JP2000151887A - Network facsimile terminal - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a network facsimile terminal that can easily manage electronic mails at a receiver side. SOLUTION: An Internet facsimile terminal 1 can make facsimile transmission to terminals on the Internet 3 via a LAN 2 in the form of electronic mails. An attachment file generating section 14 generates an image file based on image data corresponding to a transmission original read by a scanner 11 and uses the file as an attachment to an electronic mail. A title name registration section 18 can store a title name relating to the contents of an original image in advance. An operation section 20 can designated a proper title name out of the registered title names. Thus, the contents of the received image can roughly be recognized from the title name of a received mail.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] 1. Field of the Invention [0002] The present invention relates to a network facsimile apparatus that implements facsimile communication using an electronic mail function on a computer network.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, an Internet facsimile apparatus using an electronic mail function on the Internet has been proposed. The Internet facsimile apparatus includes a scanner unit that optically reads a document, an e-mail conversion unit that converts image data output by the scanner unit into an e-mail attachment, and an e-mail transmission that transmits an e-mail with the attachment. Including parts. With this configuration, facsimile transmission can be performed to any destination (e-mail address) on the Internet.

The receiving function unit of the Internet facsimile apparatus includes an e-mail receiving unit, an image data restoring unit for restoring image data based on an attached file of the received e-mail, and a printing unit for printing the restored image data. . With this configuration, facsimile reception is achieved by reproducing the original image based on the attached file of the received e-mail.

[0004] A terminal corresponding to an electronic mail address of a transmission destination by the Internet facsimile apparatus does not necessarily need to be an Internet facsimile apparatus. That is, most of the terminal devices provided with electronic mail addresses on the Internet are personal computers, but facsimile communication from the Internet facsimile device to the personal computer is also possible.

[0005] That is, if the receiving personal computer has e-mail software and software for reproducing image data from an attached file of the e-mail, the reproduced image can be displayed on a display. And can be output as a hard copy by a printer.

[0006]

However, in a conventional Internet facsimile apparatus, a title (Subject) of an electronic mail is automatically given by the apparatus. In this case, the title to be given is usually a fixed one such as "IMAGE from internet fax" or a serial number using alphabets and numerals.

However, when there are a plurality of received mails on the hard disk of a personal computer, if the titles are all the same or if the titles are difficult to interpret for humans, such as serial numbers, a particular reception When trying to view a document, the document cannot be identified. Therefore, the attached file of each received mail is
For example, a target received mail cannot be specified unless the mail is developed one by one using browsing software. For this reason, management of the e-mail received from the Internet facsimile machine was extremely complicated.

An object of the present invention is to provide a network facsimile apparatus which can solve the above-mentioned technical problems and can easily manage electronic mail on a receiving side.

[0009]

Means for Solving the Problems and Effects of the Invention According to the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image data generating means for generating image data corresponding to a document image; Attachment file creation means (14) for creating an image file as an e-mail attachment file from the image data generated by the data generation means
And a title registration means (18) for registering in advance a title related to the contents of the document image, and a title designation means (20, S4) for calling and designating a title registered in the title registration means. E-mail creating means (15) for attaching an attached file created by the attached file creating means and creating an e-mail by giving the title designated by the title designating means; Mail sending means (1) for sending an e-mail created by the means to a computer network
And 6) a network facsimile apparatus. It should be noted that the numbers in parentheses represent corresponding components in the embodiments described later.

According to the above configuration, in facsimile communication using an e-mail function on a computer network, by appropriately designating the title of the e-mail for the facsimile communication, the content of the transmitted original image can be changed. Can be represented. This facilitates the management of the received mail on the receiving side. Preferably, the title registration means further includes a title input means for registering a title in advance.

[0011] Thus, the user can register a desired title as needed.

[0012]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram mainly showing a portion related to a transmission function of an Internet facsimile apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. The Internet facsimile apparatus 1 is connected to, for example, a local area network (LAN) 2 built in a certain business office, and the LAN 2 is connected to the Internet 3.

The Internet facsimile apparatus 1 is an L
An image file corresponding to a document image can be transmitted to an arbitrary e-mail address on the Internet 3 via the AN 2. More specifically, an e-mail including the image file is written to a mail server placed on the Internet 3. The terminal corresponding to the destination e-mail address may be a personal computer or another Internet facsimile machine.

A unique electronic mail address is also assigned to the Internet facsimile machine 1 itself. The Internet facsimile machine 1 can receive an e-mail from a personal computer on the Internet 3 or another Internet facsimile machine. If an image file is attached to the e-mail, an original image is obtained from the image file. It can be reproduced and recorded on recording paper as needed.

Further, the Internet facsimile machine 1 uses a mail server placed on the LAN 2 to perform the same communication with a terminal device (a personal computer, another Internet facsimile machine, etc.) on the LAN 2. It can be carried out. That is, as long as data can be exchanged by e-mail,
Terminal devices with which the Internet facsimile machine 1 can communicate are not limited to those on the Internet.

The Internet facsimile apparatus 1 has a control section 10 for controlling the entire apparatus, a scanner section 11 for optically reading an image of a document, and an automatic document supply apparatus for automatically supplying a document to the scanner section 11. (ADF) 1
2, an image memory 13 for storing image data output from the scanner unit 11, an attached file creating unit 14 for creating an image file corresponding to the image data stored in the image memory 13 as an attached file, An e-mail creating unit 15 for creating an e-mail to be transmitted by attaching the attached file created by the attached file creating unit 14 to an e-mail body composed of a fixed message. The e-mail created by the e-mail creation unit 15 is sent to the LNA 2 by the e-mail transmission unit 16 via the LAN interface unit 17.

The Internet facsimile apparatus 1 further includes a title registration unit (memory) 18 for registering a plurality of e-mail titles, a display unit 19 such as a liquid crystal display device, and the like, for performing various operations. An operation unit 20 is provided. The operation unit 20 includes a title registration key group (title input means) for pre-registering a title in the title registration unit 18 and a title call for calling and specifying a title registered in advance in the title registration unit 18. A key group and a mail address input key group for inputting a destination e-mail address are provided. Although these key groups may be independent of each other, some keys may be shared for functions of two or more key groups. Also, the operation unit
A one-touch key for calling a specific e-mail address registered in advance may be provided, and in that case, designation of a destination can be easily performed.

By operating the group of title registration keys,
For example, “important”, “information”,
A title such as "CONFIDENTIAL" can be registered in advance. FIG. 2 is a flowchart for explaining the operation when facsimile transmission is performed with an e-mail address on the Internet 3 as a destination.
The operator sets a document to be transmitted on the ADF 12 (step S1). Thereafter, when a predetermined key among the title calling keys is operated (step S2), the control unit 10
, A list of titles registered in the title registration unit 18 is displayed on the display unit 19 (Step S).
3). The operator operates a predetermined selection key among the title calling keys to specify an appropriate one of the displayed titles (step S4).

Next, the operator operates the mail address input key group or the one-touch key to input the destination e-mail address (step S5). Subsequent to this, transmission processing is performed (step S6). To omit the selection of the title, the destination e-mail address may be input without operating the title calling key group (NO in step S2) (step S5).
In this case, a title automatically generated by the control unit 10 is set. The title may be a predetermined fixed one, or may be a serial number composed of alphabets and numerals.

The transmission process in step S6 will be outlined as follows. That is, the operation of the ADF 12 is started, and reading of the transmission original by the scanner unit 11 is started. The image data output with this is accumulated in the image memory 13. When the accumulation of the image data is completed, the control unit 10 gives the image data in the image memory 13 to the attached file creation unit 14. The attached file creation unit 14 creates an image file in a certain format (for example, TIFF format, GIF format, bitmap format, etc.) as an attached file based on the given image data.

The attached file is provided from the control unit 10 to the mail creation unit 15. At this time, the control unit 10
The title specified as described above is also stored in the mail
Give to. Based on this, the mail creation unit 15 attaches the attached file to the mail body of the fixed message, further gives the title, and creates an e-mail. The e-mail created in this way is sent to the e-mail transmission unit 16.
The data is written to a mail server placed on the Internet 3 via the LAN 2 and the Internet 3 by the operation of the LAN interface unit 17 and the like. Thus, the transmission operation is completed.

The receiving terminal corresponding to the designated e-mail address retrieves the e-mail from the mail server placed on the Internet 3.
In this case, when the receiving side terminal device is a personal computer, the received mail is stored together with the attached file in a storage medium such as a hard disk device of the personal computer.

Since the title selected in the Internet facsimile machine 1 is given to the received mail at this time, the user of the receiving terminal device can easily identify the received mail. Then, the contents of the received image can be generally interpreted based on the title. Although one embodiment of the present invention has been described, the present invention can be implemented in other embodiments. For example, in the above embodiment, the Internet facsimile device 1
Is connected to the Internet 3 via the LAN 2, but the Internet facsimile apparatus 1
Internet 3 directly without LAN2
May be connected.

In addition, it is possible to make various design changes within the technical scope described in the claims.

[Brief description of the drawings]

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

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a transmission operation of the Internet facsimile apparatus.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Internet facsimile apparatus 2 LAN 3 Internet 11 Scanner part 13 Image memory 14 Attached file creation part 15 E-mail creation part 16 E-mail transmission part 18 Title registration part 19 Display part 20 Operation part

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An image data generating means for generating image data corresponding to a document image, and an attached file creating means for creating an image file as an attached file for e-mail from the image data generated by the image data generating means. Title registration means for pre-registering a title related to the content of the document image; title designation means for calling and designating a title registered in the title registration means; E-mail creating means for creating an e-mail by attaching the attached file created by the e-mail and giving the title designated by the above-mentioned title designating means; and sending the e-mail created by the e-mail creating means to a computer network. Network facsimile, including means for sending mail. Apparatus.