JP2003099215A - Printing method, printing controller, and printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To specify a print format and to print without requiring any printer driver. SOLUTION: An electronic mail reception management control part 22 controls a communication part 20 to receive electronic mail addressed to a printer 10. An attached document extraction part 24 extracts an attached document from the received electronic mail and an application selection and actuation part 26 actuates an application corresponding to the attached document to generate PDL data; and the electronic mail reception management control part 22 retrieves a character string specifying a print format from the body and title of the electronic mail, a print data generation part 30 generates print data for printing in the specified print format from the PDL data, and a print processing part 32 prints the print data in the specified print format.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printing method, a printing control device, and a printing device, and more particularly, to a printing method for printing data of at least one of a document and an image attached to an electronic mail, and this printing method. The present invention relates to an applicable print control device and a printing device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, as shown in FIG. 6, a plurality of information terminals 52 are connected via a network 50 such as the Internet or a LAN (Local Area Network), and a printer 54 is connected to the information terminals 52. At the same time, the printer driver of each printer 54 is installed and the printer 54 is shared and used via the network 50.
That is, in FIG. 6, in the information terminal 52A (or the information terminal 52B), the information terminal 52B (or the information terminal 52
A) to access the printer 54B (or printer 5)
4A) can be used.

In recent years, mobile phones and PHS (Person)
With the spread of al Handyphone System), PDA (Person
Portable information terminals such as al Digital (Data) Assistants) and mobile PCs are widely used, and even if you do not physically connect to the network with a cable, you can use the information terminal by wirelessly connecting to the network. The form is widespread. Thereby, for example, the network 50 of FIG.
It is also possible to use the printer 54A or the printer 54B by connecting to the network 50 through the public line and accessing the information terminal 52A or the information terminal 52B from the information terminal 52C not connected to the printer 54A or the printer 54B.

For this purpose, however, the printer driver software for the printers 54A and 54B must be installed in the information terminal 52C. For example, if you want to print quickly when you are out, there is a printer at the destination. However, printing could not be performed unless the printer driver was installed in the information terminal 52C.

By the way, with the recent development of network technology, the use of electronic mail is rapidly spreading. In electronic mail, not only the exchange of character information (text) but also
Documents and images created using application software such as word processors can be attached and sent. Utilizing this technique, JP-A-10-222330, JP-A-2000-242444, and JP-A-2001-2001
Japanese Patent No. 84191 proposes a technique in which data of a document or an image to be printed is attached to an e-mail and transmitted from an information terminal not connected to a network, and the document or the image is printed by a printer. Printing is possible even if the printer driver is not installed on the information terminal to be transmitted.

[0006]

However, in the prior art, instead of using a printer driver, printing can be performed only in a preset printing form, and the number of copies, reduction / enlargement ratio, black / white / color printing, A4, It was not possible to arbitrarily specify the print size such as the paper size of B5 or the like and the post-processing such as sorting, stapling, punching and the like. For example, the conventional technique outputs only one copy of the attached document or image, and when printing a plurality of copies, the same electronic mail must be transmitted a plurality of times for the number of copies to be printed.

The present invention has been made in order to solve the above problems, and provides a printing method, a printing control device, and a printing device that can print by designating a printing mode without requiring a printer driver. The purpose is to do.

[0008]

In order to achieve the above object, the invention according to claim 1 is a printing method for printing data of at least one of a document and an image attached to an electronic mail, which is a document. And an e-mail to which a data of at least one of the images is attached is sent to a predetermined e-mail address, and a character string designating a printing form is searched from at least one of the body and the title of the received e-mail, According to the print form specified by the searched character string,
The data attached to the received e-mail is printed.

According to the first aspect of the present invention, when printing the data of at least one of the document and the image attached to the electronic mail, the character designating the printing form from at least one of the text and the title of the electronic mail. The column is searched,
The data of the attached document or image is printed in the print form designated by the retrieved character string. That is, at least one of the body and title of the e-mail is filled with a character string that specifies the print mode, the data of the document or image to be printed is attached to the e-mail, and the e-mail is sent to a predetermined e-mail address. For example, it is possible to specify a print mode and print without a printer driver.

At this time, as described in claim 2, at least one of the sender's mail address for rejecting printing and the sender's mail address for printing is set in advance, and the reject mail address for printing is set. Printing may be stopped when an e-mail transmitted from E-mail is received, or when an e-mail sent from an e-mail address other than the e-mail address to be printed is received.

The printing method can be realized by using the following print control device. That is, as described in claim 3, a print control device for controlling printing of data of at least one of a document and an image attached to an e-mail, wherein at least one of a body and a title of the e-mail is used. A print form setting means for searching a character string designating a print form and setting a print form of at least one of data of a document and an image attached to the electronic mail to a print form specified by the searched character string .

At this time, as described in claim 4, further comprising a receiving means for accessing the mail server in which the electronic mail is stored and receiving the electronic mail addressed to a predetermined predetermined mail address. Good. Alternatively, as described in claim 5, the receiving means for accessing the mail server storing the electronic mail and receiving the electronic mail addressed to the predetermined mail address is connectable. Good.

Further, as described in claim 6,
Setting means for setting at least one of the sender's email address for rejecting printing and the sender's email address for printing, the email address for rejecting printing set by the setting means, or the email address for printing In the case of an electronic mail sent from a mail address other than the above, it is preferable that the electronic mail further includes a canceling unit that cancels the printing.

Further, as described in claim 7,
The print form setting means may search for a character string having a predetermined identification code added to at least one of the beginning and the end.

Further, as described in claim 8,
The print form setting means, according to the retrieved character string, the number of copies to print, a magnification for enlarging or reducing printing, a paper size for automatically enlarging or reducing according to the paper size, equal-size printing, black-and-white printing, It is preferable that at least one of color printing can be designated.

The print control device may be provided separately from the printing device, and as described in claim 9, the print control device according to any one of claims 3 to 8 may be provided. The printing apparatus may be integrated with a printing apparatus as a printing apparatus that prints the data attached to the e-mail according to the printing mode set by the printing mode setting unit.

[0017]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Next, an example of an embodiment according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows a network configuration example using a printer to which the present invention is applied.

As shown in FIG. 1, the printer 10 to which the present invention is applied is capable of wirelessly accessing a network 14 such as the Internet to which an information terminal 12A is connected. Further, the network 14 can be accessed from an information terminal 12B not connected to the network 14 through a public line using a mobile phone or the like. Less than,
If it is not necessary to distinguish between the information terminals 12A and 12B,
The explanation will be made by omitting the alphabets at the end of the reference numerals.

Each information terminal 12 can create and edit documents and images using application software, and can send and receive electronic mail via the network 14. Of course, at this time, the information terminal 12 can send the electronic mail by attaching the data of the document created or edited by using the application software, the data of the image, or both of them.

Generally, the electronic mail transmitted from the information terminal 12 is stored in the mail box for each destination of the mail server (not shown) connected to the network 14 managed by the provider providing the Internet connection service. . Further, when receiving an electronic mail, the electronic mail is received from a mail box corresponding to a predetermined mail address (own mail address) allocated in advance.

A predetermined mail address (hereinafter referred to as "printer mail address") is assigned to the printer 10 in advance. Specifically, in general, an email address is assigned to a user by a provider, and the email address assigned to this user is set as the email address of the printer 10, so that the email address can be assigned to the printer. Further, in a company that constructs a network environment, an email address using the company domain is assigned by the administrator of the network, so this email address may be set as the email address of the printer 10. In recent years, PHSs and mobile phones have been assigned unique email addresses in advance by their distributors. When a PHS or mobile phone is used for the communication unit 20 described later, it is assigned to the PHS or mobile phone. The e-mail address can also be used as the e-mail address of the printer 10.

The printer 10 receives an electronic mail addressed to the mail address of the printer 10 via the network 14 and receives the text of the received electronic mail or the data of a document or an image attached to the electronic mail (hereinafter referred to as "data"). , "Attached document") is to be printed.

More specifically, as shown in FIG. 2, the printer 1
0 is a communication unit 20, an electronic mail reception management control unit 22, an attached document extraction unit 24, an application selection / activation unit 2
6, a plurality of application software (hereinafter referred to as “application”) 28, a print data creation unit 30, a print processing unit 32, and a user interface (UI) such as a touch panel and operation buttons provided on the upper surface and side surfaces of the printer 10. It is configured with 34.

A card type PHS, a mobile phone, a wireless device using a Bluetooth function, or the like can be used as the communication unit 20, and the network 14 can be used by wireless communication.
It accesses the above device to send and receive data, and more specifically, accesses a mail server to send and receive electronic mail. That is, the communication unit 20 corresponds to the receiving means of the present invention.

The communication unit 20 may be built in the printer 10, or the printer 1 may be provided by using an adapter code or the like.
It may be detachable from 0. Further, in the present embodiment,
A case where the printer 10 is wirelessly connected to the network 14 by the communication unit 20 will be described as an example. LAN, XDS
L (x Digital Subscriber Line), CATV (Cable
It may be connected to the network 14 by wire using a TV), an optical fiber cable or the like, and the communication speed can be improved.

The electronic mail reception management control unit 22 operates the communication unit 20 at predetermined time intervals, and more specifically, causes the communication unit 20 to access a mail server provided on the network 14 and store the mail server in the mail server. The electronic mail is received by receiving the electronic mail transmitted to the mail address of the printer. Further, the acquired electronic mail is spooled in a memory (not shown).

In this embodiment, the case where the communication unit 20 actively accesses the mail server will be described, but passive access may be used. That is, when the electronic mail addressed to the mail address of the printer 10 is transmitted from the information terminal 12 and stored in the mailbox of the mail server (not shown) on the network 14, the communication unit 20 is accessed from the mail server side and stored. The transmitted electronic mail may be transmitted to the printer 10, and the communication unit 20 may receive the transmitted electronic mail.

Further, the electronic mail reception management control unit 22 is
The print mode is set based on the title and body of the acquired printable e-mail. That is, the electronic mail reception management control unit 22 functions as the print form setting unit of the present invention.

Further, the electronic mail reception management control unit 22
Determines whether printing is possible based on the email address of the sender (sender) of the acquired email, and printable emails are printed after printing is completed, and emails that are not printed are spooled immediately after reception. And then cancel printing. That is, the electronic mail reception management control unit 22 also has a function as a stopping unit of the present invention. The mail address used to determine whether printing is possible is set based on the input information from the UI 34, and
I34 corresponds to the setting means of the present invention.

The attached document extraction unit 24 extracts attached documents from the printable electronic mail acquired by the electronic mail reception management control unit 22. The application selecting / starting unit 26 selects the application 28 corresponding to the attached document extracted by the attached document extracting unit 24, and activates the selected application 28.

The application 28 reads the data of the attached document and generates data described in PDL (Page Description Language) such as PostScript based on the attached document. The print data creation unit 30 rasterizes the PDL data created by the application 28 to create print data. If the e-mail has no attached file, print data is generated based on the content (text) of the e-mail.

The print processing unit 32 performs print processing based on the print data according to the print mode set by the electronic mail reception management control unit 22, and prints the body of the electronic mail or the attached document on a sheet and outputs it.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described. FIG. 3 shows a processing routine executed by the printer.

As shown in FIG. 3, the printer 10 first controls the communication unit 20 by the e-mail reception management control unit 22 in step 100 to cause the printer 10 to operate.
The e-mail addressed to the e-mail address is received and spooled in a memory (not shown). In the next step 102, it is determined whether or not the received email is sent from a printable email address. For details, the sender's e-mail address in the header part of the e-mail text (usually shown after "From:")
, It is determined whether or not it has a preset mail address.

At this time, an e-mail address for printing (print permission) may be set in advance, an e-mail address for not printing (print refusal) may be set in advance, or both can be set at the same time. Good. The mail address can be set by the user operating the UI 34. In addition, as to whether to set the print permit or print reject email address, the UI
It may be switchable by 34 operations.

When the sender's mail address corresponds to a predesignated mail address permitting printing or does not correspond to a predesignated mail address rejecting printing, it is transmitted from a printable mail address. Judge as an email.

Then, only when the mail is sent from the printable mail address, step 102 to step 1
If no, that is, for an electronic mail for which printing is rejected, the operation proceeds to step 120, the electronic mail is deleted, and the processing of the printer 10 ends (print cancellation). It should be noted that the print refusal e-mails may not be deleted immediately, but the print refusal e-mails whose printing has been stopped by the time may be collectively deleted at predetermined time intervals.

In step 104, it is determined whether or not the electronic mail has an attached document. If there is no attached document in the e-mail, the process proceeds to step 106, the print data creation unit 30 creates print data based on the body of the e-mail, and the print processing unit 32 creates the print data in the next step 108. By printing the data, one copy of the body of the e-mail is printed. Note that the printing form at this time is set in advance as an initial value, for example, paper size: A4, enlargement / reduction ratio: equal size (no enlargement / reduction), monochrome / color printing: monochrome print. Use one. Naturally, the initial value of the number of print copies is one copy.

When printing is completed, step 120
Then, the procedure advances to step S5 and deletes the printed e-mail.

On the other hand, if there is an attached document in the electronic mail, the process proceeds to step 110, where the attached document extracting section 24 extracts the attached document from the electronic mail. Then, in the next step 112, the application 28 corresponding to the extracted attached document is selected and activated to convert the attached document into PDL data.

Then, in the next step 114, the electronic mail reception management control unit 22 searches the character string in the mail body or the title, extracts the designated items of the print form, and sets the print form (described later). (Refer to "Print form setting process")
At the same time, in step 116, the print data creation unit 30 rasterizes the PDL data to generate print data for the attached document, and in step 118, print processing is performed on the print data created based on the specified print form. And
When printing is completed, the process proceeds to step 120, and the electronic mail that has been printed is deleted.

It should be noted that the print data generating section 30 is, of course,
Then, the print data for printing in the designated print form is generated. For example, when color printing is specified, Y (yellow) M (magenta) C (cyan) K
Print data of each color component of (black) is generated.

Here, the judgment criteria of the designated items of the printing form can be customized by the user operating the UI 34, and in the present embodiment, the following settings are made as the initial setting values.

It is determined that the character string sandwiched between the predetermined identification codes is the designated item of the print form. For example, if the identification code is "*", a character string between "*" such as "* □□□□ *" is searched, and the "□□□□" part is designated as the print mode designation item. (□□□□: Character string with an arbitrary number of characters).
Hereinafter, a case where “*” is used as the identification code will be described as an example, but it goes without saying that codes other than “*” can be used.

When the character string sandwiched between the identification codes is a character string consisting only of numbers, it is determined that the number of print copies is designated. For example, in the case of "* 12 *", it is determined that 12 copies are designated to be printed.

When the character string sandwiched between the identification codes is a character string in which “%” is added to the end of the number, it is determined that the enlargement or reduction ratio is designated. For example, in the case of "* 70% *", it is determined that the reduction printing is specified to 70%, and in the case of "* 120% *", the enlargement printing is specified to 120%.

When the character string sandwiched between the identification codes is a character string of a combination of alphabets and numbers, it is determined that the automatic enlargement / reduction printing is performed by designating the paper size.
For example, "* A3 *" is A3 size, "* B4
"*" Indicates B4 size, "* A4 *" indicates A4 size, and "* B5 *" indicates B5 size, and it is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the specified paper size. It is determined that

If the character string sandwiched by the identification codes is color or black and white, for example, "* color *", it is determined that color printing is designated, and if "* monochrome *", it is determined that black and white printing is designated.

For items that have not been designated, preset default values are used. In addition, the items that can be specified are the above-mentioned number of copies, enlargement / reduction ratio, paper size,
The items are not limited to the four items of monochrome / color printing, but may be items that can be specified when the printer driver is installed, depending on the function of each printer. For example, in addition to the above, items of print modes that can be designated include normal-size printing in which enlargement / reduction is prohibited, post-processing such as sorting, stapling, punching, and N-up for printing a plurality of pages on one sheet.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart showing an example of the print mode setting process executed by the electronic mail reception management control section 22 in accordance with the above-mentioned judgment criteria. As shown in FIG. 4, first, in step 200, the text data in the body or title of the electronic mail is searched, and in step 202
It is determined whether or not there is a character string sandwiched between identification codes "*".

If there is a character string sandwiched by the identification code "*", the process proceeds to step 204, and if the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is only a numeric character string, the number of prints is designated. And step 23 to step 23
The process proceeds to 0, and the print form of the attached document is set with the numerical value indicated by the character string of the numeral as the designated number of print copies. This allows
The attached document is printed in the specified number of prints.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is only the character string with "%" added to the end of the number, it is judged that the enlargement or reduction ratio is designated, and step 204 From step 206 to step 232, the numerical value indicated by the numeral portion of the character string is set as the designated magnification.
The print mode of the attached document is set. As a result, the attached document is enlarged or reduced at the designated magnification and partially printed.

Further, the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is only a character string in which alphabets and numbers are combined, more specifically, "A3", "B4", "A4", "B".
If only one of the character strings "5" is specified, it is determined that the automatic enlargement / reduction is designated by specifying the paper size, and step 2 is performed.
04 through steps 206 and 208 to step 23
4, the print mode of the attached document is set so that the size indicated by the character string is set as the designated paper size and the printing is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the designated paper size. As a result, the attached document is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the designated paper size and one copy is printed on the designated paper size.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is only the character string of "black and white" or "color", it is judged that black or white or color printing is designated, and step 20
4 to step 206, step 208, step 21
After 0, the process proceeds to step 236, and the character string is "black and white".
The print mode of the attached document is set as black-and-white printing in the case of, and color printing in the case of "color". As a result, the attached document is partially printed in black and white or color.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is a character string of numbers and a character string with "%" added to the end of the numbers, the number of print copies and the enlargement or reduction ratio are designated. It is judged that it is
After 6, 208, 210 and 212, the process proceeds to step 238, and the print form of the attached document is set to the number of copies and the magnification specified by each character string, as in the above description. As a result, the attached document is enlarged or reduced by the designated magnification and printed by the designated number of prints.

Further, the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is a numerical character string and "A3", "B4", "A".
If the character string is either "4" or "B5", it is determined that the automatic enlargement / reduction is designated by specifying the number of copies and the paper size, and steps 204 to 206, 208,
After 210, 212, and 214, the process proceeds to step 240, and when the printing is automatically enlarged or reduced in accordance with the number of copies and the designated paper size designated by each character string, the print form of the attached document is set. It This allows
The attached document is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the designated paper size, and is printed on the paper of the designated paper size by the designated number of copies.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is a character string of numbers and a character string of "black and white" or "color", it is designated as the number of copies and monochrome / color printing. Judgment, Step 204 to Step 206, 20
After 8, 210, 212, 214, 216, the process proceeds to step 242, and the number of prints designated by each character string and the print mode of the attached document are set to monochrome printing or color printing as described above. As a result, the attached document is printed in the designated number of copies in the designated monochrome or color.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is a character string having "%" added to the end of the numeral and a character string of "black and white" or "color", it is enlarged or reduced. It is determined that the magnification and monochrome / color printing are designated, and the steps 204 to 206, 208, 210, 21 are performed.
After 2, 214, 216, and 218, the process proceeds to step 244, and the print format of the attached document is set to the magnification and the monochrome printing or the color printing designated by each character string as described above. As a result, the attached document is enlarged or reduced at the designated magnification and partially printed in the designated black and white or color.

Further, the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is any one of the character strings "A3", "B4", "A4", "B5" and the character of "black and white" or "color". If it is a column, it is determined that automatic enlargement / reduction with a designated paper size and monochrome / color printing are designated, and steps 204 to 206, 208, 210, 212, 214, 21.
After 6, 218 and 220, the process proceeds to step 246, and as described above, the enlargement or reduction printing is automatically performed according to the designated paper size designated by each character string, and the attached document is printed in monochrome printing or color printing. The form is set. As a result, the attached document is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the designated paper size, and is partially printed in the designated black and white or color on the paper of the designated paper size.

The character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" may be a character string of numbers, a character string with "%" added to the end of the number, or a character string of "black and white" or "color". If
It is determined that the designation of the number of print copies, the enlargement or reduction ratio, and the monochrome / color printing is performed, and steps 204 to 20 are performed.
6, 208, 210, 212, 214, 216, 21
After 8, 220, 222, the process proceeds to step 248, where the number of print copies designated by each character string and the magnification,
The print mode of the attached document is set to monochrome printing or color printing. As a result, the attached document is enlarged or reduced at the designated magnification, and the designated number of copies is printed in the designated black and white or color.

The character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" is a numerical character string "A3", "B4", "A4",
If any of the character strings "B5" and the character strings "black and white" or "color", it is determined that the automatic enlargement / reduction specifying the number of copies and the paper size and the monochrome / color printing are specified. , Step 204 to step 206, 20
8, 210, 212, 214, 216, 218, 22
After 0, 222, and 224, the process proceeds to step 250, and as described above, the number of prints designated by each character string is automatically enlarged or reduced according to the designated paper size, and attached to black-and-white print or color print. The print mode of the document is set. As a result, the attached document is automatically enlarged or reduced in accordance with the designated paper size, and the designated number of copies is printed on the paper of the designated paper size in the designated black and white or color.

If the character string sandwiched by the identification code "*" does not correspond to any of the above, step 204
To steps 206, 208, 210, 212, 21
4, 216, 218, 220, 222, 224,
In step 252, the attached document is partially printed. Accordingly, for example, when a printing mode that the printer 10 does not support is specified, such as when staples are specified, even though there is no post-processing function such as stapling or punching, the printing mode is set. Is ignored, and the default print value is used for printing.

It is also possible to ignore only the designated items of the printing form that the printer 10 does not support and to print the compatible items for the designated printing form.
Printing may be stopped. In addition, the printer 10
If there is a specified item of the print style that does not support,
To the email address of the sender of the email,
You may make it the communication part 20 transmit the e-mail which notifies that the specification which cannot respond | correspond.

Further, this e-mail may be informed of the correspondence such as ignoring the designation of the printing form or canceling the printing. Alternatively, in this e-mail, the printer 10 is prompted to select a response such as ignoring the print mode designation or canceling the printing, and an e-mail indicating the selected response is sent to the printer 10.
Alternatively, the communication unit 20 may receive the electronic mail and respond based on the selection result.

On the other hand, as a result of searching the text data in the body or title of the electronic mail, if there is no character string sandwiched by the identification code "*", the process proceeds from step 202 to step 252, and the attached document is partially copied. Print.

As described above, in the present embodiment, when the printer 10 receives an electronic mail addressed to the mail address of the printer 10, if the received electronic mail has an attached document, the text of the electronic mail or It is possible to search for a character string that specifies the print form from the title, and print the attached document in the print form specified by the searched character string.
As a result, the user can write a character string designating a print mode in the body or title of the email and attach the document or image to be printed to the email without installing the printer driver on the information terminal 12. By simply sending the e-mail to the e-mail address of 10, the printer 10 can be made to print the document or image to be printed in the specified printing mode.

That is, when it is desired to print a plurality of copies, it is not necessary to send the same e-mail as many times as in the conventional case, but it is only necessary to send once. Further, not only the number of copies to be printed, but also various print forms such as enlargement / reduction ratio, monochrome / color printing, and paper size specified by a normal printer driver can be easily specified by inputting a character string.

Specifically, according to the example described with reference to FIG. 4, the user operates the information terminal 12 to describe, for example, “* 16 * 70% * color *” in the body or title of the electronic mail, By attaching the data of the document or image to be printed to the e-mail and sending the e-mail to the mail address of the printer 10, the size of the document or image attached to the e-mail is reduced to 70% in the printer 10. , 16 copies can be printed in color.

Further, a print-permitted mail address and a print-rejected mail address are set in advance, and based on whether or not the sender mail address of the received electronic mail corresponds to the set mail address. Since printing can be canceled (rejected), there is an effect of preventing mischief such as printing from a third party.

In the above description, the case where the character string designating the printing form is sandwiched by the same identification codes has been described as an example, but the identification codes at the beginning and end of the character string may not be the same. Further, the identification code may be attached only to either the beginning or the end without sandwiching it with the identification code, but since the possibility of erroneous determination increases, a form in which the identification code is sandwiched as in the present embodiment Is preferred.

In the above description, it is assumed that the printer 10 receives the electronic mail addressed to the printer dedicated mail address, but the present invention is not limited to this. For example, if a mobile phone or PHS owned by the user to which the user's mail address is assigned is used as the communication unit 20, the printer 10 can print an electronic mail addressed to the user's mail address in the same manner as above. it can. This is, for example, when the user is on the go,
If you want to print the document or image data provided by a third party, the third party who has the document or image data will send it to your own email address that the user always uses. If an e-mail is sent, the printer 10 can print the e-mail, and a third party can know the e-mail address of the printer or the e-mail sent from the third party to his or her e-mail address can be sent to the printer 10.
You can save the trouble of forwarding to the e-mail address of.

Further, although the printer having the function of the print control device of the present invention has been described above, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, as shown in FIG. The device 42 can also be configured separately. Note that, in FIG. 5, the same members as those in FIG. 2 are denoted by the same reference numerals. Generally, a printer has a function of creating print data from PDL data and printing the print data.
That is, since the print data creation unit 30 and the print processing unit 32 are provided, an existing general printer can be used as the printer 40 in this case, and the printer can be realized at a lower cost.

[0073]

As described above, the present invention has an excellent effect that it is possible to perform printing by designating a printing mode without requiring a printer driver.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a network configuration example using a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing processing executed by the printer according to the embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating an example of a print form setting process when printing an attached document.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of a case where a print control device is configured separately from a printer according to another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a network configuration diagram of a conventional printer.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 Printer 12A, 12B Information terminal 14 network 20 Communications Department 22 E-mail reception management control unit 24 Attached document extractor 26 Application Selector / Starter 28 applications 30 Print data creation section 32 Print processing unit 34 User Interface

Claims (9)

[Claims] 1. A printing method for printing data of at least one of a document and an image attached to an electronic mail, wherein data of at least one of the document and the image is attached.
An e-mail addressed to a predetermined mail address is received, a character string designating a print form is searched for from at least one of the body and title of the received e-mail, A printing method comprising: printing the data attached to a received e-mail. 2. A sender's email address for which printing is denied,
Also, at least one of the sender's email addresses to be printed is set in advance, and when an email sent from the print rejected email address is received, or sent from an email address other than the email address to be printed. The printing method according to claim 1, wherein the printing is stopped when the received e-mail is received. 3. A print control device for controlling printing of data of at least one of a document and an image attached to an electronic mail, the character string designating a printing form from at least one of a body and a title of the electronic mail. And a print form setting unit that sets the print form of at least one of the data of the document and the image attached to the electronic mail to the print form specified by the searched character string. apparatus. 4. The printing according to claim 3, further comprising receiving means for accessing a mail server in which electronic mail is stored and receiving an electronic mail addressed to a predetermined mail address. Control device. 5. The receiving means for accessing a mail server in which electronic mails are stored and receiving an electronic mail addressed to a predetermined mail address is connectable. Print controller. 6. An email address of a sender who rejects printing,
And setting means for setting at least one of the sender's email address to be printed, the email address for rejecting printing set by the setting means, or the electronic mail sent from an email address other than the email address for printing The print control apparatus according to claim 3, further comprising: a canceling unit that cancels the printing in the case of an e-mail. 7. The print form setting means searches for a character string having a predetermined identification code added to at least one of a leading end and an end thereof. The printing control device described in 1. 8. The print form setting means, based on the retrieved character string, the number of print copies, a magnification for enlarging or reducing printing, a paper size for automatically enlarging or reducing in accordance with a paper size, and an equal size. 8. The print control apparatus according to claim 3, wherein at least one of printing, black-and-white printing, and color printing can be designated. 9. The print control device according to claim 3, further comprising: a print control device configured to print the data attached to the electronic mail according to a print form set by the print form setting unit. Printing device.