conversion means performs a character recognition process on a character area to convert the character area into character data. And

[0008] The third invention of the present application is a third invention of the present application.
In the invention according to the first or second aspect, the conversion means performs a table analysis process on the table area to convert the data into table data.

[0009] The fourth invention of the present application is the fourth invention of the present application.
In any one of the first to third inventions, the conversion unit includes:
It is characterized in that an image area is subjected to compression processing by a predetermined method and is converted into compressed data.

[0010] The fifth invention of the present application is the fifth invention of the present application.
In any one of the inventions according to 1 to 4, the determining means includes:
The relay unit determines whether the relay destination is a facsimile machine or a computer terminal, and the control unit executes the conversion unit when the relay destination is a computer terminal, and does not execute the conversion unit when the relay destination is a facsimile device. It is characterized by the following.

[0011] The sixth invention of the present application is the sixth invention of the present application.
In any one of the first to fifth aspects, the control unit further includes a selection unit that selects a transmission protocol when relaying image data based on the determination result.

According to a seventh invention of the present application, in the sixth invention of the present application, the determining means determines whether the relay destination is a facsimile machine or a computer terminal, and the selecting means includes a relay device. A facsimile procedure is selected when the destination is a facsimile apparatus, and FTP or HTTP is selected when the relay destination is a computer terminal.

According to an eighth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a communication method for relaying received image data to a predetermined relay destination, comprising the steps of: determining a device type of the relay destination; And a conversion step of converting the image data into a data format that has been processed in accordance with the attribute of each area, and whether or not to convert the image data in the conversion step based on the determination result of the determination step during relay transmission. And a control step of controlling

According to a ninth aspect of the present invention, in the eighth aspect of the present invention, the converting step includes performing a character recognition process on a character area to convert the character area into character data. And

According to a tenth invention of the present application, in the eighth or ninth invention of the present application, the conversion step performs a table analysis process on the table area to convert the table area into table data. There is a feature.

According to an eleventh aspect of the present invention, in any one of the eighth to tenth aspects of the present invention, the converting step includes performing a compression process on the image area by a predetermined method to convert the image area into compressed data. It is characterized by that.

Further, in the twelfth invention of the present application, in any of the eighth to eleventh inventions of the present application, the determining step determines whether a relay destination is a facsimile apparatus or a computer terminal. The step is characterized in that the conversion step is executed when the relay destination is a computer terminal, and the conversion step is not executed when the relay destination is a facsimile machine.

According to a thirteenth invention of the present application, in any one of the eighth to twelfth inventions of the present application, the control step sets a transmission protocol for relay transmission of image data based on the determination result. It is characterized by further comprising a selecting step of selecting.

According to a fourteenth invention of the present application, in the thirteenth invention of the present application, the determining step determines whether a relay destination is a facsimile apparatus or a computer terminal. A facsimile procedure is selected when the destination is a facsimile apparatus, and FTP or HTTP is selected when the relay destination is a computer terminal.

According to a fifteenth aspect of the present invention, there is provided a computer-readable storage medium storing a program code for communication processing for relaying received image data to a predetermined relay destination, wherein the device type of the relay destination is And a conversion step of performing an area analysis of the image data and converting the image data into a data format subjected to a process according to the attribute of each area, and at the time of relay transmission, based on the determination result of the determination step, And a control step of controlling whether to convert the image data in the conversion step.

[0021]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG.
7 controls the entire apparatus. Reference numeral 1 denotes a communication line, and CCU 2 denotes a communication control unit that controls transmission and reception operations via the communication line 1. The HD 3 is a hard disk for temporarily storing received documents and for storing various programs to be executed by the CPU 7. PANEL 4 is an operation panel for the operator to instruct various operations. The RAM 5 is used as a work area when the CPU 7 executes a program. The ROM 6 stores a program for controlling the device. Also, if necessary, CP
The U7 reads and executes various programs stored in the HD3. At this time, the RAM 5 operates as a main storage for the auxiliary storage HD3.

Next, the operation of the communication apparatus according to the embodiment of the present invention for receiving a relay image from a relay instruction source will be described. Here, as a method for the relay instruction source device to specify the destination of the relay destination, ITU-T Recommendation T.30 A case where 30 sub-address signals are used will be described. FIG. 3 shows a sequence of the facsimile procedure. In the figure, reference numeral 301 denotes a transmitter which is a relay instruction source, and 302 denotes a receiver which is a relay. First, after the call connection between the two devices is completed, the receiver 302 sends a called station identification tone signal (CED), followed by a non-standard function signal (NSF), a called terminal identification signal (CSI), and a digital identification signal. A signal (DIS) is transmitted (step S303). At this time, by setting a predetermined bit of the DIS signal to “1”, the transmitter is notified that “there is a sub-address communication function”. On the other hand, the transmitter transmits a password signal (PWD), a subaddress signal (SUB), an NSS (non-standard function setting signal), a TSI (calling station identification signal), and a DCS (digital command signal) (step S304). ). Here, the sub-address data specified by the operator is set in the SUB signal and notified to the receiver. Hereinafter, an image is received according to a known facsimile procedure (step S305).
To S310). The received image is stored in the HD 3 and relayed to the destination specified by the sub-address data received in step S304. The association between the sub-address data and the relay destination is stored in a table in the HD 3. The relay instruction method is not limited to the method described in the present embodiment, and may include an instruction using an NSS signal in addition to the above-described sub-address data.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the structure of a relay destination table storing correspondence between sub-address data and relay destinations according to the embodiment of the present invention. Relay destination table 40
In 0, a relay destination 402 (telephone number) is stored corresponding to the sub-address data 401. The device type 403 corresponding to each relay destination includes a facsimile device (FAX) or a computer terminal (PC).
Is stored. In the example shown in the figure, three relay destination telephone numbers are stored for the sub-address data “1234”, and the breakdown of the device type is 2 for the facsimile machine and 1 for the computer terminal. For the sub-address data "5678", the telephone numbers of the two relay destinations are stored, and the device types are all facsimile devices. Note that this relay destination table is created and updated by the operator registering from the operation panel.

According to the present invention, when the relay destination is a computer terminal, the received image data is analyzed and the layout description,
The data is relayed and transmitted as a data file that is divided into regions, such as a character recognition description, a table structure description, and an image description, and that has been subjected to appropriate processing for each region. The data is in an intermediate format that can be converted (converted) by any application or system at the relay destination computer terminal. SGML format and PDF (Page Desc)
An example of such a format is a DAOF (D) format.
document Analysis Output Fo
rmat). The data structure of DAOF will be described with reference to FIG. In the figure, reference numeral 501 denotes a header portion,
Information on document image data to be processed is held.
In the layout description data section 502, TEXT (character), TITLE (title), CAP
TION (caption), LINEART (line drawing),
PICTURE (natural image), FRAME (frame), TAB
The attribute information of each block recognized for each attribute such as LE (table) and its rectangular address information are held. In the character recognition description data section 503, TEXT, TITLE, CAPTI
A character recognition result obtained by character recognition of a TEXT block such as ON is held. In the table description data section 504, TA
The details of the structure of the BLE block are stored. The image description data section 505 cuts out image data of a block such as PICTURE or LINEART from document image data and holds it.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing details of the processing executed in the embodiment of the present invention. First, step S
At 602, a layout recognition process is performed. More specifically, black pixels in the document image data are detected, and a rectangular frame of black pixel blocks is created by contour tracing or labeling. Next, based on the black pixel density in the rectangular frame, the presence or absence of the adjacent rectangular frame, the aspect ratio of the rectangular frame, and the like,
A block is recognized for each attribute such as an image block such as a TABLE block and a PICTURE block and a TEXT block. Processing corresponding to each block of each attribute recognized by the layout recognition processing is performed.

If the TEXT block is recognized (step S603), a character recognition process is performed in step S604. As one method of the character recognition processing performed in step S604, there is a feature vector extraction comparison method. For example, assume that the character "book" is present in the document image data. On the other hand, as a first step, a character cutout process is performed. This is a process of cutting out a rectangle of one character, and is obtained by detecting the state of black pixel continuity. As a second step, one character is cut into m × n blocks. For example, 64 × 64. Then, the distribution direction of the black pixels is extracted from the block using a 2 × 2 window (direction vector information). The 2 × 2 windows are shifted to obtain several tens of direction vector information. This vector information is the feature of the extracted character. The feature vector is compared with a character recognition dictionary prepared in advance, and characters are extracted in order from the character closest to the feature vector. The closest character is the first candidate, followed by the second,
Become the third candidate. The closeness of the feature vector is a closeness of the distance to the character, and this is a numerical value of the similarity.
If the similarity is close, the character has higher accuracy.

In the above-described layout recognition processing, T
When an ABLE block is recognized (step S60)
5) In step S606, a table analysis is performed. When an image block such as a PICTURE block is recognized in the above-described layout recognition processing (step S60)
7) In step S608, an image is cut out. Next, in step S609, it is determined whether to compress the cut-out image. When compressing (Y in step S609)
ES), and the process advances to step S610 to compress the cut image. On the other hand, when compression is not performed (step S609)
NO), and proceeds to step S612. In the above-described layout recognition processing, the above-described TEXT block, TAB
When a block other than the LE block and the image block is recognized (step S611), the block is held as it is.

In step S612, based on the data obtained by the processing performed for each block of each attribute recognized by the layout recognition processing, the DA shown in FIG.
Create an OF file.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the relay transmission operation of the communication device according to the embodiment of the present invention. CPU
7 is a program code based on this flowchart R
Read from OM6 and execute. First, step S201
First, the relay destination is determined. For this, the relay destination table 400 stored in the HD 3 is referred to, and the determination is made based on the content of the device type stored corresponding to the relay destination. In step S202, it is determined whether or not the input telephone number is a PC (computer device). If the telephone number is a PC, the process proceeds to step S203 to decode the received image. In step S204, the received image is divided into regions by the processing described with reference to FIGS.
Create an AOF file. The file created after the above compression processing is transmitted from the CCU 2 by selecting the file transfer protocol in step S205. Here, as the file transfer protocol, for example, FTP (F
ile Transfer Protocol), HTTP (Hyper Text Transf
A standard file transfer protocol such as an er Protocol) is used. Also, BFT recommended by ITU-T
(Binary File Transfer) function. According to this BFT function, it is possible to transmit the file with attribute information of the file (defined in ITU-T Recommendation T.434) along with the file content. Therefore, the DAOF file is set in the attribute information to indicate that the file is a DAOF file. Submit the file.

If it is determined in step S202 that the relay destination is not a PC, the destination is a facsimile machine, so that a facsimile protocol is selected in step S206 and transmitted from the CCU 2.
The determination as to whether the other party is a computer device can also be made by looking at the terminal identifier during negotiation between the device and the destination.

As described above, according to the embodiment of the present invention,
When the relay destination is a computer terminal, the data is transmitted in a DAOF format file, so that the relay destination can easily use the received data for secondary use.

Even if the present invention is applied to a system including a plurality of devices (eg, a host computer, a scanner, a printer, etc.), an apparatus including one device (eg, a copier, a facsimile machine, etc.) May be applied.

It is needless to say that the present invention can be applied to a case where the present invention is achieved by supplying a program to a system or an apparatus. In that case, the program code for achieving the present invention stored in the storage medium is transferred to the computer (CPU or MPU) of the system or the apparatus.
The object of the present invention is achieved by executing the reading.

[0035]

As described above, according to the invention of the present application, the relay destination is transmitted in a reusable file format according to the type of the destination device (computer terminal or facsimile terminal). Therefore, there is an effect that the secondary use of the received data can be easily performed.

In particular, according to the second and ninth aspects of the present invention, the character area of the relay image is subjected to character recognition processing and converted into character data and transmitted. Thus, there is an effect that labor such as inputting by an operator or reading by a scanner and performing OCR processing can be omitted.

Further, according to the third and tenth aspects of the present invention, the table area of the relay image is subjected to table analysis processing and converted into table data and transmitted.
This has the effect of eliminating the need for the operator to input based on the received image or to perform OCR processing by scanning with a scanner.

Further, according to the fourth and eleventh aspects of the present invention, since the image area of the relay image is subjected to compression processing, converted into compressed data and transmitted, the effect of suppressing the load on the network can be reduced. is there.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of a communication device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing an operation at the time of relay transmission of the communication device according to the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a sequence of a facsimile procedure using a sub address.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a structure of a relay destination table in the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of a data structure of a DAOF in the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing an operation of DAOF data generation in the embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Communication line 2 Communication control part 3 Hard disk 4 Operation panel 5 RAM 6 ROM 7 Microprocessor

Claims (15)

[Claims] 1. A communication device for relaying received image data to a predetermined relay destination, comprising: a determination unit configured to determine a device type of the relay destination; And a control unit for controlling whether or not to convert the image data by the conversion unit at the time of relay transmission based on the result of the determination by the determination unit. A communication device characterized by the above-mentioned. 2. The communication apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the conversion unit performs a character recognition process on a character area to convert the character area into character data. 3. The communication device according to claim 1, wherein the conversion unit performs a table analysis process on the table area and converts the table area into table data. 4. The communication apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said conversion means performs a compression process on the image area by a predetermined method to convert the image area into compressed data. 5. The determining means determines at least whether the relay destination is a facsimile machine or a computer terminal, and the control means executes the converting means when the relay destination is a computer terminal, and determines whether the relay destination is a computer terminal. 5. The communication device according to claim 1, wherein the conversion unit is not executed when the communication device is a facsimile device. 6. The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said control means further comprises a selection means for selecting a transmission protocol for relaying the image data based on the determination result.
The communication device according to any one of claims 1 to 5, 7. The determining means determines whether a relay destination is a facsimile apparatus or a computer terminal. The selecting means selects a facsimile procedure when the relay destination is a facsimile apparatus, and the relay destination is a computer terminal. 7. The communication device according to claim 6, wherein FTP or HTTP is selected in the case of. 8. A communication method for relay-transmitting received image data to a predetermined relay destination, comprising: a determining step of determining a device type of the relay destination; And a control step of controlling whether to convert the image data by the conversion step at the time of relay transmission, based on the determination result of the determination step. A communication method, comprising: 9. The communication method according to claim 8, wherein said converting step performs a character recognition process on a character area to convert the character area into character data. 10. The communication method according to claim 8, wherein the converting step performs a table analysis process on the table area to convert the table area into table data. 11. The communication method according to claim 8, wherein the converting step includes performing a compression process on the image area by a predetermined method to convert the image area into compressed data. 12. The determining step determines at least whether a relay destination is a facsimile machine or a computer terminal. The control step executes the conversion step when the relay destination is a computer terminal, and determines whether the relay destination is a computer terminal. 12. The communication method according to claim 8, wherein the conversion step is not performed when the apparatus is a facsimile apparatus. 13. The method according to claim 8, wherein the control step further includes a selection step of selecting a transmission protocol for relaying the image data based on the determination result. The communication method described. 14. The step of determining whether the relay destination is a facsimile machine or a computer terminal.
14. The communication method according to claim 13, wherein the selecting step selects a facsimile procedure when the relay destination is a facsimile apparatus, and selects FTP or HTTP when the relay destination is a computer terminal. 15. A computer-readable storage medium storing a program code of a communication process for relay-transmitting received image data to a predetermined relay destination, wherein a determining step of determining a device type of the relay destination; And a conversion step of converting the image data into a data format subjected to processing according to the attribute of each area, and determining whether or not to convert the image data by the conversion step during relay transmission. A computer-readable storage medium storing a program code for executing a control step of performing control based on a result.