JP2000236410A - Network scanner device - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To confirm the state of a read picture by an outputted paper before sending to the side of a scanner server by printing scanned image data through the use of the printing function of a digital copier before transferring data. SOLUTION: An original is set to a network scanner device, i.e., a digital copier, and a prescanning button is pressed. By pressing the prescanning button, a scanning control part 15 instructs original reading to a scanner device control part 16. The part 16 actually reads the original from the scanner device, stores scanned image data in a picture storing part 11 and informs the part 15 of the completion of scanning. The part 15 instructs a print control part 17 to print image data stored in the part 11. Then, the part 17 prints image data in the part 11 to a paper by controlling the printing device.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a network scanner, and more particularly, to a digital copying machine having a print function and a scanner function connected to a network, and a client terminal on a network such as a PC or WS. Alternatively, the present invention relates to a network scanner device in a network scanner system including a scanner server device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art With the recent spread of networks, various devices have been connected to the networks and have been used as shared devices by a plurality of users. In particular,
A network compatible printer is a typical example.
Conventionally, scanners have been used by being directly connected to a PC or the like using SCSI or the like. Recently, however, many attempts have been made to incorporate a network interface and directly connect to a network. In particular, in the case of a digital copying machine, due to the characteristics of the device, it is not a so-called PC local connection that is used by connecting to a single PC via SCSI or the like.
Multiple PCs connected to the network as floor equipment
In addition, there is a high demand from users for use as a shared device. In order to satisfy these demands, digital copiers have recently been directly connected to a network, and are used as shared devices from PCs on the network mainly for printing functions.

However, unlike a printer, a scanner sets a document on the scanner,
Since it was necessary to remove the original after scanning, it was not easy to connect to a network and use it. That is, in the conventional PC local connection method using SCSI or the like, a user sets reading conditions such as a reading document size, resolution, and density using a PC application, sets a document on a scanner, and sets
Instruct reading from the application C, read the target document, and remove the document after reading.
However, it can be said that the inconvenience was not so much felt because the scanner is locally connected to the PC used by the user and the scanner is right next to the PC.

However, in the case of a scanner device as a floor sharing device connected to a network such as a digital copying machine, there is a distance between the PC and the scanner device. Had occurred. In other words, after the user specifies the size, resolution, and density of a document to be read by using an application on the PC at his / her desk, the user sets the document to the scanner device away from the document, returns to the PC at his desk again, and returns To read from At the time when the reading is completed, it is necessary to go again to the scanner device in order to retrieve the original after the reading. Therefore, the greater the distance between the PC and the scanner device, which is a shared device on the network, the more the usability drops.

In order to solve this problem, for example, in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-204515, a user sets reading conditions on a PC side, transmits these setting conditions to a scanner in advance, and holds a document. To the scanner device. In the scanner device, the original is set, the reading conditions transmitted from the PC in advance are selected from the operation panel, and the scanner device starts up for reading the original, so that the number of times to return to the PC once is reduced. I try to reduce it. In addition, the user goes directly to the scanner server device without performing operations on the PC, interactively interacts with the scanner device, sets the storage destination of the scanned image data, sets the original, and presses the start button. Automatically reads the manuscript and stores the image in a groupware database, etc.
Accordingly, it has been proposed that the user does not need to move between the PC and the scanner device in a complicated manner.

[0006]

However, the above-mentioned technique and another major problem caused by the separation of the scanner device have not been solved. That is, when the user goes to the network scanner device with the original, reads the target original, and then returns to his / her desk and displays the original image read from the PC with an application or the like, the desired image is obtained. If not, the problem has not been solved. The case where the desired image cannot be obtained is, for example, a case where characters are not read because the image is too light, a case where the background color of the paper is scanned darkly or a photograph is crushed. is there.

In general, when a local connection is made to a PC, if a desired image cannot be obtained,
In general, the scanner is right next to the scanner. You can easily change the settings such as density from the PC application again and read it. However, in the case of a network scanner, hold the document again and transfer it to the network scanner device. The need to go arises. In other words, in the case of a network scanner, a desired image can be obtained only after the document is read by the network scanner device, and after returning to the user's seat after completion of reading and displaying the read image data. I had a problem of not knowing whether or not it was done.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentioned problems, and a network scanner according to claim 1 is a digital copier having a scanner function and a print function used by connecting to a network; In a network scanner system including a scanner server device configured by a PC connected to a network scanner function of the digital copying machine via a network, a means for designating pre-scanning and a pre-scanning function, wherein the scanned image data is directly used as the scanner server device Instead of sending it to the scanner server, check the status of the scanned image on the output paper before sending it to the scanner server by providing a means for printing on paper once using the print function of the digital copier. The purpose is to provide a function that can be confirmed in advance Than it is.

In general, when the scanned data is different from the desired image, the reading density is not appropriate, and when the photographic original is read in monochrome binary. Therefore, a network scanner according to a second aspect of the present invention includes a means for setting reading conditions such as a density and a document type from a density setting button and a document type setting button on an operation panel of a digital copier body, If the desired image is not obtained by the scanning means and the prescan, the reading density and the like are set again on the operation panel of the digital copying machine, and the prescan is performed until the desired image is obtained. Is obtained, a scan is performed in the setting state, and a function of transmitting the read image data to the scanner server device is provided, so that the user returns to the PC at his seat, displays the scanned data, and displays a desired image image. To go to the network scanner again and scan again because it was not obtained It is an object of the present invention to eliminate the inconvenience.

[0010]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a so-called digital copying machine having a copy function, a scanner function, a printer function, and the like, having a means for connecting to a network, and a personal computer having, similarly, means for connecting to a network. A scanner server device including a computer or a workstation (hereinafter collectively referred to as a PC); and a network configuration for communicatively connecting the scanner server device and the digital copier. In a network scanner for scanning a document and transmitting the scanned image data to the scanner server, the scanned image data is transferred to a printer of the digital copying machine before the scanned image data is transferred to the scanner server. And a function of printing using a function, in which characterized in that perform the pre-check of the read state.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the network scanner device according to the first aspect, all reading conditions such as the type of the original and the reading density are set from an operation panel of the digital copying machine. It is characterized in that reading conditions can be set and pre-scanning can be repeated until a desired image is obtained by scanning.

[0012]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a network scanner system showing the configuration of an embodiment of the present invention.
In FIG. 1, a digital copier 10 having a print function and a network scanner function on a local network (LAN) or a wide area network (WAN) network 40, a scanner server device 20 composed of a PC, The client PC 30 is connected. The client PC 30 can view and edit image data stored in the scanner server 20 device.

The network scanner 10 is constituted by a digital copying machine, and has an internal BUS 19 and an internal bus.
A CPU 12 connected to the US 19, a network control unit 13 connected with a network cable to exchange communication control signals with the scanner server device 20 and the PC 30 through a network, an operation panel control unit 14 including an operation panel, and a scanner device. A scanner device control unit 16 that actually reads a document, an image data storage unit 11 in which data scanned by the scanner device control unit is stored, and print data sent from the PC 30 through the network control unit 13 to raster data. Then, a print control unit 17 that controls a print device including exposure, development, transfer, and fixing to perform printing on paper, and a scan control unit that controls these control units to control a network scan function. Become.

The scanner server device 20 is composed of a personal computer (PC) or a workstation (WS). The scanner server device 20 controls a network scanner device of a digital copying machine through a network, accumulates read image data, and accumulates the image data from a client PC. It is possible to access the image data. FIG. 2 shows an operation example of the network scanner device according to the first aspect of the present invention. The operation of FIG. 2 will be described with reference to FIG. First, a user goes to a digital copying machine, which is a network scanner, with a document, and presses a scanner mode button on an operation panel to switch the digital copying machine to a network scanner mode. When entering the scanner mode, the digital copier exchanges data with the scanner server device, and the user makes various settings and is ready to actually read the original.

According to the present invention, in this state, as shown in FIG. 2, an original is set on a network scanner device which is a digital copying machine (S1), and a prescan button is pressed (S1).
2). The press of the pre-scan button is detected by the scan control unit 15 of FIG. When the pre-scan button is pressed, the scan control unit 15
Instructs to read the original. Scanner device controller 16
Actually reads the original from the scanner device, stores the scanned image data in the image data storage unit 11 (S3), and notifies the scan control unit 15 that the scan is completed.

The scan control unit receives the notification of the completion of the scan, and instructs the print control unit to print the image data stored in the image data storage unit. The print control unit 17 controls the print device to print the image data in the image data storage unit 11 on paper (S
4). Thus, the image data scanned by the scanner device is transferred to the print control unit 17 of the same digital copying machine.
By providing a pre-scan function for printing on paper through the printer, the user can see the print result (S5) and determine whether the original has been read with a desired image.

When the user sets the original in a desired state and presses the start button, the scan control unit 15 operates the operation panel control unit 1 again.
4 detects that the start button has been pressed, scans in the normal scan mode through the scanner device control unit 16, and transfers the scanned document data to the scanner server device 20 through the network control unit 13.

Next, an operation example of claim 2 will be described with reference to FIGS.
This will be described with reference to FIG. The operation panel of the digital copying machine is provided with a density setting button, a document type setting button, and the like for use in the copy function. The scan control unit 15 monitors the state of the operation panel through the operation panel control unit 14 whenever the network scanner mode is entered. Each time the user presses the density setting button or the document type setting button, the scan control unit 15 The setting of the reading condition stored in the table is changed (S6) and is stored. This allows the user to perform a pre-scan, check the print result output on paper, and if the desired image has not been obtained, the user can press the density button on the operation panel, the document type setting button, etc. Press to change reading conditions.

When the user presses the pre-scan button, the pre-scan processing described in the first embodiment is performed, and when the scan controller 15 instructs the scanner device controller 16 to read a document, Scan control unit 1
The scanner device controller 16 notifies the scanner device controller 16 of the reading conditions such as the density and the type of the document held by the scanner 5, and the scanner device controller 16 actually reads the document from the scanner device under the notified reading conditions, and The scanned image data is stored in the storage unit 11, and the completion of the scan is notified to the scan control unit 15. Subsequent processing is performed by the processing described in the first embodiment. If a desired image cannot be obtained, the user changes the reading conditions using the operation panel and performs pre-scanning again. , And the operation of confirming with the print result can be repeatedly performed until a desired image is obtained.

[0020]

According to the first aspect of the invention, since the image image can be confirmed in advance as a pre-scan by the network scanner device, the user goes to the network scanner device with the document, reads the target document, and thereafter, When the user returns to his / her seat and displays the original image read from the PC with an application or the like, the inconvenience that the desired image image has not been obtained is solved.

According to the present invention, when a desired image cannot be obtained by pre-scanning, the density can be adjusted and the type of the original can be set from the operation panel of the digital copying machine. Without returning, prescanning can be performed many times until a desired image is obtained, and the desired image can be reliably stored in the scanner server device. Further, since all operations can be performed in front of the network scanner device by the user, a desired image can be easily and reliably read even by a user unfamiliar with the operation of the PC.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a network scanner system showing a configuration of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart for explaining an operation example of the network scanner device according to the first and second aspects of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

10: Network scanner device, 11: Image data storage unit, 20: Scanner server device, 30: Client PC

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. means for connecting to a network;
A so-called digital copier having a copy function, a scanner function, a printer function, and the like, a scanner server device including a personal computer or a workstation (hereinafter collectively referred to as a PC) also having means for connecting to a network, and the scanner server A network scanner configured to scan a document from a scanner unit of the digital copying machine and transmit the scanned image data to the scanner server device. Before transferring the scanned image data to the scanner server device, a function of printing the scanned image data by using a print function of the digital copying machine is provided, so that a reading state can be confirmed in advance. Network scanner device. 2. The network scanner according to claim 1, wherein all reading conditions such as the type of document and the reading density are set from an operation panel of the digital copying machine, and a desired image is obtained by pre-scanning of the digital copying machine. A network scanner device which can repeatedly perform reading condition setting and pre-scanning until an image is obtained.