JP2006268330A - Equipment provided with power saving function, printer, power saving status shift notification method, and storage medium - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make it possible to know in advance that equipment shifts to a power saving status on the side of a terminal which uses the equipment. <P>SOLUTION: Information is included to the extent that the equipment shifts to the power saving status while reply packetting from the equipment which is to shift to the power saving status. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a device having a power saving function, a printing apparatus, a power saving state transition notification method, and a storage medium.

  To save power consumption, when an operation to explicitly shift to the power saving state or an instruction via the network to explicitly shift to the power saving state is received, or at a certain time every day There is a network device having a function of shifting to a state.

  When the network device is in the power saving state, the network device returns from the power saving state on condition that an input to the operation panel of the device or a specific time has come.

Patent Document 1 describes a technique for providing a substitute device in the case of a device that cannot respond.
JP 2002-287936 A

  When a device (for example, a printing apparatus) that shifts to the power saving state shifts to the power saving state, the device cannot respond to a command from the terminal. Since the terminal that sent a command to the device immediately before the device enters the power saving state cannot receive a reply from the device that has entered the power saving state, whether the device has failed or the network has failed, Or you can't tell if the device has entered a power saving state. When the terminal tries to send the command to the device again, or displays the cause of the terminal user's expectation that there is no response from the device, and displays a message prompting the investigation and removal of the cause Is common. In such a countermeasure, useless commands flow on the network, the terminal user goes to the installation location of the device, whether it is faulty or turned off, whether the network cable is disconnected, etc. It takes time to investigate. Thus, the conventional device has not been provided with means for notifying the terminal that the power saving state has been entered.

  The present invention has been made paying attention to the above points, and a device, a printing apparatus, and a power saving device having a power saving function capable of preliminarily knowing that a device shifts to a power saving state on the terminal side using the device. An object is to provide a power state transition notification method and a storage medium.

  Therefore, in the present invention, a device that has been determined to shift to the power saving state and is performing a command and reply to the terminal that is in communication includes information indicating the shift to the power saving state during the reply. The previous problem is solved by notifying the transition to the power saving state. After the terminal discovers information indicating that the device shifts to the power saving state during the reply from the device, the device does not issue a command to the device, and the device is also in the power saving state to the terminal and the user. You can display that you want to move to. This has the effect of not increasing network traffic when the device is communicating with a plurality of terminals simultaneously on the network. Furthermore, the user of the terminal does not need to investigate whether or not the device is faulty.

  The configuration of the present invention will be described below by arranging the above.

  (1) A device having a power saving function that is connected to a network and returns a reply in response to a command from a terminal, having a power saving state and a normal state, and during the transition to the power saving state, during the reply A device having a power saving function, characterized by adding information indicating a transition to a power saving state.

  According to the present invention, the reply packet from the device determined to shift to the power saving state includes information indicating the shift to the power saving state, and this information processes the command from the terminal. Therefore, the terminal can know in advance that the device shifts to the power saving state, and can prevent the sending of unnecessary command packets thereafter, and can be used by the user of the terminal. On the other hand, it is possible to warn that the device being used shifts to the power saving state and cannot be used.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

  FIG. 1 shows the configuration of equipment necessary for implementing the present invention. The device in this embodiment is a printer that is connected to a network and prints text or the like according to instructions from a terminal. The printer receives commands in the form of packets from a plurality of terminals on the network and returns replies. The command packet includes a print instruction and print data. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the structure of a command packet and a reply packet exchanged between the terminal and the printer. FIG. 3 is a detailed configuration diagram thereof. The command packet is composed of a command header and command data. The command header stores a command flag indicating whether the packet is a command packet or a reply packet, a command packet identification number, a command code for identifying a command, a size of a command data portion, and the like. In the case of a command packet, the command flag is set to “1”. A parameter corresponding to the command code is stored in the command data portion. On the other hand, a reply packet returned from the device to the terminal is composed of a reply header and reply data. The reply header stores a command packet identification number and a command code corresponding to the command flag, a result code obtained as a result of processing the command, and the size of the reply data portion. Furthermore, a flag (hereinafter referred to as a sleep flag) indicating that the device shifts to a power saving state, which is a feature of the present invention, is stored. The reply data stores information to be returned from the printer to the terminal in accordance with the command.

  FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a procedure for creating a reply packet by the printer of this embodiment. In step S001, it waits for reception of a command packet addressed to itself. When a command packet addressed to itself is received, in step S002, a command code and command data are extracted from the packet and processed. Depending on the success or failure of the process, the result, code, and reply data in the header of the reply packet change. In step S003, it is inspected whether or not the current printer is determined to shift to the power saving state. In the case of the printer of this embodiment, when the user presses the sleep button on the operation panel of the printer, the shift to the power saving state is confirmed, and the process for shifting to the same state is started. The check in step S003 in FIG. 4 is to check the value of the flag on the memory reflecting the state determined by pressing the button. If the transition to the power saving state has been confirmed, the sleep flag in the reply header of the reply packet previously created in step S004 is set. In addition, since it takes a normal time until the transition is actually completed after the transition to the power saving state is confirmed, there is a case where a plurality of command packets are processed through step S004. That is, it does not mean that it does not respond to the subsequent commands after the sleep flag is returned to the terminal and does not respond to the subsequent commands. A reply flag in which is set will be returned. Subsequently, in step S005, a reply packet is returned to the terminal, and the process ends.

Configuration diagram of equipment related to the present invention Packet configuration diagram exchanged between devices and terminals according to the present invention Detailed view of command packet and reply packet Device reply packet creation flowchart

Explanation of symbols

Terminal 1 Terminal used by a user who sends an input signal to the device 2 Terminal DEV used by a user who sends the input signal to the device DEV Network device having a power saving function

Claims (4)

  A device that has a power saving function that connects to a network and returns a reply in response to a command from a terminal, has a power saving state and a normal state, and enters a power saving state during the transition to the power saving state. A device equipped with a power saving function, characterized by adding information indicating the transition to.   A network-connectable printing apparatus having a power saving function having the transition condition according to claim 1.   Connected to the network, returns a reply in response to a command from the terminal, and in the power saving state transition notification method of the device having the power saving state and the normal state, the power saving state during the reply at the time of transition to the power saving state A power saving state transition notification method for notifying the terminal of a transition to a power saving state by adding information indicating a transition to a power saving state.   A storage medium having a computer program for executing the method according to claim 3.

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