JP2005094539A - Image forming system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve a problem that a communication error or a setting error easily occurs between following both programs since a program for deciding a method of transmitting/receiving a command corresponding to each protocol differs from a program for performing control based on a result of the decision. <P>SOLUTION: In the image forming system composed of a client device connected to a network, a printer controller and an image forming apparatus including a FAX function, when transmitting a FAX job from the client device through the printer controller to a designated port number of the image forming apparatus, a program stored in a storage device of the printer controller refers to the transmission destination port number of the image forming apparatus and a data table describing a protocol corresponding to the port number, thereby uniquely determining processing of the program. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2005,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an image forming system including a client device and a printer controller connected to a network, and an image processing forming apparatus having a plurality of functions such as copying, printer, and FAX.

  2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in an image forming system including a client and a printer controller and an image forming apparatus having a plurality of functions such as copy, printer, and FAX, various jobs such as a print job, a scan job, and a FAX job are transmitted from the client via the printer controller. Are sent to the image forming apparatus (for example, Patent Document 1). The communication protocol between the printer controller and the image forming apparatus differs depending on the model or job of the image forming apparatus. In the printer controller, the program for receiving and processing the job from the client, the type of received job, and the model of the destination image processing apparatus The system is controlled using a program that performs conversion processing to a protocol that supports the above.

For FAX jobs, there are several types of protocols, as represented by Port 9100 and LPD. When a command is transmitted from the printer controller to the MFP in the transmission / reception of a command between the printer controller and the MFP when a FAX job is transmitted from the client device to the LPD port of the MFP via the printer controller, the reply is transmitted from the MFP. However, if it is transmitted to the port of Port 9100, the reply command is not transmitted. Conventionally, a program that performs reception processing determines a command transmission / reception method corresponding to each protocol, and the protocol conversion program controls the command based on the determination result.
JP-A-11-194908

  However, because the program for determining the command transmission / reception method corresponding to each protocol and the control program that controls the result are different, communication errors and setting errors between the two programs are likely to occur. End up.

  In order to solve the above-described problems, according to the first aspect of the present invention, in an image forming system comprising a client device connected to a network, a printer controller, and an image forming device having a FAX function, a FAX job is transferred from the client device to the printer controller. When the program stored in the storage device of the printer controller is transmitted to the designated port number of the image forming apparatus via the network, the transmission port number of the image forming apparatus and the protocol corresponding to the port number By referring to the described data table, it is possible to uniquely determine the processing of the program.

  In order to solve the above problem, in the invention of claim 2, when adding or changing a transmission destination port of the image forming apparatus, a protocol corresponding to the transmission destination port and the transmission destination port is added to the data table, or The image forming system according to claim 1, wherein the transmission destination port can be added or changed by changing.

  As described above, according to the image forming system of the first aspect of the present invention, in the image forming system including the client apparatus connected to the network, the printer controller, and the image forming apparatus having the FAX function, the FAX job is transmitted to the client apparatus. Is transmitted to the designated port number of the image forming apparatus via the printer controller, the program stored in the storage device of the printer controller is stored in the transmission destination port number and the port number of the image forming apparatus. By referring to the data table describing the corresponding protocol, it is possible to uniquely determine the processing of the program, and the program for judging the protocol and the program for controlling the command are the same, so that the program Communication errors between It is possible to prevent the constant mistakes.

  According to the image forming system of claim 2 of the present invention, when the transmission destination port of the image forming apparatus is added or changed, the data table is added or changed to add the transmission destination port of the image forming apparatus. Or, since it can be changed, the work of adding or changing the program code can be omitted.

(Example 1)
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a system according to the present invention. The printer controller 103 has two network interface cards (NICs) on the hardware in a part called a motherboard 104 on which a CPU, a memory, etc. are mounted. One is a NIC 105 connected to the network 102 side, and the other is a network interface card (NIC). There is a NIC 106 connected to the network 107 side. An MFP (Multi Function Peripheral) 108 is connected to a printer controller 103 via a network 107, and a printer controller 103 and a client PC 101 are connected via a different network 102.

  FIG. 2 shows the configuration of the MFP. The MFP includes a scanner unit 201 that reads an image, a scanner IP unit 202 that performs image processing on the image data, a FAX unit 203 that transmits and receives an image using a telephone line such as a facsimile, and a network. There is a NIC part 204 for exchanging image data and device information, and a NIC part 204 for exchanging information with the MFP 103. Then, the image signal is temporarily stored in the core unit 206 according to the usage of the MFP 103, and the path is determined.

  The FAX unit 203 will be described with reference to FIG. First, at the time of reception, data from the telephone line is received by the NCU unit 301 and converted in voltage, A / D conversion and demodulation operations are performed by the demodulation unit 304 in the modem unit 302, and then rasterized by the decompression unit 306. Expand to data. In general, a run length method or the like is used for compression / expansion by FAX. The image converted into the raster data is temporarily stored in the memory unit 307 and is sent to the core unit 206 after confirming that there is no transfer error in the image data. At the time of transmission, the image signal of the raster image coming from the core unit is subjected to compression such as a run length method by the compression unit 305, and D / A conversion and modulation operation are performed by the modulation unit 303 in the modem unit 302. Thereafter, it is sent to the telephone line via the NCU unit 301.

  The NIC unit 204 will be described with reference to FIG. The NIC unit 204 has a function of an interface to the network 102. For example, information from outside can be obtained by using an Ethernet (registered trademark) cable such as 10Base-T / 100Base-TX. It plays the role of flowing information to the outside.

  When obtaining information from the outside, first, the voltage is converted by the transformer 601 and sent to the LAN controller 602. The LAN controller unit 602 has a first buffer memory (not shown) therein, and after determining whether the information is necessary information, the LAN controller unit 602 sends it to the second buffer memory (not shown). A signal is passed through the core unit 206.

  Next, when providing information to the outside, the data sent from the core unit 206 adds necessary information to the LAN controller unit 602 and connects to the networks 102 and 107 via the transformer unit 601. Is done.

  Next, the printer controller 102 will be described with reference to FIG. A job input from the NIC 105 enters the server from the input device control unit 501 and plays a role in connecting the server with various client applications. PDL data and JCL (Job Control Language) data are accepted as input. It corresponds to various clients with status information about printers and servers, and the output of this module is responsible for combining all the appropriate PDL and JCL components.

  Next, the input job control unit 502 manages the requested list of jobs and creates a job list for accessing individual jobs submitted to the server. Furthermore, this module has three functions: job routing for determining a job route, job split for determining whether to divide and RIP, and job scheduling for determining the job order.

  A rasterization processing (RIP) unit 503 performs RIP processing on PDLs of various jobs, and creates bitmaps with appropriate sizes and resolutions. As for RIP processing, rasterization processing in various formats such as PostScript (registered trademark of Adobe), PCL, TIFF, JPEG, PDF, etc. is possible.

  The data conversion unit 504 plays a role of compressing a bitmap image created by the RIP or performing format conversion, and selects an optimal image type that matches each printer. For example, when a job is to be handled in units of pages, processing such as adding a PDF header to bitmap data after rasterizing TIFF or JPEG in the RIP portion and editing the data as PDF data is performed.

  The output job control unit 505 takes page images of jobs and manages how they are handled based on command settings. The page is printed on a printer or saved on the hard disk 507. Whether or not to leave the job after printing in the hard server 507 can be selected, and can be recalled when saved. Further, this module manages the interaction between the hard disk 507 and the RAM 508.

  The output device control unit 506 controls which device is output and which device is clustered (multiple devices are connected and printed at the same time), and is sent to the interface card 106 of the selected device. This module also plays a role of monitoring the status of the device 108 and transmitting the device status to the printer controller 103.

  FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating a control unit of the printer controller 103. A CPU 601 that performs overall control of the printer controller 103, a ROM 602 that stores various programs such as a program that executes a command for controlling the CPU 601, a program that performs image processing, a program 603 that performs reception processing, and a program that performs protocol conversion; A RAM 508 is provided for temporarily storing the program read from the ROM 602 for execution by the CPU 601 and spooling print data.

  The embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.

  First, in step 701, a FAX job is transmitted from the client PC 101 to the printer controller 103 via the network 102.

  In step 702, the reception processing program 603 stored in the ROM 602 of the printer controller 103 receives this FAX job.

  In step 703, the reception processing program starts a session with the protocol conversion processing program 604.

  In step 704, the reception processing program transmits the received FAX job information to the protocol conversion processing program 604 as one command (hereinafter referred to as command A).

  FIG. 8 shows a configuration example of the command A. The command A is composed of various types of information relating to a job such as a data type 801, a data size 802, a connection destination port number 803, and a job handle 804 for identifying the job.

  In step 705, the protocol conversion program 604 receives the command A.

  In step 706, the data table is referenced based on the received information.

  FIG. 9 shows a configuration example of the data table. In the data table, for the transmission destination port number (MFP side) 901 and each transmission destination port number (protocol) 901, the MFP indicates whether to send a reply command of command A (902).

  In step 707, the protocol conversion processing program 604 performs command conversion on the command A, and generates a new command (hereinafter referred to as command B).

  If the destination port number 803 is 515 (LPD), the protocol conversion processing program 604 transmits a command B to the MFP's 515 port in step 708, and the MFP receives the command B in step 709.

  In step 710, the MFP generates and transmits a reply command for the received command B. In step 711, the protocol conversion processing program 604 receives this reply command.

  In step 714, the protocol conversion processing program 604 transmits a reply command for the command A to the reception processing program 603.

  If the destination port number 803 is 9100 (Port 9100), the protocol conversion processing program 604 refers to the data table (FIG. 9) in step 706, converts the command A in step 712, After the generation, in step 713, the command B is transmitted to the 9100th port of the MFP. In the case of transmission to number 9100, unlike the case of LPD, the data table (FIG. 9) shows that there is no reply command for command B from the MFP. Therefore, immediately after sending the command B to the 9100th port of the MFP, the protocol conversion processing program 604 sends a reply command for the command A to the reception processing program 603 (step 714).

The figure which shows the whole system of embodiment of this invention Configuration of MFP FAX section NIC Department Printer controller process flow Control section of printer controller Flow chart showing an embodiment Command configuration example Data table configuration example

Claims (2)

  In an image forming system including a client device connected to a network, a printer controller, and an image forming device having a FAX function, a FAX job is transferred from the client device to the designated port number of the image forming device via the printer controller. At the time of transmission, the program stored in the storage device of the printer controller refers to the data table describing the transmission destination port number of the image forming apparatus and the protocol corresponding to the port number. An image forming system characterized in that it can be determined uniquely. When adding or changing the destination port of the image forming apparatus, the destination port can be added or changed by adding or changing the destination port and a protocol corresponding to the destination port in the data table. The image forming system according to claim 1, wherein:

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