JP2006260077A - Electronic form printer - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To obtain a proper layout of application blank used for an online application, from an electronic form displayed in an application site. <P>SOLUTION: An HTML tag and an interpretation rule of an element correlated therewith are registered in a storage part 11 while correlated each other. When an electronic form structurization document data is input from an electronic form input part 15, the tag and the interpretation rule included in the electronic form structurization document data are read out from the storage part 11, contents of the tag and the element are modified pursuant to the read-out interpretation rule, and the modified electronic form structurization document data is printed on a paper medium. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to an electronic form printing apparatus.

With the progress of digitalization of information distribution and networking, most of the application procedures such as purchase of goods and participation in events have been carried out in real time through dedicated sites that handle them. When a user accesses this type of site from his / her terminal, an interface screen called “electronic form” is often presented. The user can complete the application procedure by embedding his / her name and address in a predetermined column of the electronic form using a mouse or a keyboard. A technique for supporting the exchange of information via the electronic form has been proposed so far. For example, Patent Document 1 discloses a printing system in which form data provided from a host can be suitably combined with text and printed regardless of whether the form data is in raster format or vector format. There is. Patent Document 2 discloses an electronic form utilization system that favorably supports creation of an electronic document according to an electronic form, and allows the created electronic document to be directly submitted via a network.
JP 2004-54361 A JP 2003-6191 A

By the way, there are not a few users who are not good at input operations to electronic forms using a mouse or a keyboard even when the Internet is becoming familiar with the progress of digitization and networking of information distribution forms. To do. In addition, an input operation itself may be difficult for a disabled person or the like. Such users often prefer a so-called offline application procedure in which an electronic form is printed as it is as an application form, and necessary items are handwritten and mailed to the application form.
However, at present, most of the electronic forms presented when accessing various application sites are in a format that allows the user to select necessary items from candidates prepared in advance using a pull-down menu or the like. For this reason, even if the display content is printed on a sheet by a printer or the like, it cannot be used as it is as an application sheet for offline application.
The present invention has been devised under such a background, and an object thereof is to obtain an application form having an appropriate layout that can be used for offline application from an electronic form displayed on an application site. .

  An electronic form printing apparatus according to a preferred aspect of the present invention associates each type of tag used in a predetermined markup language with a rule that specifies a layout mode of an element associated with each type of tag. Storage means, input means for inputting an electronic form structured document in which each element constituting the electronic form and tags associated with each element are described according to the markup language, and the input electronic form Extracting means for sequentially extracting each pair of element and tag from the structured document, and forming the other of the pair based on the rule stored in the storage means in association with the type of tag forming one of the extracted pairs A specifying unit for specifying a layout mode of an element, and a layout mode for each element included in the input electronic form structured document is the specifying unit. Therefore, when each is specified, a generation unit that generates a print image by laying out each element according to the specified layout mode, and a print control unit that outputs the generated print image as print control data With.

  In this aspect, the rule stored in the storage unit in association with a predetermined tag may indicate that the layout should be performed after adding predetermined text information to an element associated with the tag.

  Moreover, you may further provide the update means which updates the correspondence of each kind of said tag and rule in the said memory | storage means.

  The storage means stores each type of the tag and a group of the plurality of rules in association with each other, and employs any rule among the group of the plurality of rules associated with each of the types. You may further provide the selection means to select these.

  According to the present invention, an application form having an appropriate layout that can be used for offline application can be acquired from an electronic form displayed on the application site.

(Embodiment of the Invention)
An embodiment of the present invention will be described.
In the present embodiment, the term “electronic form” is used to mean an interface screen provided with one or a plurality of input fields for inputting necessary items for various application procedures.
The term “electronic form structured document data” is used in the sense of data describing the layout of an electronic form according to HTML (HyperText Markup Language).

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a hardware configuration of an electronic form printing apparatus according to the present embodiment. As shown in the figure, this apparatus includes a storage unit 11, an input instruction unit 12, an output unit 13, an interpretation rule registration / update unit 14, an electronic form input unit 15, an extraction unit 16, an interpretation rule search unit 17, and a conversion unit 18. And a print control unit 19.

The storage unit 11 stores various HTML tags and interpretation rules of these tags in association with each other, and corresponds to a storage unit in claims of the present application. Here, the interpretation rule means a rule for designating a layout mode at the time of printing of an element associated with each HTML tag in the electronic form structured document. The interpretation rules are set by the user individually for each type of HTML tag, and the content thereof may be the same as or different from the layout mode defined by the HTML rules. However, the user must set a layout mode in which all the contents represented by the elements associated with various HTML tags can be grasped at a glance at the print contents as interpretation rules.
For example, it is assumed that an interpretation rule is paired with an HTML tag of <SELECT>. When this HTML tag is interpreted in accordance with the HTML rules, a plurality of options that are elements associated with the tag are displayed as a pull-down menu. Therefore, when the display state is printed on the paper as it is, there may be a case where all the options cannot be grasped only by looking at the printed paper. In order to avoid such a situation, it is desirable that an HTML tag of <SELECT> has an interpretation rule such as “list all options in the pull-down menu one by one”.

The output unit 13 is, for example, a printer, and corresponds to the printing unit in the claims of the present application. The input instruction unit 12 is, for example, a mouse or a keyboard. The interpretation rule registering / updating unit 14 corresponds to an updating unit in the claims of the present application, registers a tag and interpretation rule pair in the storage unit 11 in accordance with an instruction from the input instruction unit 12, and stores the contents of the already registered pair Update.
The electronic form input unit 15 is an interface for inputting electronic form structured document data, and corresponds to an input unit in the claims of the present application.

  The extraction unit 16, the interpretation rule search unit 17, the conversion unit 18, and the print control unit 19 are functional modules that are logically realized by a CPU (not shown). The extraction unit 16 corresponds to the extraction unit in the claims of the present application, the interpretation rule search unit 17 corresponds to the identification unit, the conversion unit 18 corresponds to the generation unit, and the print control unit 19 corresponds to the print control unit.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the operation of this embodiment. The operation shown in the figure is triggered by the input of electronic form structured document data from the electronic form input unit 15.
In step 100 shown in the figure, the extraction unit 16 extracts each pair of element and tag from the input electronic form structured document data. Then, a series of subsequent processes are sequentially executed with each extracted pair as a processing target.

In step 110, the interpretation rule search unit 17 identifies one of the pairs extracted by the extraction unit 16 as a processing measure, and the interpretation rule associated with the type of tag included in the pair is stored in the storage unit 11. Judge whether or not. If the determination result in step 110 is “YES”, the process proceeds to step 120, while if “NO”, the process proceeds to step 140.
In step 120, the interpretation rule search unit reads the interpretation rule associated with the tag type from the storage unit 11.

In subsequent step 130, the conversion unit 18 modifies the content of the HTML tag and the element to be processed according to the interpretation rule read in step 120.
In step 140, the interpretation rule search unit 17 determines whether or not there remains a pair that has not yet been processed among the pairs extracted in step 100. If the determination result in step 140 is “YES”, the process returns to step 110, and the subsequent processing is repeated with another HTML tag / element pair as the processing target. On the other hand, if the determination is “NO”, the flow proceeds to step 150.
In step 150, the print control unit 19 supplies a print image obtained by laying out new electronic form structured document data obtained by changing the contents of the HTML tag and the element to the output unit 13 as print control data. To do.

Here, the layout change of the electronic form created by processing the electronic form structured document data by the apparatus will be described in more detail with reference to a plurality of examples.
FIG. 3 is a first example of electronic form structured document data input from the electronic form input unit 15. FIG. 4A shows a mode when the input structured document data is output as it is, and FIG. 4B shows a mode when it is output after being modified by this apparatus.
When the two output modes of FIG. 4 are compared, in FIG. 4A, the element laid out at the top is the “color of the desired cup”. On the other hand, in FIG. 4B, “color of desired cup” is replaced with “color of desired cup (select one)”. This is because the HTML tag of <TD width = 178 bgColor = # c5dead><FONT class = f11> associated with the element of “desired cup color” in the structured document data of FIG. This indicates that it is associated with the interpretation rule “add character string“ (select one) ””.

FIG. 5 is a second example of electronic form structured document data input from the electronic form input unit 15. FIG. 6A shows a mode when the input structured document data is output as it is, and FIG. 6B shows a mode when it is output after being modified by this apparatus.
When the two output modes in FIG. 6 are compared, in FIG. 6A, the elements laid out at the top are “favorite colors”. On the other hand, in FIG. 6B, “favorite color” is replaced with “favorite color (s)”. This is because the HTML tag of <TD width = 178 bgColor = # c5dead><FONT class = f11> associated with the element “favorite color” in the structured document data of FIG. This indicates that it is associated with the interpretation rule “add character string“ (s) ”.

FIG. 7 is a third example of electronic form structured document data input from the electronic form input unit 15. FIG. 8A shows a mode when the input structured document data is output as it is, and FIG. 8B shows a mode when it is output after being modified by this apparatus.
Comparing the two output modes in FIG. 8, in FIG. 8A, a pull-down menu labeled “Please select” is laid out under the element “Select the card you want”. Yes. In contrast, in FIG. 8B, instead of the pull-down menu, “(1) A card”, “(2) B card”, “(3) C card”, “(4) D card”, “ You can see that each character string of “Please select: _____” is laid out in five levels. This is because the HTML tag of <SELECT name = CardType> associated with the pull-down menu in the electronic form structured document data of FIG. 7 is “arranged all the options one by one: entry of options” This indicates that the data is associated with the interpretation rule “add bar indicating position”.

FIG. 9 is a third example of electronic form structured document data input from the electronic form input unit 15. FIG. 10A shows a mode when the input structured document data is output as it is, and FIG. 10B shows a mode when it is output after being modified by this apparatus.
Comparing the two output modes of FIG. 10, in FIG. 10A, an element “about revolving” with a link to another address is laid out under the pull-down menu. In contrast, in FIG. 10B, “about revolving payment” is replaced with “please refer to attached page for revolving payment”. This is <a href = ”/cgi-bin/log-cgifrom=20050131001&jump=http://xxxxxxx.co. Associated with the element“ about revolving ”in the electronic form structured document data of FIG. This indicates that the HTML tag of jp / index.html> is associated with the interpretation rule “add a character string“ Please refer to the attached page ”for the text” in the storage unit 11.

FIG. 11 is a fourth example of electronic form structured document data input from the electronic form input unit 15. FIG. 12A shows a mode in which the input structured document data is output as it is, and FIGS. 12B and 12C show a mode in which the structured document data is output after being modified by this apparatus.
Comparing the output modes of FIGS. 12A and 12B, FIG. 12A shows “business”, each of which is connected to a check box under the element “Please select from below:”. , “Interest / dividend”, “pension”, “real estate”, and “temporary income” are laid out. In contrast, in FIG. 12B, “Please select from below:” is replaced with “Please select from below: (multiple)”. This is because the HTML tag of <TD width = 178 bgColor = # c5dead><FONT class = f11> associated with the element “Please select from below:” in the electronic form structured document data of FIG. This indicates that the storage unit 11 is associated with the interpretation rule “add character string of“ multiple allowed ””.
Comparing the output modes of FIGS. 12A and 12C, in FIG. 12C, “Please select from the bottom:” is replaced with “Please select from the bottom: Multiple______”. , “Business”, “Interest / dividend”, “Pension”, “Real estate”, and “Temporary income” have been replaced by the numbers 1 to 5, respectively. This is because the HTML tag of <TD width = 178 bgColor = # c5dead><FONT class = f11> associated with the element “Please select from below:” in the electronic form structured document data of FIG. In the storage unit 11, it is associated with an interpretation rule of “add character string“ multiple ”: add a bar indicating the entry position of options”, and further, “business”, “interest / dividend”, “pension” , HTML tag of <INPUT type = checkbox value = # name = Income> associated with each element of "real estate" and "temporary income" is associated with an interpretation rule of "replace ascending numbers with check boxes" It has been shown.

  According to the embodiment described above, the user can set interpretation rules for elements associated with each tag used in HTML. When the electronic form structured document data is input, the contents of the tags and elements included in the electronic form structured document data are modified according to the interpretation rules before printing. Therefore, the layout of each element of the electronic form structured document data originally created for display can be easily changed to one suitable for printing.

(Other embodiments)
The present invention can be modified in various ways.
The electronic form printing apparatus according to the above embodiment is constructed on the assumption that the electronic form structured document data is described according to HTML, and the user registers various HTML tag and interpretation rule pairs in the storage unit 11. Or was to update. On the other hand, in order to be able to convert electronic form structured document data described in accordance with other markup languages such as XML (Extensible Markup Language), the tags appearing in those other markup languages are unique. Interpretation rules may be registered in the storage unit 11.
In addition, the storage unit 11 of the electronic form printing apparatus according to the above embodiment associates the HTML tag and the interpretation rule on a one-to-one basis, but associates one HTML tag with a plurality of interpretation rule sets. It may be stored and the conversion may be performed by appropriately using one of the plurality of interpretation rules according to the selection by the user.

It is a hardware block diagram of an electronic form printing apparatus. It is a flowchart which shows operation | movement of this embodiment. It is a 1st example of electronic form structured document data. It is a figure which shows the comparison of the output aspect of an electronic form. It is a 2nd example of electronic form structured document data. . It is a figure which shows the comparison of the output aspect of an electronic form. It is a 3rd example of electronic form structured document data. It is a figure which shows the comparison of the output aspect of an electronic form. It is a 3rd example of electronic form structured document data. It is a figure which shows the comparison of the output aspect of an electronic form. It is a 4th example of electronic form structured document data. It is a figure which shows the comparison of the output aspect of an electronic form.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 11 ... Memory | storage part, 12 ... Input instruction | indication part, 13 ... Output part, 14 ... Interpretation rule registration / update part, 15 ... Electronic form input part, 16 ... Extraction part, 17 ... Interpretation rule search part, 18 ... Conversion part, 19 ... Print control unit

Claims (4)

Storage means for storing each type of tag used in a predetermined markup language and a rule for specifying a layout mode of an element associated with each type of tag, in association with each other;
Input means for inputting an electronic form structured document in which each element constituting the electronic form and tags associated with each element are described according to the markup language;
Extraction means for sequentially extracting each pair of elements and tags from the input electronic form structured document;
A specifying means for specifying a layout mode of an element constituting the other of the pair based on a rule stored in the storage means in association with a type of the tag constituting one of the extracted pairs;
When the layout mode of each element included in the input electronic form structured document is specified by the specifying unit, a printing image is generated by laying out each element according to the specified layout mode. Generating means;
An electronic form printing apparatus comprising: a printing control unit that outputs the generated printing image as printing control data. The electronic form printing apparatus according to claim 1.
The rules stored in the storage means in association with a predetermined tag are:
An electronic form printing apparatus that indicates that layout should be performed after adding predetermined text information to an element associated with the tag. The electronic form printing apparatus according to claim 1 or 2,
An electronic form printing apparatus, further comprising: an updating unit that updates a correspondence relationship between each type of the tag and the rule in the storage unit. The electronic form printing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 3,
The storage means
Each type of tag and a group of a plurality of rules are stored in association with each other,
An electronic form printing apparatus, further comprising: a selecting unit that selects which rule is to be adopted from a group of the plurality of rules associated with each of the types.

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