JP2005346737A - Printer apparatus information setting method, server, and program - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a technique for reflecting apparatus information of a printer on a printer driver on a server in an environment (for example, a metaframe environment) wherein an application program is introduced only on the server. <P>SOLUTION: In an image print system including a client, the printer, and the server having the printer driver of the printer, the server stores apparatus information of the printer acquired by the client or the server, and an apparatus information acquisition means of the server acquires the apparatus information on the basis of a request from the printer driver and transfers the apparatus information to the printer driver. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a technique for reflecting printer device information on a printer driver on a server in an environment (for example, a metaframe environment) in which an application program is introduced only on the server.

  In order to solve the problems of the conventional client / server system, there is a system in which an application program is installed only on a server and is not operated on a client. As such a method, for example, there is a method called a metaframe.

  FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example of a metaframe environment. The application program is run on the metaframe server 1 shown in the figure, and the client 2 displays only the execution result of the application program running on the metaframe server 1.

  When the printer 3 is used in a metaframe environment, for example, a printer driver is installed in the metaframe server 1 in advance, and the logic of the printer 3 is logged when the client 2 using the printer 3 logs in to the metaframe server 1. The printer is automatically created (AutoCreate) using the printer driver. When printing is executed from the client 2, print data is generated by the metaframe server 1, transmitted to the printer 3 via the client 2, and printed by the printer 3.

Further, as a conventional technique for configuring a printer system in a metaframe environment, for example, there is a technique described in US Publication No. US2002 / 0018234A1. US Publication No. US2002 / 0018234A1 describes a universal printer driver that can be used in a metaframe environment.
US Publication US2002 / 0018234A1

  However, in the printer system using the metaframe environment as described above, there is a problem that the setting is not reflected in the printer driver in the metaframe server even though the option setting is performed on the client side.

  That is, the option setting in the logical printer remains in the default state. For example, the setting value on the logical printer becomes “no duplex” even though there is a duplex tray. In addition, the setting of the paper size and paper type of the tray becomes unclear. Such a problem occurs for the following reason.

  In the normal configuration including the client 2 and the printer 3 as shown in FIG. 2, the option information such as the double-sided tray in the printer driver of the printer 3 in the client 2 is normally transmitted bidirectionally by the client 2 to the printer 3. By doing so, the client 2 acquires. Bidirectional communication is performed, for example, with the configuration shown in FIG. In this configuration, the network communication module 6 acquires information instructed from the bidirectional communication module 5 that is a part of the printer driver 4 from the printer 3 via a network using a protocol such as SNMP.

  However, since bidirectional communication as described above cannot be performed between the metaframe server and the printer, option information cannot be reflected in the printer driver. Therefore, the above problem occurs.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and provides a technique for reflecting printer device information on a printer driver on a server in an environment where an application program is introduced only on the server (for example, a metaframe environment). For the purpose.

  In order to achieve the above object, the present invention is configured as follows.

  A first aspect of the present invention is a method for setting printer device information in a printer driver in an image printing system including a client, a printer, and a server having a printer driver for the printer, the server A storage step of storing the device information of the printer acquired by the server or client, and device information acquisition means in the server acquires the device information stored in the server based on a request from a printer driver, A device information acquisition step of passing the device information to the printer driver.

  According to the present invention, the device information is acquired and stored in the server, and the device information acquisition means provides the device information to the printer driver. Even in an environment where bi-directional communication is not possible and device information cannot be acquired by bi-directional communication, device information can be reflected in the printer driver, and the user can set options such as trays to print. Is possible.

  The invention described in claim 2 is the network communication module in the client according to claim 1, wherein the interface between the device information acquisition unit and the printer driver in the device information acquisition unit is a client that performs bidirectional communication with the printer. It is the same as the interface between printer drivers.

  According to the present invention, device information can be reflected in a printer driver in an environment such as a metaframe environment while using a conventional printer driver.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the second aspect, the device information acquisition unit acquires which information of the stored device information based on the interface and information from the interface. Means for determining whether to do so, and means for accessing the device information and reading the information.

  According to the present invention, a device information acquisition unit can be realized with a simple configuration as compared with a conventional network communication module.

  According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect, the server or the client acquires device information of the printer by using a network communication module that is used when bidirectional communication with the printer is performed.

  According to the present invention, by making the API of the network communication module and the API of the device information acquisition unit the same, the device information acquisition unit can use the stored device information as it is. The device information acquisition unit corresponds to the pseudo network communication module in the embodiment.

  According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, in the fourth aspect, the server or client causes the user to select one or more of at least one printer driver included in the server or client, so that the device information The device information is acquired using a tool for selecting a printer to be acquired.

  According to a sixth aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect, in the storing step, the server stores the device information instead of the server storing the device information.

  The invention described in claim 7 is the server according to any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the server is a server having the application program in an environment in which the application program is introduced only on the server. Here, the environment in which the application program is introduced only on the server is, for example, a metaframe environment.

  The invention described in claims 8 to 12 is an image printing apparatus invention that can be used in the implementation of the above method invention, and the invention described in claims 13 to 15 is a program suitable for execution on the server. The invention according to claim 16 is a computer-readable recording medium on which the program is recorded.

  According to the present invention, in a centralized system configuration (for example, a metaframe environment) in which an application program is installed on a server instead of a client, tray information is created when a logical printer is automatically created on the server or after automatic creation. It is possible to set option settings by reflecting printer option information such as duplex unit information in the printer driver.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described.

(Configuration overview)
In the present invention, in the network environment shown in FIG. 1, device information (option configuration information) such as tray information of the printer 3 that cannot be acquired by bidirectional communication is acquired from the client 2 by the configuration data acquisition tool. Configuration data is stored in the metaframe server 1 (hereinafter, device information such as tray information is also referred to as configuration data, but may also be referred to as pseudo bidirectional communication data).

  Then, by accessing this data in the metaframe server 1, the printer driver can acquire the device information and reflect it in the option settings of the logical printer that is automatically created.

  FIG. 4 shows a module configuration of software according to the present invention in the metaframe server 1 (indicated by a solid line). For comparison, the configuration in the prior art is shown within a dotted line.

  As shown in the figure, in the present invention, the normally used network communication module 6 is not used, but the pseudo network communication module 7 is used. As a result, the printer driver 4 acquires device information from the pseudo bidirectional communication data 8 stored in advance via the pseudo network communication module 7.

(Process flow)
Next, the flow of processing in the embodiment of the present invention will be described in more detail with reference to FIGS.

  FIG. 5A is a diagram for explaining acquisition of configuration data. As shown in the figure, a client that is running a configuration data acquisition tool acquires configuration data.

  In this case, for example, by selecting a printer driver installed in the client on the screen as shown in FIG. 6 on the client side, a printer from which device information is acquired is designated. Then, the client acquires data from the designated printer and saves the acquired data. The mechanism for acquiring configuration data by the configuration data acquisition tool is the same as that for acquiring printer information using a printer driver (bidirectional communication module) and a network communication module as shown in FIG. is there.

  Note that the entity that acquires configuration data using the configuration data acquisition tool may be a PC or a server, as long as a printer driver for the target printer is installed, regardless of the type of computer.

  Next, as shown in FIG. 5B, the configuration data 8 and the pseudo network communication module 7 are installed in the metaframe server 1. For example, the installation is performed by copying the configuration data 8 and the pseudo network communication module 7 to a predetermined folder. The pseudo network communication module 7 may be installed in advance.

  Although it is possible to store the configuration data on the client 2 side and the metaframe server 1 obtains this data via the network, the amount of data flowing through the network should be reduced in the metaframe environment. In the present invention, configuration data is placed on the server side.

  A flow of processing for reflecting device information in the printer driver using the configuration of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.

  This processing may be performed when a logical printer is automatically created in a metaframe environment, or may be performed when a client-side user opens a printer driver property screen after creating a logical printer. May be.

  In FIG. 7, first, the printer driver outputs an option information acquisition request to the bidirectional communication module 5. The option information acquisition request is information including an instruction as to which device information to acquire, such as tray information (step 1). Next, the bidirectional communication module 5 checks whether or not the pseudo network communication module 7 exists (step 2).

  If the pseudo network communication module 7 does not exist (No in step 3), the bidirectional module 5 is notified that the process has failed (step 4), and the process is terminated. When the pseudo network communication module 7 exists (Yes in step 3), the pseudo network communication module 7 is called, and information suitable for the option information acquisition request is obtained from the configuration data file 8 stored in advance ( Step 5) The read data is output to the bidirectional module 5 (Step 6). Then, the data is reflected in the printer driver setting (step 7).

(Details of pseudo network communication module)
Next, the configuration of the pseudo network communication module according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to FIG. 8 including comparison with a normal network communication module.

  FIG. 8A is a diagram showing a configuration of a network communication module conventionally used, and FIG. 8B is a diagram showing a configuration of a pseudo network communication module according to the present invention.

  As shown in FIG. 8A, the conventional network communication module mainly includes an API (application program interface) 61 that interfaces with an application program that specifies information to be acquired, information specified by an application, and a printer. It has a conversion unit 62 that performs conversion with MIB information, an MIB acquisition / analysis unit 63 that acquires and analyzes MIB in the printer, and a protocol implementation unit 64 (such as SNMP). With this configuration, it is possible to acquire printer device information (option information) composed of MIB information by bidirectional communication.

  On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 8B, the pseudo network communication module 7 determines which information in the configuration data file from the API 71 having the same interface as the conventional network communication module 6 and the information specified by the API. A file search / information acquisition unit 72 for searching the file and acquiring the information, and a file access unit 73 for performing a process for actually accessing the file. Yes.

  In the configuration of FIG. 8B, the API 71 and the API 61 have the same interface between the bidirectional communication modules, so that the pseudo network communication module 7 and the network communication module 6 look the same when viewed from the bidirectional communication module. . Therefore, in the present invention, the conventional printer driver can be used as it is.

(Relationship between pseudo network communication module and configuration data acquisition method)
Next, the relationship between the pseudo network communication module and the configuration data acquisition method according to the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.

  As described above, acquisition of configuration data is performed using a conventional software configuration for bidirectional communication. That is, as shown in the configuration on the client side in FIG. 9, configuration data is acquired by SNMP via an API in the network communication module 6. Since configuration data is acquired using a conventional API, configuration data can be acquired in API units. Then, a data file in which configuration data is recorded in API units is stored in the metaframe server as a configuration data file.

  In acquiring configuration data, the configuration data acquisition tool calls all APIs for acquiring device information (step 11), and stores device information (parameters) acquired from the printer via the API as it is (in API units). (Step 12).

By storing the configuration data in such a format, the pseudo network communication module 7 using the same API as that of the conventional API allows the information (parameters) in API units requested from the bidirectional module to be received as configuration data. It can be read from the file and returned to the bidirectional communication module (step 13).
(Embodiment using a plurality of printer drivers for one printer device)
In the present invention, it is possible to take a form in which a plurality of printer drivers are used for one printer device, and the carrying will be described with reference to FIG.

  In such a case, there are cases where the information acquired by each printer driver is different. That is, the printer driver 1 acquires information A and the printer driver 2 acquires information B.

  In such a case, the configuration data acquisition tool calls all APIs for acquiring device information (step 21, in this case, reads A and B), and parameters acquired from the printer via the API (device configuration information, A And B) are stored as they are (in API units) (step 22). By storing the configuration data in such a format, the pseudo network communication module 7 using the same API as the conventional API allows the API unit information (A or B) requested from the bidirectional communication module as it is. It is possible to read from the configuration data file and return it to the bidirectional communication module (step 13). As a result, it is possible to support all printer drivers in one printer device.

  The embodiments of the present invention are not limited to those described above, and it goes without saying that various applications can be considered within the scope of the claims.

It is a figure which shows an example of a meta-frame environment. 2 is a diagram illustrating a normal configuration including a client 2 and a printer 3. FIG. It is a figure for demonstrating the bidirectional | two-way communication in a prior art. It is a figure (figure in a solid line) which shows the module structure of the software of this invention in the meta-frame server. It is a figure for demonstrating acquisition and utilization of configuration data. It is a figure which shows the example of a screen display of a configuration data acquisition tool. 6 is a flowchart of processing for reflecting device information on a printer driver. It is a figure for demonstrating the structure of a pseudo network communication module. It is a figure for demonstrating the relationship between a pseudo network communication module and a configuration data acquisition method. FIG. 6 is a diagram for describing a case where a plurality of printer drivers are used for one printer device.

Explanation of symbols

1 Metaframe Server 2 Client 3 Printer 4 Printer Driver 5 Bidirectional Communication Module 6 Network Communication Module 7 Pseudo Network Communication Module 8 Data for Pseudo Bidirectional Communication (Configuration Data)

Claims (16)

A method for setting printer device information in a printer driver in an image printing system including a client, a printer, and a server having a printer driver for the printer,
A storage step in which the server stores device information of the printer acquired by the server or client;
A device information acquisition unit in the server includes a device information acquisition step of acquiring device information stored in the server based on a request from a printer driver and passing the device information to the printer driver. .   The method according to claim 1, wherein an interface between the device information acquisition unit and the printer driver in the device information acquisition unit is the same as an interface between a network communication module and a printer driver in a client that performs bidirectional communication with a printer. . The device information acquisition means
The interface;
Means for determining which information of the stored device information to acquire based on information from the interface;
The method according to claim 2, further comprising means for accessing the device information and reading the information.   The method according to claim 1, wherein the server or the client obtains device information of the printer using a network communication module used when performing bidirectional communication with the printer.   The server or client uses the tool for selecting a printer from which device information is to be acquired by allowing a user to select one or more of at least one printer driver of the server or client. The method of claim 4, wherein information is obtained.   The method according to claim 1, wherein, in the storing step, the client stores the device information instead of the server storing the device information.   The method according to claim 1, wherein the server is a server having the application program in an environment in which the application program is introduced only on the server. An image printing apparatus usable in an image printing system including a client, a printer, and an image printing apparatus having a printer driver for the printer,
Storing means for storing device information of the printer acquired by the image printing apparatus or client, and device information acquiring means,
The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the device information acquisition unit includes a unit that acquires the device information stored by the storage unit based on a request from the printer driver and passes the device information to the printer driver.   9. The image according to claim 8, wherein an interface between the device information acquisition unit and the printer driver in the device information acquisition unit is the same as an interface between a network communication module and a printer driver in a client that performs bidirectional communication with a printer. Printing device. The device information acquisition means
The interface;
Means for determining which information of the stored device information to acquire based on information from the interface;
The image printing apparatus according to claim 9, further comprising a unit that accesses the device information and reads the information.   The image printing apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the image printing apparatus or the client acquires device information of the printer by using a network communication module used when performing bidirectional communication with the printer.   The image printing apparatus or client has a tool for selecting a printer from which device information is acquired by causing the user to select one or more of at least one printer driver of the image printing apparatus or client. The image printing apparatus according to claim 11, wherein the apparatus information is acquired by using the apparatus. A server used in an image printing system including a client, a printer, and a server having a printer driver for the printer;
A function that the server or client obtains and accesses device information of the printer stored in the server;
A program that realizes a device information acquisition function that acquires device information stored in the server based on a request from the printer driver and passes the device information to the printer driver.   14. The device information acquisition function according to claim 13, wherein an interface between the device information acquisition function and the printer driver is the same as an interface between a network communication module and a printer driver in a client that performs bidirectional communication with a printer. Program. The device information acquisition function
Functions of the interface;
A function of determining which information of the stored device information is to be acquired based on information from the interface;
The program according to claim 14, further comprising a function of accessing the device information and reading the information.   A computer-readable recording medium storing the program according to any one of claims 13 to 15.

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