JP2013120401A - Image processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve determination accuracy problems that a final printed matter is erroneously determined as a color print even when it is monochrome because the color/monochrome determination is made based on each drawing object unit.SOLUTION: An image processor comprises: a printer driver including first color/monochrome determination means which determines whether a drawing instruction content includes chromatic colors, and addition means which adds the determination result to a print job as color/monochrome information; a print server which retains the print job; confirmation means which checks the color/monochrome information included in the print job received form the print server; page image generation means which analyzes the print job and generates a preview image; preview means which displays the preview image; and second color/monochrome determination means which determines the presence of chromatic colors on the basis of the preview image when a result by the confirmation means indicates a color print or includes no added color/monochrome information.

Description

  The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus that analyzes a print job received from an external apparatus and generates image data. In particular, the present invention relates to an image processing apparatus that interprets a print job described in a page description language (hereinafter referred to as PDL) and generates a chromatic (color) or achromatic (monochrome) page image.

  In the past, there has been a need to know whether or not the contents of a print job described in PDL include color information before outputting a printed matter with an output device such as a printer. In particular, there is a strong need in a printing system that prints a print job held on a print server in accordance with an output request from an output device. That is, when the user displays the print job list on the operation panel of the output device, the color / monochrome information of each print job is displayed together, thereby recognizing an unintended color printing instruction and performing unnecessary color printing. It is a need for deterrence. An example of a printing system that prints by being kept on a print server as described above is “Anyplace Print for Meap” (hereinafter, referred to as “Anyplace Print for Meap”).

  On the other hand, as a prior art for determining the color / monochrome information of a print job, a conventional example is provided with a setting reception step for accepting setting of a color / monochrome determination criterion, and color / monochrome distributed printing based on the determination criterion is performed for each page. (See Patent Document 1). The conventional example describes a method of determining color / monochrome information using at least one of text data and image data included in a print job.

JP 2004-70521 A

  In order to determine whether a print job includes color information, a printer driver that generates a PDL command in response to a print instruction from an application performs color / monochrome determination for each individual drawing object. For this reason, in the case of content in which a chromatic color object overlaps an achromatic color object, there is a problem of determination accuracy such that the final printed matter is erroneously determined to be a color even if it is monochrome.

  Further, the user cannot immediately determine which part in the document contains the chromatic color for the page determined to be in color.

  Furthermore, due to restrictions on the OS on which the printer driver operates, there are cases in which the monochrome determination process cannot be performed on the client PC side.

  On the other hand, the above-described prior art also has a problem that color monochrome information is erroneously determined as in the case of a printer driver because page attributes and the like are determined based on drawing commands and object attribute information generated via the OS. It was.

An image processing apparatus for solving the above problem has the following configuration.
That is, a printer driver that generates a print job (201) described in a page description language (hereinafter referred to as PDL) format in accordance with a drawing instruction from an application program, and the print job received together with user information and stored in a storage unit In response to a request from the image processing apparatus (102), a print server (107) that transmits a print job list and a print job that match the user information, and receives and operates the print job list and the print job, respectively. In an image processing apparatus including an image output apparatus that displays or prints on a panel (104),
The printer driver uses first color / monochrome determination means (S1008) for determining whether the drawing instruction content includes chromatic color information, and the color / monochrome determination result as color / mono information (503, 601, 602). Means for adding to the print job (S1011),
The image processing apparatus analyzes the PDL format print job by confirming the color / mono information (503) included in the print job list received from the print server (S716), and generates a page image or a preview image. The page image generation means (S714, S715) to be generated, the preview means (S718) for displaying the preview image on the operation panel, and the result of the confirmation means are color or color mono information is added. If not, second color / monochrome determination means (S717) for determining the presence or absence of a chromatic color based on the preview image generated at the time of executing the preview is provided.

  It is possible to accurately determine whether or not the print job contains color immediately before output, leading to the suppression of useless color printing, and therefore a printing system that is highly appealing to customers who are aware of cost reduction Can provide. In particular, in a printing system that prints a print job held in a print server in response to a request from an output device, color / monochrome information can be determined from a preview image on an operation panel of the output device, which is convenient. improves.

  In addition, by preferentially displaying a page that has a high possibility of including a color at the time of previewing, it is possible to reduce the time required for specifying a color portion.

Block diagram of an image processing apparatus to which this embodiment can be applied The figure which showed the structure of the image processing system of a present Example, and the input path | route of a print job Display example of the print job list on the operation panel of the image processing device Display example of preview and color information determination result (a), (b) Configuration examples (a), (b), (c) of print jobs generated by the printer driver Examples of values that can be taken by color / monochrome information included in a print job A flowchart showing a print job list display procedure (a) and a preview and monochrome determination procedure (b) Example of configuration of job information footer unit including color / monochrome information in embodiment 2 The flowchart which showed the procedure of the preview and the mono-color determination in Example 2. 10 is a flowchart illustrating a print job generation procedure of the printer driver in the third embodiment.

  The best mode for carrying out the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

<Example 1>
FIG. 1 shows an image comprising an image processing apparatus (102, hereinafter referred to as a printer), a personal computer (101, hereinafter referred to as a PC) that generates and sends a print job, and a print server (107) that spools the print job. It is a figure explaining the structure of a processing system.

  In the figure, a CPU 121 controls the devices connected to a system bus (120) in a control unit (controller) 103 of the printer 102 to output a printed matter. Further, the CPU 121 executes a control program stored in the program ROM (122a) included in the ROM (122), generates a page image by analyzing the PDL, and is connected via the printing unit I / F 125. The video signal is output to the printer engine (105).

  Further, the CPU 121 generates a preview image to be described later, displays the preview image on a panel provided in the operation unit (104), and determines the presence or absence of color information for each page.

  Further, the ROM 122 includes a font ROM (122b) and a data ROM (122c) including various image processing tables.

  Reference numeral 123 denotes a RAM that functions as a work memory for holding various data for analysis processing in addition to a program area for loading the control program. That is, a reception buffer (123a) that temporarily holds print data received from the PC, a page spool memory (123b) that holds a page image obtained from the analysis result of the print data, and a work memory (123c) that stores temporary data ) Etc.

  Subsequently, 128 is a non-volatile storage device such as a hard disk, which is used as a storage area for storing the preview image.

  The operation unit 104 includes an operation panel for performing various operations such as setting and resetting of menu items, and an LED display for displaying various statuses and the preview image.

  A printer engine 105 forms a latent image on the photosensitive drum in accordance with the video signal, and performs printing by thermally fixing it to a sheet.

  The printer engine 105 applied to the present embodiment can be applied to various printing methods such as a laser beam printer or an ink jet printer, and has a configuration of either a single function machine (SFP) or a multifunction machine (MFP). It doesn't matter.

  Next, the outline of the exchange of print data between the image processing systems in this embodiment will be described with reference to FIG.

  In the figure, the same components as those in FIG.

  A print job (201) input from a printer driver operating on the PC (101) to the print server (107) is retained in the spool area of the print server. Thereafter, the controller (103) reads user information recorded in advance on the IC card via a card reader (not shown), and inquires the print server of the user's print job list (202). On the other hand, in response to the inquiry from the printer, the print server transmits a list of print jobs including the corresponding user information to the printer (203).

  The controller (103) displays a print job list of the user authenticated by the IC card on the operation panel (104) on the basis of the print job list information received by the series of processes (FIG. 3).

  FIG. 3 shows an example in which the print job list is displayed on the operation panel (104). Each process in the image processing apparatus described below is executed by the CPU 121 loaded with a control program stored in the program ROM 122a. Executed by.

  In the figure, reference numeral 301 denotes user information logged in to the printer by the IC card authentication. When the list acquisition button (302) is pressed, the user print job information stored in the print server is displayed as a list. (303). In the print job information list, print job information such as the document name, print setting information (305), the number of pages, and the print start date of the print job is displayed. The print setting information includes color / monochrome information indicating whether or not the print job includes chromatic color information, as well as layout information such as single-sided / double-sided printing / allocation layout. Is output by the printer driver added to the print job.

  If the print job list does not fit on one screen, it can be scrolled by an arrow button (304) laid out on the right side of the operation panel screen.

  When a desired print job is selected from the print job list by the user's screen operation, the operation unit (104) displays the selected print job in black and white as shown in the drawing to select it. In response to pressing of the print start button (306), the selected print job is acquired from the print server (107) to generate a page image.

  On the other hand, when the detailed information button (307) is pressed, a preview of the print job in the selected state is displayed, and a preview is displayed for a print job in which the color / monochrome information (305) is determined to be color. The color / monochrome determination result based on the image is displayed (FIG. 4).

  FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of the preview display, where (a) shows a preview display of the first page of a print job having a total number of 10 pages, and (b) shows, for example, the ninth page. Is shown.

  In FIG. 6A, 401 is an example in which the result of determining whether or not the selected print job includes a chromatic color is displayed as “color determination”. The displayed page is determined to be monochrome and printed. As a result of determining five pages in the job, all the pages are monochrome. Here, the determination process of whether or not a chromatic color is included is determined by referring to the preview image in units of pixels and determining that there is a chromatic color if even one pixel other than R = G = B is included. (S717 described later). Further, the determination process sequentially analyzes the print job regardless of the page being preview-displayed. In addition, in response to pressing of the next page button (402) and the previous page button, preview images of the respective pages are sequentially displayed.

  On the other hand, in FIG. 5B, the page being displayed (9th page) is determined to be in color, and as a result of determining the entire job (10th page), pages 6, 7, and 9 are pages including chromatic colors. Shows the case.

  Further, in this embodiment, the chromatic color area is blinked or displayed, or the density of the achromatic color area is reduced, or the rectangle surrounding the outer frame of the chromatic color area is overlaid and displayed as indicated by 403. Therefore, it is possible to provide a preview function that makes it easy to determine a chromatic color portion.

  Next, the data structure of the print job (201) generated by the printer driver will be described below with reference to FIGS.

  In the figure, (a) is determined that the second page (504) includes a chromatic color, and the color / monochrome determination result of the entire job is determined to be “color”, and (b) is determined to be “monochrome”. (C) shows a case where color / monochrome determination is not made.

  In FIG. 9A, reference numeral 501 denotes a job information header portion added to the head of a print job, which includes “ColorMode” as to whether or not color mono determination processing is performed in addition to the layout information shown in FIG. Here, the “ColorMode” takes three values of “Color”, “Mono”, and “Auto”, and “Auto” means that the color mono determination processing has been completed. In this case, the printer driver adds a job information footer (503) including color mono information at the end of the print job. On the other hand, “Color” indicates that the color / mono determination has not been processed, and “Mono” indicates that the printer driver has generated a print job converted to grayscale. In this case, as shown in (c), the job information footer (503) including color mono information is not added at the end of the print job.

  In the figure, reference numeral 502 denotes a print data body described in the PDL format.

  FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining possible values of the color mono information (included in the job information footer 503). In the figure, “Color” (601) indicates a case where the print job includes at least one color page, and is a value set when the printer driver determines color monochrome for each drawing command. It is. That is, the case where it is erroneously determined that the content in which the drawing objects overlap each other includes a chromatic color is included.

  On the other hand, “Mono” (602) is set when no color page is included in the print job. Note that 603 and 604 will be described later.

  Next, the procedure from when the list acquisition button (302) is pressed until the print job list (303) is displayed will be described below with reference to the flowchart (a) of FIG.

  In addition, a procedure until the mono color determination result is displayed using the preview image after the detailed information button (307) is pressed will be described below with reference to the flowchart (b) of FIG.

  Each procedure shown in each flowchart is stored as a program code in a program ROM 122 a constituting the controller 103, loaded into the RAM 123, and executed by the CPU 121.

  First, in step S701 of FIG. 7A, the controller 103 requests the print server (107) for print job information that matches the user information acquired by the IC card authentication, and receives it in a list format. In the subsequent steps after S702, the received print job information is repeatedly referred to the number of the list (S703), and the print job information including monochromatic information (305) is sequentially displayed on the operation panel (104) (S704). ).

  Here, the print server determines the mono color information (305) based on the color mono information in the job information footer (503). That is, when the job information footer (503) is not added to the print job or when the color mono information in the job information footer is “Color”, the mono color information (305) is displayed as “color”. .

  On the other hand, when a preview display instruction is received by pressing the detailed information button (307), the controller first requests a print job selected on the print job information list 303 from the print server and displays the received print job. Save in the HDD 128. Thereafter, a job information footer of the print job is acquired (S711).

  Subsequently, after initializing page number n for generating a preview image to 1 (S712), preview display and color mono determination processing are performed in steps S713 to S718. That is, the PDL data of the print job is analyzed (S714), a preview image is generated (S715), and when the mono color information (305) is “color”, the preview image is scanned in units of pixels, Monochrome information is determined (S717). Finally, in S718, the color / mono determination result is displayed as "color determination" (401).

  As described above, when the color / mono information (305) is “color”, the determination result in units of drawing objects by the printer driver may be erroneously determined, so that the color / mono determination is performed with reference to the preview image. .

  In this embodiment, the color / mono determination process is performed with reference to the preview image for all pages included in the print job. However, the determination process is not performed when a page determined to be in color exists. Thus, it is possible to suppress a decrease in the display speed of the preview.

  Further, when the determination result of all pages included in the print job is different from the determination result (503) of the printer driver, the color mono information (305) of the print job list display is updated.

<Example 2>
In the first embodiment, the preview image is configured to be sequentially performed from the first page of the print job. However, the preview is not necessary for the page determined by the printer driver as monochrome, and the preview display unit is configured to display only the page determined as color. Also good.

  In order to realize the above, in this embodiment, the printer driver generates the job information footer illustrated in FIG. 8, and the controller 103 displays the page described in the job information footer when displaying the preview image. Only the preview target.

  That is, when determining the color mono information of each page, the printer driver holds the number of pages determined as color (802) and the page IDs determined as color (803, 804), and stores the job information footer. Append to

  In FIG. 8, (a) shows a case where the number of color determination pages (802) is 0, that is, it is determined that the entire print job does not contain a chromatic color. On the other hand, (b) shows an example in which pages 6 and 7 are determined to be in color and the number of color determination pages (802) is 2.

  In this embodiment, the page ID is added by the number equal to the number of color determination pages (802). However, a predetermined upper limit value may be provided.

  Hereinafter, the preview display procedure in the controller 103 shown in the present embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.

  First, S901 in the figure is the same as S711, and a description thereof will be omitted. In subsequent S902, it is checked whether color mono information is added to the job information footer, and if it is added, it is checked whether the number of color determination pages is 1 or more (S903).

  If “no information” is determined in S902, it is determined that the color / mono determination is not performed by the printer driver, and the color / mono determination is performed when the preview image of each page is generated in S912 and thereafter. Since the same procedure is possible, the description is omitted.

  On the other hand, even if the number of color determination pages is 0 in S903, the pages in the print job are previewed in order from the top, and the process proceeds to the steps after S912 (the color mono determination in S918 is not performed).

  On the other hand, if the determination in S903 is Yes, only the pages determined to be in color are previewed with reference to the color determination page number (802) and the color page IDs (803, 804) (S904 to S911). ).

  At this time, the page to be previewed is determined by referring to the color page IDs one by one, not from the first page in the print job (S904, S911). Further, since it is already known that the color / mono information is “Color”, color / monochrome determination is performed for all pages in the loop (S909). The other processing steps may be the same as the processing of S914 to S919, and thus description thereof is omitted.

  In addition, the present embodiment can be applied to a PDF or the like in which the PDL language structure is page-independent.

<Example 3>
In the above embodiment, the strict color / mono determination with reference to the preview image is performed by the output device. However, the printer driver has a mode for performing strict color / mono determination, and is generated in the strict determination mode. Color / monochrome determination may be performed based on the page image.

  In this case, the value “Exactly Color” (603) indicating that there is no risk of erroneous determination is set in the color mono information (503) generated by the printer driver. In FIG. 6, a value “Exactly Mono” (604) indicating “surely monochrome” is also prepared, but “Mono” (602) is not erroneously determined as monochrome. There is the same.

  If the color / mono information (503) is “Exact Color” or “Mono” as a result of strict determination by the printer driver, the controller 103 does not need to perform color / mono determination at the time of preview execution.

  FIG. 10 is a flowchart showing the processing procedure of the printer driver in this embodiment.

  First, the color determination mode set on the UI screen is read (S1001). If the color determination mode is not “color / monochrome automatic determination” (S1002), the color / monochrome determination result is unknown (S1012), and the color mono information ( 503) is not added (S1011).

  On the other hand, if the result of S1002 is Yes, the printer driver checks whether or not it is in the strict determination mode (S1003). Here, the strict determination mode can also be set from the UI screen of the printer driver.

  When the strict determination mode is designated in S1003, the operation is performed in an image mode in which a rendering process is performed for each page to generate a page image (S1004), and the monochrome image is strictly determined by referring to the page image in units of pixels. (S1006-S1010). Finally, if the color / mono determination result of all the print jobs is monochrome, “Mono” (602) is set in the color / mono information (503), otherwise “Exact Color” (603) is set ( S1011).

  On the other hand, if the determination mode set in S1003 is not the strict determination mode, the process proceeds to S1005, and color mono determination is performed in the same procedure as the printer driver of the first embodiment.

<Example 4>
As a result of previewing all pages included in the print job, if the color mono determination result (404) of the print job is different from the determination result by the driver (color monochrome information before preview (305)), the printer driver makes an erroneous determination. Can be considered as

  At this time, the color mono information (503) of the print job stored in the print server is updated to “Exactly Mono” (604), so that it is not necessary to re-determine when reusing the print job.

104 Operation unit 303 Print job list 305 Color / monochrome information (printer driver determination result)
401, 404 Color / monochrome information (judgment result by preview)
501 Job information header 503 Job information footer (color / monochrome information)

Claims (5)

A printer driver that generates a print job (201) described in a page description language (hereinafter referred to as PDL) format in accordance with a drawing instruction from an application program, and received together with the user information of the print job and stored in a storage unit In response to a request from the image processing apparatus (102), a print server (107) that transmits a print job list that matches the user information and a print job, and an operation panel that receives the print job list and the print job, respectively. 104) In a printing system composed of an image output device that displays or prints on the screen,
The printer driver uses first color / monochrome determination means (S1008) for determining whether the drawing instruction content includes chromatic color information, and the color / monochrome determination result as color / mono information (503, 601, 602). Means for adding to the print job (S1011),
The image processing apparatus includes confirmation means (S716) for examining the color / mono information (503) included in the print job list received from the print server;
Page image generation means (S714, S715) for analyzing the PDL format print job and generating a page image or preview image;
Preview means (S718) for displaying the preview image on the operation panel;
If the result of the confirmation means is color or color mono information is not added, second color / monochrome judgment means for judging the presence / absence of a chromatic color based on the preview image generated at the time of preview execution ( S717)
An image processing apparatus comprising: The image processing apparatus is configured to check whether there is a difference between color mono information included in the print job and a determination result of the second determination unit;
Means for outputting, to the print server, a request to update the color mono information of the print job held in the print server to the determination result when there is a difference in the determination result;
The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the preview unit includes a unit that highlights a portion of the print job that is determined by the second determination unit to include a chromatic color. The printer driver includes means for adding the total number of pages (802) determined to contain a chromatic color and a list of page IDs (803, 804) to the job information footer (503) of the print job,
The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the preview unit includes a unit (S903 to S911) for previewing only the pages described in the page ID list. The printer driver receives a strict determination as a color / monochrome determination method (S1003);
When the color / monochrome determination method indicates strict determination, page image generation means for generating a page image in accordance with a drawing instruction from an application program;
Third color / monochrome determination means (S1007) for determining whether or not a chromatic color is included based on the page image;
Means (S1011) for adding the determination result of the third color / monochrome determination means to the print job as color / mono information (503, 601 to 604);
The second color / monochrome determination means, when the color mono information (503) is included in the print job received from the print server (107) and is not "color" (601), at the time of preview image generation. The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the color mono determination process is not performed.