JP2010214912A - Printer - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a printer communally used by a plurality of persons, which easily specifies whose printed matter is piled on a discharge tray, based on an information of a printing person, number of printing sheets, paper size, etc. included in a printing job, even if the printed matter is left on the discharge tray. <P>SOLUTION: The printer receives a printing data input by a plurality of host machines connected through a network and the printing job containing an originator identification information of the printing data to carry out printing treatment, wherein the printer has a receiving means for receiving each printing job, a printing means for printing on a recording medium designated based on the printing data contained each printing job, a calculating means for calculating a discharge amount of the recording medium in accordance with printing treatment of every printing job, a printing-job-history management table preparation means for recording a calculation result of the calculating means according to each originator identification information, and a display means for displaying a content of a printing-job-history management table for a determined number of printing jobs which went back to the past. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2010,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a printing apparatus that prints out a plurality of print data of different creators and sequentially discharges them to a paper discharge unit.

2. Description of the Related Art Today, computer networks are widely constructed, and printing systems that perform printing processing by connecting a plurality of personal computers (PCs) to one printing apparatus are widely used. In such a system, print output by a plurality of users is performed by one printing apparatus, and print outputs of a plurality of people are sequentially discharged to a paper discharge unit.
In such a case, the user may go to pick up the printed matter immediately, but it may take time to collect the printed matter or forget the printed output. For this reason, printed materials that do not know who prints are accumulated in the paper discharge unit of the printing apparatus, and in order to solve this state, troublesome work such as confirmation by an individual is required.

In addition, when the printed matter forgets to take a printed matter, Patent Document 1 makes a voice call to a pre-registered printer's mobile phone and notifies the user by sounding an alarm when the printer passes by the printing device. To do.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2004-228688 discloses a printing apparatus that prints a host identification character on a sheet selected as a partition sheet and discharges it before executing a received print job when the host computer that issued the print instruction is different from the previous one. Is disclosed.

JP2008-229913 JP 05-212929 A

  However, the above conventional method requires additional equipment or additional printing, and a printing apparatus has been proposed that simply provides information about printed matter that has been forgotten to people other than the printer. Absent.

  Therefore, the present invention provides a printing apparatus that can provide information regarding a printer included in a print job and information regarding a printed matter at the time of printing to a user who shares the printing apparatus.

  According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printing apparatus for receiving a print job including print data output from a plurality of host devices connected via a network and source identification information of the print data and performing a printing process. The printing apparatus includes: a receiving unit that receives each print job; a printing unit that executes a printing process on a recording medium designated based on print data included in each print job; and Counting means for counting the discharge amount of the recording medium according to the printing process, print job history management table creating means for recording the counting result of the counting means for each source identification information, and a predetermined number of prints going back in the past This can be achieved by providing a printing apparatus comprising display means for displaying the contents of a print job history management table for a job.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, the above-mentioned object can be achieved by providing a printing apparatus characterized in that the sender identification information is identification information of a host device.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the printing apparatus, the transmission source identification information is identification information of a transmission operator who operates the host device and transmits the print job to the printing apparatus. Can be achieved by providing.

  According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, there is provided the printing apparatus, wherein the discharge amount of the recording medium is the number of output sheets according to the size information of the recording medium discharged from the printing apparatus in accordance with execution of the print job. Can be achieved.

  According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, there is provided the transmission source identification information included in a print job newly input from the host device and the transmission for a print job recorded in the most recently created job management table information. The original identification information is compared and matched, and if the transmission source identification information matches, the discharge amount information for the newly input print job is aggregated under the same transmission source identification information and updated in the job history management table. This can be achieved by providing a printing device for recording.

  According to the present invention, in a printer shared by a plurality of people, even when a printed matter is forgotten and remains on the paper discharge tray, the printer information, the number of printed sheets, and the paper included in the print job Based on the size and the like, it is possible to easily know who the printed matter printed on the paper discharge tray is.

2 is a circuit block diagram of an interface controller of the printer apparatus 1. FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram in which a printer device 1 used in the present embodiment is connected to a personal computer (PC) as a host device via a network. It is a flowchart explaining the initial setting process of this embodiment. (A)-(e) is a figure which shows the data structural example of the print job log | history management table memorize | stored in SDRAM in the printing example 1. FIG. It is a flowchart explaining the processing operation of this embodiment. (A)-(e) is a figure which shows the example of a display in the display part in the example 1 of printing. (A)-(e) is a figure which shows the data structural example of the print job log | history management table memorize | stored in SDRAM in the printing example 2. FIG. (A)-(e) is a figure which shows the example of a display in the display part in the example 2 of printing. It is a figure which shows the example which displays a time on a display part using a real-time clock (RTC). It is a figure which shows the example which displays a user's name in Chinese characters.

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 2 is a system configuration diagram in which a printer device (printing device) 1 used in this embodiment is connected to a personal computer (PC) as a host device via a network. In FIG. 1, a printer apparatus 1 is connected to a personal computer (PC) via a LAN (local area network) and receives print data from the personal computer (PC).

In this example, five personal computers (PC 1 to 5) are connected to the printer device 1 via a hub (HUB) 2. The printer device 1 is connected to one personal computer (PC 6) using a USB port.
In this example, the user of the personal computer (PC1) is Mr. Tsuchiya and the computer name is (TSUCHIYA), the user of the personal computer (PC2) is Mr. Yamada and the computer name is (Yamada), and the personal computer (PC3) Is Ogawa, the computer name is (S. Ogawa), the personal computer (PC4) user is Takahashi, the computer name is (Takahashi), and the personal computer (PC5) user is Ito, the computer name. (K.Ito), the personal computer (PC6) is a notebook personal computer, the computer name is NOTE1, and the user is not particularly specified.

  FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram of an interface (I / F) controller of the printer apparatus 1. The I / F controller 3 includes a CPU 4, an SDRAM 5, a flash memory (FLASH) 6, a real time clock (RTC) 7, and an EEPROM 8. Further, the PHY (physical layer) 9 for LAN is the above-described personal computer (PC1 to PC5). The USB interface 10 performs communication control with the personal computer (PC 6) described above. Further, it is connected to the engine unit 12 via an ASIC (application specific integrated circuit) 11, and transmits and receives the COMMAND signal and the STATUS signal, and transmits a video signal to the engine unit 12.

  The operation panel 14 also has a display unit 15 on which a print job history management table (to be described later) is displayed. Among the data displayed on the display unit 15, for example, a computer name (user name) and a memory value are displayed as sender identification information of a print job stored in the SDRAM 5.

In the above configuration, the processing operation of this example will be described below.
First, initial setting processing is performed according to the flowchart shown in FIG. First, a blank character (for example, “20H” in the ASCII code) is filled in the PCNAME1 area, the A3CNT1 area is cleared to 0, the A4CNT1 area is cleared to 0, and the OTHERCNT1 value is cleared to 0 (step) (Hereinafter referred to as ST) 1). Here, FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a memory configuration of a print job history management table configured in the SDRAM 5. The SDRAM 5 stores PCNAME (computer name: user name) in which the source identification information of each received print job is stored. , A3CNT (a counter indicating the usage amount of A3 size paper), A4CNT (a counter indicating the usage amount of A4 size paper), and OTHERCNT (counter indicating the usage amount of other size paper) are provided, for example, 3 A data storage table for the user (print job source) is constructed. The PCNAME1, A3CNT1, A4CNT1, and OTHERCNT1 are processes for initializing an area for storing the first user information.

  Next, similarly, blank characters are filled in the PCNAME2 area, the A3CNT2 area is cleared to 0, the A4CNT2 area is cleared to 0, and the OTHERCNT2 area is cleared to 0 (ST2). Similarly, blank characters are filled in the PCNAME3 area, the A3CNT3 area is cleared to 0, the A4CNT3 area is cleared to 0, and the OTHERCNT3 area is cleared to 0 (ST3).

  Next, after initializing the SDRAM 5 as described above, the flowchart shown in FIG. 5 is executed. This process is performed when the printer apparatus 1 receives print data from any of the personal computers (PCs 1 to 5), which are host devices, and when the printer apparatus 1 receives the print data, the print added to the received data is performed. The computer name (user name) as the job source identification information is compared with the value of PCNAME1 (step (hereinafter referred to as S) 1). In this first processing, as described above, each area of the print job history management table in the SDRAM 5 is initialized, and the computer name (user name) added to the received data does not match PCNAME1 (NO in S2). . Therefore, in this case, the following processes (S3 to S5) are executed.

  First, the value of PCNAME2 is copied to PCNAME3, the value of A3CNT2 is copied to A3CNT3, the value of A4CNT2 is copied to A4CNT3, and the value of OTHERCNT2 is copied to OTHERCNT3 (S3). Further, the value of PCNAME1 is copied to PCNAME2, the value of A3CNT1 is copied to A3CNT2, the value of A4CNT1 is copied to A4CNT2, and the value of OTHERCNT1 is copied to OTHERCNT2 (S4). As a result of the above processing, as shown in FIG. 4A, the second user information moves to the third user information area, the first user information moves to the second user information area, and the first user information Free up information area.

  Next, the information added to the header of the print data is recorded in the first empty user information area. That is, the computer name added to the header information of the current received data is stored in PCNAME1, the A3CNT1 area is set to 0, the A4CNT1 area is set to 0, and the OTHERCNT1 area is set to 0 (S5). In the case of this example, as shown in FIG. 4B, information of Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa) is stored as PCNAME1.

  Next, it is determined whether the paper size of the page to be printed is A3 (S6). If the paper size is A3 (S6 is YES), A3 size paper is unloaded from the paper feed cassette and printing processing is performed according to the print data (S7). Then, A3CNT1 is incremented by 1 (S8). On the other hand, if the paper size is not A3 (S6 is NO), it is further determined whether the paper size to be printed is A4 (S9).

  Here, when the paper size is A4 (S9 is YES), A4 size paper is carried out of the paper feed cassette and the printing process is performed according to the print data (S10). Then, A4CNT1 is incremented by 1 (S11). On the other hand, if the paper size is not A4 (S9 is NO), printing processing is performed using paper of another size (S12), and OTHERCNT1 is incremented by 1 (S13). In the case of this example, as shown in FIG. 4B, it is assumed that one A3 size printing process is performed according to the print data from Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa).

At this time, the display of FIG. 6B is performed on the display unit 15 of the printer apparatus 1. The display shown in FIG. 5A is a display example of the display unit 15 in the initial state described above.
Next, when new print data is input to the printer apparatus 1, the same processing as described above is performed. That is, first, the computer name (user name) added to the received data is compared with the value of PCNAME1 (S1), and it is determined whether or not they are the same (S2). Here, for example, if the print data is supplied from the personal computer (PC2) of Yamada (Yamada), the determination (S3) is NO, and the value of PCNAME2 is copied to PCNAME3 as described above, and A3CNT2 Is copied to A3CNT3, the value of A4CNT2 is copied to A4CNT3, and the value of OTHERCNT2 is copied to OTHERCNT3 (S3). Further, the value of PCNAME1 is copied to PCNAME2, the value of A3CNT1 is copied to A3CNT2, the value of A4CNT1 is copied to A4CNT2, and the value of OTHERCNT1 is copied to OTHERCNT2 (S4). Then, through the above process, the first user information area is vacated, and the new Yamada information is stored in PCNAME 1 (S5).

Further, it is determined whether the paper size of the page to be printed is A3 (S6). If the paper size is A3 (S6 is YES), the A3 size paper is unloaded from the paper feed cassette and printed according to the print data. Processing is performed (S7). On the other hand, if the paper size is not A3 (S6 is NO), it is further determined whether the paper size to be printed is A4 (S9). If the paper size is A4 (YES in S9), A4 size paper is unloaded from the paper feed cassette and printing processing is performed according to the print data (S10). On the other hand, if the paper size is not A4 (NO in S9), the printing process is performed using paper of other sizes (S12). In the case of this example, as shown in FIG. 4C, it is assumed that three A4 size printing processes are performed according to the print data from Mr. Yamada (Yamada). In this case, the route (S6 is NO), (S9 is YES), S10, S11, (S14 is NO), and again (S6 is NO) is repeated three times three times (S14 is YES). And one print job is completed.
At this time, the display unit 15 of the printer apparatus 1 displays the screen shown in FIG. 6C so that the user of the printed matter output to the printer apparatus 1 and the number of printed sheets can be easily known.

  Next, when new print data is input to the printer 1, the same processing as described above is performed. First, the computer name (user name) added to the received data is compared with PCNAME1 (S1), and the same. Whether or not (S2). Here, for example, if the print data is supplied from the personal computer (PC1) of Mr. Tsuchiya, the determination (S2) is NO, and the processing (S3, S4) is executed as described above. The first user information area is vacated, and information on a new Mr. Tsuchiya is stored in PCNAME 1 (S5).

  Furthermore, it is determined whether the paper size of the page to be printed is A3 (S6), the paper size is A4 (S9), or another paper size. In this example, FIG. As shown in FIG. 5, it is assumed that five A3-size printing processes have been performed in accordance with the print data from Mr. Tsuchiya (TSUCHIYA). In this case, the route (S6 is YES), S7, S8, (S14 is NO), and again (S6 is NO) is repeated 5 times and 5 times, and then the fifth time (S14 is YES), one print job. Ends. At this time, the display unit 15 of the printer apparatus 1 displays the display shown in FIG. 6D so that the user of the printed matter output to the printer apparatus 1 and the number of printed sheets can be easily known.

Next, when new print data is input to the printer apparatus 1, the same processing as described above is performed, and the computer name (user name) added to the received data is compared with PCNAME1 (S1, S2). If the print data is input from Mr. Tsuchiya (TSUCHIYA), (S2) is YES, S3, S4 and S5 are not performed, and the process jumps to S6. Next, it is determined whether the paper size of the page to be printed is A3 (S6), the paper size is A4 (S9), or another paper size. Here, assuming that 20 sheets of A4 size paper are printed by the print data supplied from Mr. Tsuchiya (SUCHIYA), S6 is NO), (S9 is YES), S10, S11, and S14 are NO. ) Again, the route (S6 is NO) is repeated 20 times 20 times, and the 20th time (S14 is YES), one print job is completed.
The data stored in the area of the SDRAM 5 is as shown in FIG. When the same person performs a plurality of print jobs in succession, that is, when Tsuchiya first prints 5 sheets of A3 and then 20 sheets of A4, the same line as shown in FIG. Is displayed.
That is, when print jobs having the same sender identification information are consecutive, they are collected under the same sender identification information and updated as a job history management table.
In addition, since the number of sheets discharged to the sheet tray is counted in the print count area, A3CNT1, etc., even if double-sided printing is performed, one count is counted.
Further, when a paper jam occurs during printing and the discharge is not completed, it is not counted.
By displaying in this manner, the size and number of printed sheets discharged onto the discharge tray of the printer apparatus 1 and the content displayed on the display unit 15 in FIG. Accordingly, the user of the printed matter output to the printer device 1 and the number of printed sheets can be easily known.

  As described above, according to this example, the print history list is displayed, so it is easy to know who the printed matter is printed out, and wasteful reprinting, etc. due to forgetting to take it, etc. Can also be prevented.

Next, print example 2 based on other print data will be specifically described.
FIG. 7 shows a data configuration of this example, which is a table configuration of a print job history management table constructed in the SDRAM 5 described above. FIG. 7A shows the state of the SDRAM 5 in the above-described initial setting state, and FIG. 8A shows the display state of the display unit 15.

  As described above, when print data is supplied from the personal computer (PC 3) of Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa), the same processing as described above is performed. As shown in FIG. The information of Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa) is stored, and as shown in FIG. 8B, it is displayed that one A4 size printing process of Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa) has been performed.

  Next, when print data is supplied from the personal computer (PC2) of Mr. Yamada (Yamada), as shown in FIG. 7 (c), the information of Mr. Yamada (Yamada) is stored in the PCNAME1 in the SDRAM5. As shown in FIG. 8B, it is displayed that 12 sheets of A4 size printing processing by Yamada (Yamada) have been performed.

  Further, when print data is again supplied from the personal computer (PC3) of Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa), the information about Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa) is stored in the SDRAM5 as shown in FIG. Is stored, and as shown in FIG. 8D, it is displayed that three A4 size printing processes by Ogawa (S. Ogawa) have been performed.

In the case of this example, when Ogawa executes the second print job, the person who printed it immediately before is Yamada, so NO in S1 and S2 in FIG. 5 and the same Mr. Ogawa (S. Ogawa) area. Instead of adding data, it is determined that the user is a new user, and the size of the printing paper and the number of printed sheets are recorded. By storing and displaying in this manner, the size and number of printed sheets discharged onto the discharge tray of the printer apparatus 1 and the content displayed on the display unit 15 in FIG. It will respond properly. That is, A4 and 3 sheets are printed by Ogawa from the top of the paper discharge tray, A4 and 12 sheets below are printed by Yamada, A4 and 1 sheet at the bottom are Ogawa's prints. It turns out that it was printed.
By doing in this way, collection | recovery of printed matter can be made easy.

FIG. 7E shows a case where the printed material is removed by the user. If the user comes to pick up the printed material, there is no need to display the history, so the data is erased. In this case, the display on the display unit 15 is also in the state shown in (e).
This operation may be programmed to be executed when the user operates a specific key on the operation panel 14, for example.

  FIG. 9 shows an example in which time is displayed on the display unit 15 using the above-mentioned real-time clock (RTC) 7, and FIG. 10 generally displays the user's name in Chinese characters instead of the computer name displayed in alphabet. An example is shown. By comprising in this way, a display can be clarified and the mistake of a user name can be prevented.

In the description of the present embodiment, the print job history management table including the user information, the paper size, and the number of printed sheets is stored in the SDRAM 5, but may be stored in another storage device such as the EEPROM 8. Further, the data to be recorded is not limited to three users, and more data such as four users, five users,... May be recorded and displayed.
In the above description of the embodiment, the method of identifying the print job originator by the computer name on the assumption that the user of each computer is always the same is shown. However, the present invention is not limited to this method. Print job history management table using the user ID information as the sender identification information of the print job when the computer is used after the user is registered by a method such as user ID information input at the time of starting the apparatus. It is also possible to adopt a configuration (PCNAME is changed to USERID).

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Printer apparatus 2 ... Hub 3 ... I / F controller 4 ... CPU
5 ... SDRAM
6 ... Flash memory 7 ... Real-time clock (RTC)
8 ... EEPROM
9 ... PHY for LAN
10. USB interface 11. ASIC
12. Engine unit 14 Operation panel 15 Display PC1 to PC6 Personal computer

Claims (6)

In a printing apparatus that receives a print job including print data output from a plurality of host devices connected via a network and origin identification information of the print data and performs print processing.
The printing apparatus includes:
Receiving means for receiving each print job;
Printing means for executing print processing on a recording medium designated based on print data included in each print job;
Counting means for counting the discharge amount of the recording medium according to the printing process for each print job;
Print job history management table creation means for recording the counting result of the counting means for each of the sender identification information;
Display means for displaying the contents of the print job history management table for a predetermined number of print jobs going back in the past;
A printing apparatus comprising:   The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the transmission source identification information is identification information of a host device.   The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the transmission source identification information is identification information of a transmission operator who has operated the host device to transmit the print job to the printing apparatus.   The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the discharge amount of the recording medium is an output number for each size information of the recording medium discharged from the printing apparatus in accordance with execution of the print job.   The transmission source identification information included in the print job newly input from the host device is compared with the transmission source identification information for the print job recorded in the most recently created job management table information, and the transmission is determined. 2. The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein when the original identification information matches, the discharge amount information for a newly input print job is aggregated under the same transmission source identification information and updated and recorded in the job history management table. Printing device.   The printing apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the aggregation process is a process of continuing an integration counting process of a discharge number counter for each recording medium type.

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