JP2010067140A - Image forming device - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To easily associate an individual printed matter with each attached file when automatically printing the plurality of attached files attached to electronic mail by an image forming device. <P>SOLUTION: The image forming device 1 includes: a network I/F part 120 for receiving electronic mail; an image forming part 220 for forming an image on a recording sheet; an attached file determination part 111 for determining whether the received electronic mail has the attached file or not; a file format determination part 112 for determining whether a file format of the attached file is available for printing; and a print order setting part 114 for setting a print order of the plurality of attached files. The image forming device 1 prints the plurality of attached files in the order set by the print order setting part 114, in addition to the body of the electronic mail, if the file formats of the plurality of attached files attached to the received electronic mail are available for printing. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus that automatically prints an e-mail body and an attached file attached to the e-mail.

  In recent years, with the spread of electronic networks such as the Internet and intranets, the number of e-mails transmitted and received on the networks has increased. Therefore, the number of received e-mails per user of the network and the time required for processing the e-mails are constantly increasing.

  An attached file such as an image file may be attached to the e-mail. When the attached file is, for example, a high-resolution image file, the resolution of the terminal screen is lower than the resolution of the image file. Therefore, the user grasps the contents of the image file on the terminal screen. It can be difficult. In that case, the user prints the attached file and confirms the contents.

  In order to cope with such a situation, a conventional image forming apparatus is known which is connected to a network and automatically prints an attached file attached to an e-mail in addition to an e-mail body ( For example, see Patent Documents 1 to 3).

If the image forming apparatus automatically prints the attached file as in Patent Documents 1 to 3, the presence or absence of the attached file is confirmed for each of the plurality of e-mails to be processed, and the content of the attached file is confirmed. It is possible to relieve the user from the cumbersome work of determining whether to print and instructing the image forming apparatus to print.
JP-A-9-247335 JP-A-11-161585 JP 2002-149575 A

  By the way, there are many cases where a plurality of attachment files are attached to an e-mail. When a plurality of attachments are printed and the printing order of the plurality of attachments is unclear to the user, the user has to make efforts to check which attachments each printed matter is. As a result, time costs increase and business efficiency decreases.

  However, in the conventional image forming apparatuses described in Patent Documents 1 to 3, no consideration is given to the print order of the attached file.

  The present invention has been made to solve the above-described problems of conventional image forming apparatuses. In an image forming apparatus that automatically prints a plurality of attached files attached to an e-mail, An object of the present invention is to provide an image forming apparatus capable of reducing the time cost due to the user's efforts to make the printed matter and each attached file correspond to each other and improving the work efficiency.

  An image forming apparatus according to the present invention includes a receiving unit that receives an e-mail from a terminal device connected via a network, an image forming unit that forms an image on a recording sheet, and an e-mail received by the receiving unit. An attached file discriminating unit that discriminates whether or not the file has an attached file, and a file that discriminates whether the format of the attached file of the e-mail received by the receiving unit is a format printable by the image forming unit; A format determination unit; and a print order setting unit that sets a print order of the attached files when a plurality of attached files are attached to the email, and the image forming unit includes the attached files in the email If the attached file discriminating unit discriminates that there is no file, only the text of the email is printed, and if the email has an attached file, the attached file is printed. When the file discriminating unit discriminates and only one attached file is attached, when the file format discriminating unit discriminates that the format of the attached file is the printable format, the e-mail In addition to the body text, when the attached file determination unit determines that the electronic mail has an attached file and the attachment file has a plurality of attached files, the format of the attached file is: When the file format determination unit determines that the format is printable, the plurality of attached files are printed in the order set by the print order setting unit in addition to the e-mail body (Claim 1). .

  According to this configuration, when a plurality of attached files are attached to the e-mail, the plurality of attached files are printed in the order set by the print order setting unit. That is, since the printing order of the attached file becomes clear to the user, it becomes easy for the user to associate each printed matter with each attached file.

  In the above configuration, the print order setting unit preferably sorts the file names of the attached files in a sort order determined by a predetermined sort rule, and the sort order is set as the print order of the attached files. Item 2).

  According to this configuration, the print order of the attached file is a sort order determined by a predetermined sort rule. Therefore, the printing order of the attached file becomes clearer to the user, and it becomes easier for the user to associate each printed matter with each attached file.

  The said structure WHEREIN: The said sort order can be made into the order by which the said attachment file is attached to the said email (Claim 3).

  According to this configuration, the print order setting unit sorts the attached files using the order in which the attached files are attached to the e-mail as a sort order, and the sort order is set as the print order of the attached files. . Therefore, the user can easily grasp the printing order of the attached file.

  The said structure WHEREIN: The said sort order can be made into the alphabetical order of the file name of the said attachment file (Claim 4).

  According to this configuration, the print order setting unit sorts the attached files using the alphabetical order of the file names of the attached files as a sort order, and sets the sort order as the print order of the attached files. Therefore, since the attached files are printed in the order of frequently used alphabetical order, the user can easily grasp the printing order of the attached files.

  In the above-described configuration, the electronic mail system further includes a file name search unit that searches for a file name of the attached file described in the body of the e-mail, and the file name searched by the file name search unit has the sort order. It is desirable to use the order described in the text.

  According to this configuration, the file name search unit searches for the file name of the attached file described in the body of the email, and the print order setting unit determines that the file name searched by the file name search unit is the file name. The attached files are sorted in the order described in the e-mail body, and the sort order is set as the print order of the attached files.

  Therefore, since the user can read through the printed matter of the attached file attached to the e-mail in the order of reading the e-mail body, the e-mail can be processed efficiently.

  In the above configuration, when the attachment file whose file name is described in the body of the e-mail and the attachment file which is not described are mixed and attached to the e-mail, the print order setting unit displays the e-mail More preferably, the print order is set in preference to the order in which the file names are described in the text.

  According to this configuration, when an attachment file in which the file name is described in the e-mail body and an attachment file that is not described are mixed and attached to the e-mail, the file name is included in the e-mail body. The described attached file is printed first.

  Therefore, when a file with a file name written in the body of the e-mail and a file with a file that is not described are mixed and attached to the e-mail, the user has the file name written in the body of the e-mail. The attached file can be read through the printed matter of the attached file attached to the e-mail in the order of reading the e-mail body, and the attached file whose file name is not described in the e-mail body is individually Since the printed matter and each attached file can be easily associated with each other, the electronic mail can be processed efficiently.

  According to the image forming apparatus of the present invention, an attached file attached to an electronic mail that is often printed and confirmed is automatically printed, and the printing order becomes clear to the user. Therefore, the user is freed from complicated printing processing and can easily associate each printed matter with each attached file. Therefore, the time cost is reduced, and the business efficiency is improved.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a network including an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.

  As shown in FIG. 1, the image forming apparatus 1 is connected to a LAN (Local Area Network). Further, a PC (Personal Computer) 2 (terminal device) and a mail server 3 are connected to the LAN. The image forming apparatus 1, the PC 2, and the mail server 3 transmit and receive various data via the LAN.

  The PC 2 includes e-mail client software for sending and receiving e-mail, a plurality of application software for handling files of various file formats, and a printer driver for generating print data to be printed by the image forming apparatus 1. Utility software for checking the printer status and print job is installed. The PC 2 generates print data to be printed by the application software and the printer driver based on an operation command from the user, and transmits the print data to the image forming apparatus 1 via the LAN.

  The mail server 3 is composed of a POP3 server compliant with POP (Post Office Protocol) 3 or an IMAP server compliant with IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol). Send to PC2.

  In FIG. 1, only one image forming apparatus 1 and one PC 2 are shown, but a plurality of PCs 2 are normally connected to a LAN, and a plurality of image forming apparatuses 1 may be connected to a LAN. is there.

  FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view mainly showing a mechanical configuration of the image forming apparatus 1. The image forming apparatus 1 is a digital multi-function peripheral having a scanner function and a printer function. The image forming apparatus 1 has a main body unit 200, a paper post-processing unit 300 disposed on the left side of the main body unit 200, and various operation commands by a user. An operation unit 400 for inputting, a document reading unit 500 disposed above the main body unit 200, and a document feeding unit 600 disposed above the document reading unit 500 are provided.

  The operation unit 400 includes a touch panel 401, a start key 402, a numeric keypad 403, and the like. The touch panel 401 displays various operation screens and various operation buttons for the user to input various operation commands. The start key 402 is used for the user to input a print execution command and the like, and the ten key 403 is used for inputting the number of copies to be printed.

  The document feeding unit 600 includes a document placement unit 601, a document discharge unit 602, a paper feed roller 603, and a document transport unit 604, and the document reading unit 500 includes a scanner 501 and the like. The paper feed roller 603 feeds out the original set on the original placement unit 601, and the original transport unit 604 transports the fed originals one by one on the scanner 501. The scanner 501 sequentially reads the conveyed document, and the read document is discharged to the document discharge unit 602.

  The main body 200 includes a paper storage unit 210, an image forming unit 220, a fixing unit 230, a discharge port 240, and a discharge tray 250.

  The paper storage unit 210 includes a paper feed cassette 211 and a paper feed roller 212. The paper feed cassette 211 stores recording paper. The paper feed roller 212 pulls out the recording paper from the paper feed cassette 211 and feeds it to the transfer roller 221 of the image forming unit 220.

  The image forming unit 220 forms a toner image on a sheet fed from the sheet storage unit 210, and includes a transfer roller 221, an intermediate transfer member roller 222, a photosensitive drum 223, an exposure device 224, yellow, magenta, and cyan. , Black color developing devices 225Y, 225M, 225C, and 225K.

  The photosensitive drum 223 is uniformly charged by a charging device (not shown) while rotating in the direction of the arrow.

  The exposure device 224 converts the modulation signal generated based on the print data of the original read by the original reading unit 500 into a laser beam and outputs it, and forms an electrostatic latent image on the photosensitive drum 223 for each color.

  The developing devices 225Y, 225M, 225C, and 225K supply each color developer to the photosensitive drum 223 to form a toner image for each color.

  The intermediate transfer roller 222 transfers the color toner images from the photosensitive drum 223, and forms a color toner image on the intermediate transfer roller 222.

  The transfer roller 221 transfers the toner image on the intermediate transfer roller 222 onto the conveyed recording paper.

  The fixing unit 230 performs a fixing process on the toner image on the paper transferred by the image forming unit 220, and is disposed so as to face the fixing roller 231 heated by an energizing heating element such as a halogen lamp and the fixing roller 231. And a pressure roller 232 that is pressed against and brought into contact with the peripheral surface of the fixing roller 231. The color toner image transferred to the recording paper in the image forming unit 220 is fixed on the recording paper by heating when passing between the fixing roller 231 and the pressure roller 232. The sheet subjected to the fixing process is selectively discharged to the discharge port 240 or the discharge tray 250.

  The paper post-processing unit 300 includes a carry-in port 301, a recording paper carrying unit 302, a carry-out port 303, and a stack tray 304. The recording paper transport unit 302 sequentially transports the recording paper carried into the carry-in port 301 from the discharge port 240 and finally discharges the recording paper from the carry-out port 303 to the stack tray 304. The stack tray 304 is configured to move up and down in the direction of the arrow in accordance with the number of recording sheets stacked from the carry-out port 303.

  FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of the image forming apparatus 1. The image forming apparatus 1 includes a control unit 110, a network I / F unit 120 (receiving unit), and a storage unit 130 in addition to the configuration shown in FIG.

  The network I / F unit 120 includes a LAN board or the like, and performs communication control of various data transmitted and received between the image forming apparatus 1 and the PC 2. Further, in the present embodiment, the network I / F unit 120 also functions as a receiving unit for the image forming apparatus 1 to receive an e-mail from the mail server 3.

  The storage unit 130 includes a ROM (Read Only Memory), a RAM (Random Access Memory), a flash memory, and the like. The ROM stores a control program of the image forming apparatus 1, and the RAM is read by the document reading unit 500. The flash memory stores a file format table that is a list of file formats that can be printed, a file conversion program that converts the attached file into print data according to the file format of the attached file, etc. Remember.

  The control unit 100 includes a CPU (Central Processing Unit) and the like, and performs overall control of the image forming apparatus 1. The control unit 100 also functions as an attached file determination unit 111, a file format determination unit 112, a file name search unit 113, a print order setting unit 114, and a file conversion unit 115.

  The attached file discriminating unit 111 determines whether the e-mail received by the network I / F unit 120 has data attached in the Base64 encoding method defined by MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions). Then, it is determined whether or not an attached file is attached to the electronic mail.

  The file format discriminating unit 112 is a format in which the attached file can be printed when the attached file discriminating unit 111 discriminates that the attached file is attached to the email received by the network I / F unit 120. It is determined whether or not. This determination by the file format determination unit 112 is performed by determining whether or not the file format of each attached file is a file format existing in the file format table stored in the storage unit 130.

  When the attached file discriminating unit 111 discriminates that an attached file is attached to the email received by the network I / F unit 120, the file name search unit 113 adds the file of the attached file to the email body. Search for a name.

  When the attached file determining unit 111 determines that a plurality of attached files are attached to the email received by the network I / F unit 120, the print order setting unit 114 sets the print order of the attached files. To do.

  That is, when the attached file determining unit 111 determines that a plurality of attached files are attached to the e-mail received by the network I / F unit 120, the print order setting unit 114 adds the attached file to the e-mail body. When the file name search unit 113 detects that the file name is described, the print order is set in the order in which the file name is described. To do.

  If an attachment file whose file name is described in the e-mail body and an attachment file that is not described are mixed and attached to the e-mail, the print order setting unit 114 includes the e-mail body. The print order is set by giving priority to the order in which the file names are described in.

  The file conversion unit 115 expands the attached file attached to the e-mail using the Base64 encoding method, reads out and executes the file conversion program stored in the storage unit 130, thereby converting the attached file into the file format of the attached file. Convert to the corresponding print data.

  The operation of the image forming apparatus 1 according to the present embodiment will be described below based on the flowcharts of FIGS. 4 and 5. When the image forming apparatus 1 is activated, the image forming apparatus 1 is in a standby state in a state where an e-mail can be received from the mail server 3.

  When the image forming apparatus 1 receives an e-mail from the mail server 3 (step S1), the attached file determining unit 111 determines whether or not an attached file is attached to the e-mail (step S2).

  When the attached file determining unit 111 determines that no attached file is attached to the e-mail (NO in step S2), the control unit 110 causes the image forming unit 220 to print only the e-mail text (step S3). .

  When the attached file determining unit 111 determines that an attached file is attached to the e-mail (YES in step S2), the attached file determining unit 111 further determines whether or not a plurality of attached files are attached to the received e-mail ( Step S4).

  When only one attached file is attached (NO in step S4), the file format determining unit 112 determines whether the format of the attached file is a file format existing in the file format table, It is determined whether or not the attached file is in a printable format (step S5).

  When the file format determining unit 112 determines that the attached file is in a printable format (YES in step S5), the file converting unit 115 converts the attached file into print data (step S6).

  Subsequently, the control unit 110 causes the image forming unit 220 to print the attached file based on the print data in addition to the e-mail body (step S7).

  If the attached file is not in a printable format (NO in step S5), as in the case where no attached file is attached (NO in step S2), the control unit 110 sends only the email text to the image forming unit 220. Printing is performed (step S3).

  Even when a plurality of attached files are attached (YES in step S4), the file format determining unit 112 determines whether each of the plurality of attached files is in a printable format in the same manner as in step S5. (Step S8).

  If the file format determination unit 112 determines that some or all of the plurality of attached files are in an unprintable format (NO in step S8), the process proceeds to step S9. If some of the plurality of attached files cannot be printed (NO in step S9), the process proceeds to step S10. If all of the plurality of attached files cannot be printed (YES in step S9), the control unit 110 proceeds to step S3 as in the case where no attached file is attached, and the control unit 110 displays only the e-mail text. To print.

  When the file format determination unit 112 determines that the plurality of attached files are all in a printable format (YES in step S8), the file name search unit 113 describes the file name of the attached file in the email body. It is searched whether it has been done (step S10).

  If the file name search unit 113 determines in step S10 that the file name of the attached file is not described in the e-mail body (NO in step S10), the print order setting unit 114 prints the attached file. Are set in the order in which the attached files are attached (step S11).

  Then, the file conversion unit 115 converts the attached file into print data (step S6). Subsequently, the control unit 110 causes the image forming unit 220 to print the attached file based on the print data in the print order set by the print order setting unit 114 in step S11 in addition to the electronic mail text (step S12).

  In step S10, when the file name search unit 113 determines that any one of the plurality of attached files is described in the body of the email (YES in step S10), the file name search unit 113 It is further searched whether or not the file names of the plurality of attached files are all described in the mail body (step S13).

  In step S13, when the file name search unit 113 determines that all the file names of the plurality of attached files are described in the e-mail body (YES in step S13), the print order setting unit 114 displays the e-mail body. Is set in the order in which the file names of the attached files are described (step S16).

  Then, the file conversion unit 115 converts the attached file into print data (step S6). Subsequently, the control unit 110 causes the image forming unit 220 to print the attached file based on the print data in the print order set by the print order setting unit 114 in step S16 in addition to the e-mail body (step S17).

  In step S13, when the file name search unit 113 determines that an attachment file in which the file name is described in the e-mail body is mixed with an attachment file in which the file name is not described (NO in step S13), print order setting is performed. The unit 114 sets the print order of the attached file in which the file name is described to the order in which the file name of the attached file is described in the email body, and the print order of the attached file in which the file name is not described is Then, the order in which the attached files are attached is set, and the printing order is set so as to give priority to the former printing order (step S14).

  Then, the file conversion unit 115 converts the attached file into print data (step S6). Subsequently, the control unit 110 causes the image forming unit 220 to print the attached file based on the print data in the print order set by the print order setting unit 114 in step S14 in addition to the electronic mail text (step S15).

  When printing is finished (step S3, step S7, step S12, step S15, step S17), the image forming apparatus 1 transmits a print completion notice to the PC 2, and displays that the printing of the e-mail body and attached file is finished. Is displayed on the display unit of the PC 2 by the utility software (step S18).

  The image forming apparatus 1 according to the embodiment of the present invention has been described above. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and for example, the following modified embodiment can be taken.

  (1) In the above embodiment, the image forming apparatus 1 receives an e-mail directly from the mail server 3, and conversion of the attached file into print data is performed by the file conversion unit 115 provided in the image forming apparatus 1. Instead, the PC 2 receives an e-mail from the mail server 3 and transfers it to the image forming apparatus 1, and the conversion of the attached file into print data is performed by the application software and the printer driver installed on the PC 2. It may be.

  (2) In the above embodiment, the print order setting unit 114 sets the print order of a plurality of attached files whose file names are not described in the e-mail body to the order in which the plurality of attached files are attached. . Alternatively, the print order setting unit 114 may set the print order of a plurality of attached files whose file names are not described in the e-mail body in alphabetical order of the file names of the plurality of attached files. .

  According to this configuration, since a plurality of attached files whose file names are not described in the body of the email are printed in the order of frequently used alphabetical order, the user can change the printing order of the plurality of attached files. It can be easily grasped.

(3) In the above embodiment, the digital multifunction peripheral having the scanner function and the printer function has been described as an example of the image forming apparatus 10. However, the present invention is limited to the multifunction peripheral exemplified in the embodiment. Instead, it may be a network printer having only a printer function, or a multi-function machine further having a facsimile function for outputting an image based on image information transmitted via a communication line.

1 is a configuration diagram of a network including an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. 1 is a cross-sectional view mainly illustrating a mechanical configuration of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. 4 is a flowchart for explaining an operation of the image forming apparatus according to the embodiment of the present disclosure. FIG. 5 is a flowchart for explaining an operation subsequent to FIG.

Explanation of symbols

1 Image forming device 2 PC (terminal device)
3 Mail Server 111 Attached File Discrimination Unit 112 File Format Discrimination Unit 113 File Name Search Unit 114 Print Order Setting Unit 120 Network I / F Unit (Reception Unit)
220 Image forming unit

Claims (6)

A receiving unit that receives an e-mail from a terminal device connected via a network;
An image forming unit for forming an image on recording paper;
An attached file discriminating unit for discriminating whether or not the email received by the receiving unit has an attached file;
A file format discriminating unit for discriminating whether the format of the attached file of the email received by the receiving unit is a format printable by the image forming unit;
A print order setting unit that sets a print order of the attached files when a plurality of attached files are attached to the e-mail;
The image forming unit includes:
When the attached file determining unit determines that there is no attached file in the e-mail, printing only the e-mail body,
When the attached file discriminating unit determines that the e-mail has an attached file and only one attached file is attached, the file is determined to be in a printable format. When the format discriminating unit discriminates, the attachment file is printed in addition to the e-mail body.
The attached file determining unit determines that the e-mail has an attached file, and when the attached file has a plurality of attached files, the attached file format is determined to be the printable format. An image forming apparatus that prints the plurality of attached files in the order set by the print order setting unit in addition to the e-mail body.   The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the printing order setting unit sorts the file names of the attached files in a sorting order determined by a predetermined sorting rule, and the sorting order is set as the printing order of the attached files. .   The image forming apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the sorting order is an order in which the attached file is attached to the e-mail.   The image forming apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the sorting order is alphabetical order of file names of the attached files. A file name search unit for searching for a file name of the attached file described in the e-mail body;
The image forming apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the sort order is an order in which the file names searched by the file name search unit are described in the e-mail body. In the case where an attachment file in which the file name is described in the email body and an attachment file that is not described are mixed and attached to the email,
The image forming apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the print order setting unit sets the print order by giving priority to an order in which the file names are described in the e-mail body.

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