JPS6361690B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a printing method using a serial printer.

Printing devices connected as terminal devices for computers are broadly classified into line printers that print line by line and serial printers that print character by character. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, when it is desired to print out the nth line of printing paper 1 as shown, the computer outputs a character code string as shown in FIG. 2 to the printing device.

In FIG. 2, for example, the seventh character "Sumi" represents the character code of the Kanji character "Sumi". Further, the first to sixth characters and the seventh to eighth characters "blank" represent a blank character (portion where nothing is printed) code.

If the printing device is a line printer, characters corresponding to all of these character code strings on the nth line are printed almost simultaneously. On the other hand, when using a serial printer, the characters are printed in order starting from the first character. Since the first to sixth characters are blank characters, printing is performed by moving the print head position by character even though nothing is actually printed.

Therefore, serial printers generally have slower printing speeds than line printers. Therefore, serial printers that can skip blank characters have been developed to improve printing speed. This is done by inserting a tab code in advance into the character code string that skips the print head to the next character printing position (not a blank character) when there are consecutive blank characters, and the serial printer detects this tab code. Then, it immediately skips to the next character printing position and performs the printing operation. However, in the case of blank character codes, the print head was still moved one character at a time.

For example, in the case of a document creation device, an operator generally uses page memory to interactively create a document consisting of a string of character codes. At this time, the operator uses tab codes one by one to specify the parts where blanks continue. Since it is an excessive effort to enter the information to do so, it can only be expected by experienced users. For this reason,
Even if the above-mentioned skippable serial printer is used, documents created by an experienced person that include tab codes can be printed relatively quickly, but documents created by an unskilled person using blank characters cannot be printed at high speed. The problem was that I couldn't do it.

An object of the present invention is to provide a printing method that solves the above problems.

In view of the fact that the transfer speed of character code strings transferred from computers etc. to serial printers is generally faster than the printing speed of serial printers, this invention has developed The feature is that it has a function to convert a string into a character code string including a tab code.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, 10 is an input buffer that accommodates a character code string supplied from a computer (not shown), 11 is a code discrimination unit for detecting a blank character code from the character code string, 12 is a tab code generation unit, and 13 is a continuous 14 is a control code generating section, 15 is an editing buffer, 16 is an output buffer, 17 is a control section, and 18 and 19 are head driving sections.

Assuming that a character code string as shown in FIG. 2 is supplied to the input buffer 10, each character code is sequentially supplied to the code determination section 11 to determine whether or not it is a blank character code. Since the first character of the character code string shown in FIG. 2 is a blank character code, the code discrimination section 11 outputs a discrimination signal to the tab code generation section 12 and the counting section 13. As a result, the tab code generating section 12 generates a tab code.
This tab code is supplied to the editing buffer 15. Further, the counting section 13 counts up an internal counter (not shown) based on the discrimination signal. Since the blank character codes are consecutive in the same manner up to the sixth character, the counting unit 13 counts the number of blank character codes. Note that the tab code generation section 12
generates a tab code only when the first space character code is detected.

Since the next seventh character is the character code "Sumi", the code discrimination section 11 first uses the control code generation section 1.
A control signal is output to 4. In response to this control signal, the control code generating section generates a control code C ₁ corresponding to the count value of the counting section 13 and supplies it to the editing buffer 15 . Thereafter, the code discrimination section 11 supplies the input character code "Sumi" to the editing buffer 15 as it is. The eighth character code "Tokoro" is also supplied to the editing buffer 15 as is. In this way, the editing buffer 15 stores character code strings including tab codes as shown in FIG. In the figure, "Tab" represents a tab code, and "C ₁ " and "C ₂ " represent control codes.

Next, the character code strings in the editing buffer 15 are sequentially taken out to the output buffer 16. The control section 17 looks at the code in the output buffer 16, and if it is a tab code, takes in the control code that follows this tab code. When the control code C ₁ (C ₁ =6) is now taken into the control section 17, the control section 17 supplies a signal to the head drive section 18 to skip six steps. Therefore, the printing head (not shown) moves (skips) to the printing position of the seventh character.

Next, the control unit 17 selects character pattern data or a type bar according to the next character code "Sumi" and instructs printing. Note that this printing may be performed using a method other than dot or impact printing. Furthermore, since the next code is the character code ``toko'', the control section 17 moves the printing position by one step as a normal operation and prints the seventh character ``toko'' shown in FIG. Thereafter, in the same manner, after skipping the 9th to 11th characters shown in FIG. 1 using the tab code and control code _C2 , "kawa", "saki", etc. are printed in this order.

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to control the serial printer to automatically skip the blank character part and perform high-speed printing without having to instruct the printer to skip the blank character part in advance from the outside. Even documents that were not created using tab codes can be printed at high speed. In particular, in the embodiment, since the serial printer is provided with a tab creation function, there is no need to uselessly occupy the computer or prepare a special processing routine for this serial printer on the computer side, which greatly contributes to increasing the efficiency of the system. I can do it.

In the above embodiment, the control code is added immediately after the tab code, but for example, the control codes that appear in the character code string of a one-line sentence are grouped together at the beginning of the character code string of this one-line sentence. Alternatively, a buffer for the control code may be provided separately without inserting the control code into the character code string. It goes without saying that various other modifications can be made without departing from the spirit of the invention.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

Figures 1 and 2 are diagrams for explaining the printing operation, Figure 3 is a diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention, and Figure 4 is a diagram for explaining the printing operation.
The figure is a diagram for explaining one embodiment of the present invention. 10...Input buffer, 11...Code discrimination section, 12...Tab code generation section, 13...Counter section, 14...Control code generation section, 15...Edit buffer.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A printing method for a serial printer, which includes a first buffer that accommodates a character code string including a blank character code, and a blank character code that is detected by sequentially extracting character codes from the first buffer. a code discriminating means for counting the number of consecutive blank character codes when the blank character code is detected by the code discriminating means; and a first control code corresponding to the count value by the counting means. a first control code generating means for outputting a second control code; a second control code generating means for outputting a second control code for instructing skip printing; and a second control code generating means for outputting a second control code for instructing skip printing; A second control code that converts and stores a blank character code part in the character code string into the first and second control codes, and stores the character code as it is when the blank character code is not detected by the code discrimination means. A printing method comprising: a buffer; and a serial printer, wherein the serial printer is enabled to skip by the second control code, and skips by an amount instructed by the first control code. 2. The printing method according to claim 1, wherein the second buffer stores the control codes in a group for each row of the character code string. 3. The printing method according to claim 1, wherein the second buffer is divided into a portion that accommodates a character code and a portion that accommodates a control code. 4. The printing method according to claim 1, wherein the second control code is a tab code.