JP2005074769A - Printing apparatus, printing management method, printing method, printing management program, printing program - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a printing device which can simply carry out management related to printing. <P>SOLUTION: The printing device which prints to a rewritable paper where a recording medium is set includes a read part for reading out printing history information stored in the recording medium, and an alarm part for alarming on the basis of the printing history read out by the read part when the number of printing times of the paper is not smaller than a predetermined number. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a printing apparatus, a printing management method, a printing method, a printing management program, and a printing program that can print using plain paper or rewritable paper as a printing medium.

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, printing apparatuses that print on a print medium having thermoreversibility have been proposed. According to this printing apparatus, the printed content can be erased and printed again, so that the print medium can be used repeatedly. Such a printing apparatus is described in Patent Document 1, for example.
A display device using a display sheet having thermoreversibility has been proposed. According to this display device, when erasing displayed characters and pictures, it is possible to prevent the generation of powder when erasing the contents written on the whiteboard using ink or the like. An example of such a display device is described in Patent Document 2.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 06-040087 Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 07-251596

  However, in the above-described prior art, the print medium used in the printing apparatus described in Patent Document 1 can be repeatedly printed. However, the print medium has a useful number of times, and printing is performed beyond that number of times. This makes it difficult to maintain the quality of the printing state. In addition, it is difficult to manage the number of prints for each print medium in a case where there are a large number of print media and the number of useful times is large (for example, several hundred times, several thousand times). Further, there is a problem that printing cannot be performed if plain paper is mixed. Therefore, it is desirable to efficiently perform management related to printing such as quality control of the printing state of the printing medium and mixing of printing media having different printing methods.

  On the other hand, according to the display device described in Patent Document 2, it is possible to rewrite the display content using thermoreversibility, but printing is not performed on a print medium using thermoreversibility. It is not used for the purpose of repeatedly using the out paper.

  The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances, and an object thereof is to provide a printing apparatus, a printing management method, a printing method, a printing management program, and a printing program that can easily perform management related to printing. It is in.

  In order to solve the above-described problem, the present invention provides a printing apparatus that performs printing on a rewritable paper attached with a recording medium, the reading unit reading print history information stored in the recording medium, And an alarm unit that issues a warning when the number of times the sheet has been printed is greater than or equal to a predetermined number based on the print history read by the reading unit.

  The present invention also relates to a printing apparatus that prints on a print medium in which a recording medium is attached to rewritable paper or plain paper, and detects whether the recording medium is attached to a print medium to be printed. Printing on rewritable paper based on information that identifies the type of print medium stored in the print medium when the recording medium is attached based on the detection result of the medium detection section and the recording medium detection section A rewritable printing mode for printing or a normal printing mode for printing on plain paper, and a printing unit for printing based on the printing mode switched by the printing mode switching unit. To do.

  The present invention is also a print management method used in a printing apparatus that prints on a rewritable paper to which a recording medium is attached, wherein the print history information stored in the recording medium is read, and the read print history Based on the above, an alarm is issued when the number of printing times of the sheet is a predetermined number or more.

  The present invention is also a printing method in a printing apparatus for printing on a rewritable paper or a printing medium having a recording medium attached to plain paper, and whether or not the recording medium is attached to a printing medium to be printed. A rewritable print mode that detects and prints on rewritable paper based on information that identifies the type of print medium stored in the print medium when a recording medium is attached based on the detected detection result Alternatively, the print mode is switched to a normal print mode for printing on plain paper, and printing is performed based on the switched print mode.

  The present invention also relates to a print management program for use in a printing apparatus that prints on a rewritable paper attached with a recording medium, the step of reading printing history information stored in the recording medium, and the reading And causing the computer to execute a step of issuing an alarm when the number of times of printing of the sheet is equal to or greater than a predetermined number of times based on the print history.

  The present invention also relates to a printing program in a printing apparatus for printing on a rewritable paper or a printing medium in which a recording medium is attached to plain paper, and whether or not the recording medium is attached to a printing medium to be printed. A rewritable sheet for printing on a rewritable sheet based on information for identifying the type of print medium stored in the print medium when a recording medium is attached based on the detected detection result It is characterized by causing a computer to execute a printing mode switching step for switching to a printing mode or a normal printing mode for printing on plain paper, and a printing step based on the switched printing mode.

  As described above, according to the present invention, based on the print history information written on the recording medium, an alarm is issued when the number of times of printing is equal to or greater than a predetermined number of times. Thus, it is possible to prevent the printing from being performed, and thus it is possible to easily maintain the quality of the printing state.

  According to the present invention, the rewritable printing mode for printing on rewritable paper or printing on plain paper based on the information specifying the type of printing medium stored in the recording medium attached to the printing medium. Since the print mode is switched to the normal print mode, printing can be performed by a printing method according to the print medium, so that the user can distinguish between rewritable paper and plain paper. Printing according to the printing medium can be performed, and management related to printing can be simplified.

  Hereinafter, a printing apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram showing the configuration of a printing apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. In this figure, a printing apparatus 1 prints rewritable paper or plain paper with a recording medium attached as a printing medium. The plain paper here is a print medium for printing using toner. A rewritable printing medium (hereinafter referred to as “rewritable paper”) is a thermal method that uses a dye that has a property of developing color at a specific temperature and becoming transparent at a specific temperature. This is a print medium for performing printing with. As a printing method using this rewritable paper, for example, there are a leuco printing method in which coloring and erasing are performed at a specific temperature using a leuco dye, and a printing method by making the silver printing surface cloudy. In the leuco printing method, printing can be performed by coloring the color “blue” or “black”.

  The recording medium attached to the rewritable paper is a tag using an IC chip, and examples thereof include an IC (Integrated Circuit) tag and an RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tag. Here, the case where the IC tag 5 is used as a recording medium and is attached to or squeezed into the rewritable paper will be described.

  In the printing apparatus 1, the paper feeding unit 10 includes a conveyance roller and a motor, and conveys the printing medium 2 set in the paper feeding tray. When the print medium 2 is rewritable paper, the reading unit 20 reads data stored in the IC tag 5 attached to the rewritable paper. Further, when the printing medium 2 is plain paper, the reading unit 20 outputs an error signal indicating that the data of the IC tag 5 cannot be read.

  The printing unit 30 includes a plain paper printing unit 31 and a rewritable printing unit 32, and prints print data (such as characters and images) based on a printing mode switched by a printing mode switching unit 50 described later. The plain paper printing unit 31 prints on plain paper using toner. The rewritable print unit 32 prints on the rewritable paper by the leuco printing method. The writing unit 40 writes various data to the IC tag 5 of the rewritable paper.

  The print data receiving unit 45 receives print data and a print instruction from a computer or the like connected to the outside, outputs the print data to the print mode switching unit 50, and instructs printing. The control unit 48 has a recording medium detection function for detecting whether or not a recording medium is attached to a print medium to be printed based on the reading result of the reading unit 20. That is, when data is received from the reading unit 20, it is detected that the print medium is rewritable paper, and when an error signal is received from the reading unit 20, it is detected that the print medium is plain paper.

  The print mode switching unit 50 switches to a rewritable print mode in which printing is performed on the rewritable paper when the recording medium is attached to the print medium (in the case of rewritable paper) based on the detection result of the recording medium of the control unit 48. When the recording medium is not attached (in the case of plain paper), the printing unit 30 is instructed to switch to the normal print mode for printing on plain paper.

  The print count management unit 60 reads the print history information recorded on the IC tag 5 of the print medium by the reading unit 20, updates the print history based on the read print history, and writes it to the IC tag 5 by the writing unit 40. . The print history here is a history of reprinting the rewritable paper and is the number of times of printing indicating the number of times of printing. In addition, the print count management unit 60 stores a reference value for a predetermined print count, detects whether the read print history has reached the reference value, and if it exceeds the reference value, an alarm unit 70 has an alarm function for warning. Here, the predetermined number of times of printing is the number of times that the rewritable paper can be repeatedly erased and printed. The alarm unit 70 is a display device such as a sound output device such as a speaker or a liquid crystal display device.

  Next, the operation of the printing apparatus 1 having the above-described configuration will be described using the flowchart of FIG. First, when a print medium is set in a paper feed tray by a user and a print instruction is input to the computer, the printing apparatus 1 receives print data and a print instruction from the connected computer by the print data receiving unit 45, The paper supply unit 10 conveys the print medium set in the paper supply tray to the printing unit 30 side. When the print medium is conveyed, the control unit 48 reads the tag from the print medium by the reading unit 20 (step S1), and detects whether or not the IC tag 5 is attached to the print medium (step S2). ).

  When the IC tag 5 cannot be read, the control unit 48 receives the error signal transmitted from the reading unit 20 and instructs the printing unit 30 by the printing mode switching unit 50 to switch to the normal printing mode. (Step S <b> 3), the print data received by the print data receiving unit 45 is output to the printing unit 30. The printing unit 30 prints the print data on the printing medium (plain paper) by the plain paper printing unit 31 based on the instruction to switch to the normal printing mode from the control unit 48 (step S4).

  On the other hand, when the IC tag 5 is read, the control unit 48 receives the data transmitted from the reading unit 20, and detects the number of times of printing with reference to the print history of the received data (step S5). Then, the control unit 48 detects whether or not the number of printings has reached the reference value based on the detection result, and issues a warning by the warning unit 70 when the number of printings has reached the reference value (step S7). At this time, the display unit of the alarm unit 70 displays that the rewritable paper has exceeded the usable number of times and emits an alarm sound.

  On the other hand, the control unit 48 instructs the printing unit 30 by the printing mode switching unit 50 to switch to the rewritable printing mode when the number of times of printing has not reached the reference value (step S8), and printing. Print data received by the data receiving unit 45 is output to the printing unit 30. Further, the control unit 48 counts up the number of printings by the printing number management unit 60, and writes the count result as a printing history by the writing unit 40 (step S9).

  The printing unit 30 prints print data on a printing medium (rewritable paper) by the rewritable printing unit 32 based on the instruction to switch to the rewritable printing mode from the control unit 48 (step S4). Here, if printing has already been performed on the rewritable paper that has been fed, the printing content is once erased by applying a predetermined temperature to the rewritable paper, and then printing is performed at the predetermined temperature.

  In the embodiment described above, the storage period information for specifying the period for storing the print contents is written in advance in the IC tag 5, and the control unit 48 reads the storage period information from the IC tag 5 by the reading unit 20. Whether or not it is within the storage period is detected, and if it is within the storage period, the alarm unit 70 outputs an alarm indicating that it is within the storage period without printing the rewritable paper. As a result, it is possible to prevent the print contents to be saved from being erased and to save them reliably.

  In the above-described embodiment, the URL (Uniform Resource Locator) of the database in which the print data is stored is stored in the IC tag 5 in advance. Then, the control unit 48 reads the URL from the rewritable paper by the reading unit 20, accesses the database of the read URL, and receives the print data by the print data receiving unit 45. The received print data is printed on the rewritable paper by the rewritable print unit 32. This saves the user from having to read the print data from the database and print it.

  Further, in the above-described embodiment, the plain paper has been described as the paper to be printed using the toner. However, when the plain paper print unit 31 has a function of performing printing by ejecting ink, the ink is ejected and printed. The paper to do is applied. Further, when the plain paper print unit 31 is configured by a thermal head or the like, thermal paper is applied as the print medium.

  In addition, information for designating the color for developing the leuco dye is stored in the IC tag 5 in advance, and the control unit 48 reads the information for designating the color from the IC tag 5 and prints it in the designated color. The print unit 32 is instructed. At this time, the rewritable print unit 32 prints on the rewritable paper with the color designated by the control unit 48.

  In the above-described embodiment, the IC tag 5 is attached to the plain paper and the IC tag 5 is not attached to the rewritable paper. When the IC tag 5 is detected, the mode is switched to the normal printing mode, and the IC tag 5 is detected. If not, it may be switched to the rewritable printing mode. Also, IC tags 5 are attached to both plain paper and rewritable paper, and information for specifying whether the print medium is plain paper or rewritable paper is stored in each IC tag 5. By referring to this information, the printing apparatus 1 may be switched between the normal printing mode and the rewritable printing mode.

  In addition, the functions of the reading unit 20, the plain paper printing unit 31, the rewritable printing unit 32, the writing unit 40, the print data receiving unit 45, the print mode switching unit 50, the printing frequency management unit 60, and the alarm unit 70 in FIG. 1 are realized. The program may be recorded on a computer-readable recording medium, and the program recorded on the recording medium may be read into a computer system and executed to perform printing on the printing medium. Here, the “computer system” includes an OS and hardware such as peripheral devices.

Further, the “computer system” includes a homepage providing environment (or display environment) if a WWW system is used.
The “computer-readable recording medium” refers to a storage device such as a flexible medium, a magneto-optical disk, a portable medium such as a ROM and a CD-ROM, and a hard disk incorporated in a computer system. Furthermore, the “computer-readable recording medium” dynamically holds a program for a short time like a communication line when transmitting a program via a network such as the Internet or a communication line such as a telephone line. In this case, a volatile memory in a computer system serving as a server or a client in that case, and a program that holds a program for a certain period of time are also included. The program may be a program for realizing a part of the functions described above, and may be a program capable of realizing the functions described above in combination with a program already recorded in a computer system.

  The embodiment of the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the drawings. However, the specific configuration is not limited to this embodiment, and includes design and the like within a scope not departing from the gist of the present invention.

1 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a configuration of a printing apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. 4 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of the printing apparatus 1.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Printing apparatus 2 Print medium 5 IC tag 10 Paper feed part 20 Reading part 30 Printing part 31 Plain paper printing part 32 Rewritable printing part 40 Writing part 45 Print data receiving part 48 Control part 50 Print mode switching part 60 Print frequency management part 70 Alarm section

Claims (6)

A printing apparatus that prints on a rewritable paper with a recording medium attached thereto,
A reading unit for reading the print history information stored in the recording medium;
And an alarm unit that gives an alarm when the number of times of printing the sheet is equal to or greater than a predetermined number based on the print history read by the reading unit. A printing apparatus for printing on a print medium in which a recording medium is attached to rewritable paper or plain paper,
A recording medium detection unit for detecting whether or not a recording medium is attached to a print medium to be printed;
A rewritable print mode for printing on rewritable paper based on information specifying the type of print medium stored in the print medium when the print medium is attached based on the detection result of the recording medium detection unit Or, a print mode switching unit for switching to a normal print mode for printing on plain paper,
A printing unit for printing based on the printing mode switched by the printing mode switching unit;
A printing apparatus comprising: A print management method used in a printing apparatus that prints on a rewritable paper to which a recording medium is attached,
Read print history information stored in the recording medium,
A print management method characterized by issuing an alarm when the number of printing times of the sheet is equal to or greater than a predetermined number based on the read printing history. A printing method in a printing apparatus for printing on a print medium in which a recording medium is attached to rewritable paper or plain paper,
Detect whether a recording medium is attached to the print medium to be printed,
Based on the detected result, a rewritable printing mode for printing on rewritable paper based on information for specifying the type of printing medium stored in the printing medium when a recording medium is attached, or normal Print mode switch to switch to normal print mode to print on paper,
Printing is performed based on the switched print mode. A print management program used in a printing apparatus that prints on rewritable paper with a recording medium attached thereto,
Reading the print history information stored in the recording medium;
Based on the read print history, a step of giving an alarm when the number of times of printing the paper is a predetermined number of times;
A print management program that causes a computer to execute. A printing program in a printing apparatus for printing on a printing medium in which a recording medium is attached to rewritable paper or plain paper,
Detecting whether a recording medium is attached to the print medium to be printed;
Based on the detected result, a rewritable printing mode for printing on rewritable paper based on information for specifying the type of printing medium stored in the printing medium when a recording medium is attached, or normal A print mode switching step for switching to a normal print mode for printing on paper;
A printing program for causing a computer to execute printing based on the switched printing mode.

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