JP2002032311A - Device for processing information communication - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To prevent disappearance of information received, to eliminate a state in which a memory capacity is overused at an early state and to receive information that has not been received, when the received information brings about the state in which the memory capacity is overused. SOLUTION: Data are received (S302), whether the received data can be outputted to the outside from a storage device is decided (S303); when the data can be outputted, the data are outputted to the outside from the storage device (S304); and when reception is continued and is completed, a delete signal is returned (S306), the information of a server being a transmission destination is erased and the processing is finished (S314). When the data cannot be outputted, whether the data exceed the free capacity of the memory is decided (S307), and when the memory capacity is decided to be overused, the delete signal is not outputted (S308), but a user is warned (S309) and the line is disconnected (S310). When a state in which the memory is fully used is released (S311), data transmission is requested (S313) and a routine up to the reception completion of a piece of information is repeated.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an information communication processing apparatus connected to the Internet and capable of transmitting and receiving e-mails. More specifically, when data such as received images is stored in a memory, the memory is full. About coping techniques when it becomes

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art It is a well-known technique to send an e-mail with an image or voice such as a facsimile or the like attached thereto. The Internet facsimile apparatus ("I-
There are many types of terminal devices connected to the Internet that are already well known, such as a "FAX" and the like, in addition to a personal computer ("PC").

For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. Hei 5-347677 discloses a facsimile machine having a means for detecting the remaining amount of paper, a computer network interface, and a means for controlling transmission and reception of electronic mail. Not only can you know the remaining amount of paper by means of detecting the amount of remaining paper and notify it by e-mail, send data that cannot be printed due to paper exhaustion by e-mail, or print received data in the normal state, as well as e-mail An apparatus characterized by the above is disclosed.

Further, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-8721 discloses an invention of the same inventor as the invention described in the above-mentioned Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 5-347677.
An improvement of the prior invention is described.

Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-65791 discloses that when printing cannot be performed due to a shortage of the mounted memory,
A print processing apparatus that enables printing by transferring print data to another printing apparatus having a larger memory capacity on a network is disclosed.

In Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. H11-122227, a server device and an information communication terminal are connected via a network in response to a connection request from the information communication terminal, and the server device receives an information provision request from the information communication terminal. hand,
In an information communication method in which requested information is transmitted to an information communication terminal via a communication path, a method capable of re-receiving the information being received by the information communication terminal even when the information being received by the information communication terminal is interrupted on the way. It has been disclosed. In this case, a method is adopted in which, when the provided information is interrupted, the information communication terminal sends a re-request for information provision including the received information to the server.

[0007]

The transmission of information such as voice and image using electronic mail of the Internet communication is a usual method of transmitting information. Upon reception, the receiving terminal often exceeds the capacity of the storage device for storing the received information, resulting in a memory over. In this case, the communication circuit is unavoidably cut off and the reception is interrupted. However, correspondingly, it is necessary to eliminate the memory over early and efficiently re-receive the information that was being received.

The present invention has been made in order to solve such a problem. When information received by a receiving terminal exceeds the capacity of a storage device for storing the information and a memory over state occurs, the receiving operation is stopped. The purpose of the present invention is to prevent the information from disappearing, to eliminate the memory over state early, and to re-receive the information that could not be received.

[0009]

To achieve the above object, the present invention relates to an information communication processing device used as a user terminal device connected to the Internet and capable of transmitting and receiving e-mail information. If the storage device that stores the received data becomes full,
In order to disconnect the communication and prevent the disappearance of the information being received, when the reception is not completed, not to send a delete signal that deletes the information of the server that is the source of the e-mail information, In order to release the memory over early, the warning is given to the user by sound or display.

Further, according to the present invention, when the memory over state is released, the information communication processing device as the terminal device immediately and automatically makes a call to the transmission source server and sends the delete signal. Therefore, information stored in the server is automatically received, and all information is received without imposing a burden on the user.

[0011]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention is applicable to an information communication processing apparatus such as a facsimile apparatus connected to an Internet network and receiving information such as images, voices, and texts by e-mail. Now, an Internet facsimile machine will be described as an example.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an Internet facsimile apparatus according to one embodiment of the present invention. The Internet facsimile apparatus is connected to a telephone line network (11) via a network control device (12). The network control device (12) monitors the status of the telephone line network (11) and switches the line between the modem (13) side and the handset (111) side. The modem (13) modulates the digital image signal into an analog signal suitable for the telephone network (11) and demodulates the analog signal of the telephone network (11) into a digital signal for printing.

The printing device (16) receives or
A unit that prints information such as a read image, and a thermal system, an electrophotographic system, an inkjet system, and the like are often used. The image reading device (17) is a device for reading a document for transmission and copying, and uses a reduction reading method using a combination of a lens and a CCD line sensor, a contact sensor method using a rod lens array, and the like.

The image storage device (15) stores the read image,
A unit for storing a received image. By providing this unit, it is possible to perform many complicated functions, for example, transfer, broadcast, substitute reception when paper is exhausted, memory transmission, and the like. The control device (14) includes a storage device (1
8), together with the program stored in the operation key (19), the input information from the dial key (110),
The operation of the entire apparatus is determined based on information indicating the state from each unit of the apparatus and information such as a signal from the telephone line network (11), a command is given to the entire apparatus, and the display apparatus (11
The display instruction is given in 2). Also, it is responsible for a compression process for reducing transmission time of image information and a decompression process for returning a compressed image signal to original pixel string information.

An operation key (19) and a dial key (11)
0) is a unit for the user to input information and instructions into the device. The display device (112) is a unit in which the facsimile device displays information and provides guidance to the user.

FIG. 1 illustrates three types of interfaces that enable communication between the facsimile machine and the Internet. A communication path with a telephone line network (11), an interface to a personal computer (PC) (116) (in the figure, a parallel I / F (113) is used, but it is not necessarily a parallel interface), and a LAN circuit. LAN I / F to network (115)
(114).

In the drawing, three types of interfaces between such a facsimile machine and the outside of the machine are provided.
Normally, normal facsimile transmission and reception through an interface with the telephone network (11) and communication with the Internet through one of other interfaces, or
Ordinary facsimile transmission / reception and communication with a server computer of LAN and the Internet via the direct telephone network (11), in other words, all communications may be performed via the telephone network (11). The three types of interfaces are illustrated as possible connection methods with the Internet, and it is not necessary to provide all of the interfaces.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of a method for connecting an Internet facsimile apparatus according to one embodiment of the present invention. In this figure, a company LA often used for business
N and how it is connected from the LAN network (28) to the Internet (211) and when an individual connects to the Internet, an Internet service provider (commonly abbreviated as "provider") commonly used.
(216) shows how to connect to the Internet (211).

In the case of a LAN, the LAN network (2
8) On the client terminal device, computer 1
(26), Computer 2 (27) is connected and LAN
The network (28) is connected to the Internet (211) via the router (25). A server computer (24) is connected to the LAN network (28).
Is connected, and the received communication data such as text data, facsimile image, voice, etc. to the client managed by the server computer (24) is temporarily stored.

This circuit configuration is an example of a configuration in which a facsimile apparatus is connected to the Internet, and the connection of the Internet facsimile apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention to a data line is not limited to this.

The facsimile 1 (21) in FIG.
Directly connected to the server computer (24) and cable (2
9) This is an example of a method for connecting an Internet facsimile apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. However, when the facsimile 1 (21) is used as a terminal device of the server (24) to transmit and receive data by a simple interface protocol, the present invention may not be applicable in some cases.
In that case, the parallel I / F (113) of FIG.
(116) is connected by a cable direct connection (29).

The facsimile 2 (22) is an example connected to a server computer (24) through a telephone line or an ISDN network (210), and is connected to the facsimile 2 (22) through a server computer (24) and a network. Understand protocols such as TPC / IP that can talk,
You need the ability to create signals. Calls are made through the network controller (12) of FIG. 1 and connected to the telephone network (including the ISDN network) (11).

The facsimile 3 (23) is an example connected through a LAN network (28). In this case, the facsimile 3 (23) is connected through a LAN I / F (114) in FIG.
(115). The present invention can be implemented using any of the above connection methods.

On the other hand, the facsimile 4 (214) is connected by an ordinary connection method when an individual connects to the Internet. The user is an Internet service provider (21
6) and is connected to the provider (216) through a public line network (215) such as a telephone line network or an ISDN line network.

The provider (216) is provided by the provider (2).
16) stores information on transmission / reception of a client (for example, facsimile 4 (214)) in a server (212) managed by the server (212), and stores the information on the Internet (21) through a router (213).
1) to transmit information to the Internet or to receive information from the Internet.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a process corresponding to a memory over of the information communication processing device according to the present invention. Start receiving one piece of information (step S30)
1) Then, communication is performed by the TPC / IP protocol,
Information such as images and sounds is stored in MIME (Multipurpos Intern
et Mail Extensions). The data is received (step S30).
2) It is determined whether or not the received data can be output from the storage device to the outside by means such as moving between media or printing (step S303).

If data can be output to the outside, data is output from the storage device to the outside (step S304).
It is determined whether or not the reception of one piece of information is completed (step S304). If not, the process returns to step S302, and the reception is continued until the reception of one piece of information is completed. Then, a delete (DELETE) signal is returned (step S306), the information of the server which is the transmission destination is deleted, and the process is terminated (step S314).

Further, if there is unreceived data, the process returns to the start (step S301) as the next piece of information, and
Repeat this flow. On the other hand, step S303
If it is not possible to output data to the outside, it is determined whether or not the data exceeds the free space of the memory (step S307). If the received data exceeds the free space in the memory and it is determined that the memory is over, no delete signal for erasing the server information is output (step S30).
8) The user is warned of the occurrence of memory over (step S309), and the line is disconnected (step S310). At this time, the server information is saved by "do not send a delete signal" in step S308.

Then, the state of the memory of the storage device is monitored, and it is determined whether or not the memory full state is released (step S311). Alternatively, when a certain amount of free space is generated in the storage device due to the simple progress of printing and the memory full is released, the next step S31
Proceed to 2.

In step S312, the terminal from which the memory full has been released automatically calls the server, requests the server to transmit data (step S313), and returns to step S302 to receive the data. The same routine is repeated until the reception of the information is completed. In the automatic call to the server in step S312, in the first call, if the call is not established due to busy or the like, the call is reissued at a predetermined timing.

In this case, if the call is not established even if the call is repeated, a method may be adopted in which the call is terminated a specified number of times and a warning is issued to the user. On the other hand, if it is determined in step S307 that the received data does not exceed the free space in the memory and that no
Returning to 302, the received data is continuously received until the reception of one piece of information is completed.

[0032]

According to the present invention, when data having a large amount of information such as voice and image is transmitted to a terminal device by using an electronic mail of the Internet communication, the storage device of the terminal device becomes insufficient in capacity. When the memory is full, the line is disconnected, and when the memory full condition is resolved, the communication is resumed and the subsequent data fetch is automatically performed. The state is notified to the user, and the data of the transmission source is saved so as not to be lost.Furthermore, when the communication is resumed, when the communication path cannot be established, the communication is automatically performed a plurality of times. Connection to prevent the loss of sent data, eliminate the memory full state early, and allow the user to recover from the memory full state with minimal operations. Ukoto can.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an Internet facsimile apparatus according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a connection state of an Internet facsimile apparatus according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a flowchart of processing corresponding to memory over of the information communication processing device according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

11 telephone network, 12 network controller, 13 modem
14 control device, 15 image storage device, 16 printing device, 17 image reading device, 18 storage device, 19 operation key, 110 dial key, 111 handset, 1
12: display device, 113: parallel I / F, 114: L
AN I / F, 115 ... LAN, 116 ... Personal computer (PC).

Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Fumiaki Kobayashi F-term in Sharp Corporation (Reference) 22-22 Nagaikecho, Abeno-ku, Osaka-shi, Osaka 5E501 AB16 AC25 AC32 BA06 CA02 CA08 FA13 FA32 FA46 5K034 AA06 AA07 AA17 CC04 DD03 FF01 FF02 FF06 FF14 FF15 FF18 HH06 HH26 NN03

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. An information communication processing device connected to the Internet and used as a user terminal device capable of transmitting and receiving e-mail information, when a storage device for storing received data becomes full when receiving data. ,
When the communication is cut off, the received data stored in the storage device is processed, and when the memory full state is resolved and the memory has enough room, the call is automatically sent to the transmission source and the data is continuously received. An information communication processing device, characterized in that: 2. The system according to claim 1, wherein when the storage device for storing the received data is in a memory full state, the user is notified by voice, display, or the like so as to cancel the memory full state. Item 2. The information communication processing device according to Item 1. 3. A storage device for storing the received data is in a memory full state and, when disconnected, does not send a delete signal for erasing data of a server which is a transmission source. 2. The information communication processing device according to 1. 4. The information communication processing device according to claim 1,
2. The information communication processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein if the information is not provided due to busy or the like as a result of calling the information re-request, the call is repeated again at a preset timing.