JP2013186669A - Information processing apparatus, data editing method in information processing apparatus, and program - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an information processing apparatus facilitating edition of data by a user when the data is laid out on a document.SOLUTION: An information processing apparatus comprises a database for holding a plurality of data which can be laid out on a predetermined region of a document. The information processing apparatus specifies data among the plurality of data which has the largest size to be laid out in the region. The information processing apparatus lays out the specified data in the region to display the document which is laid out with the specified data. In this case, the information processing apparatus displays the data so that size of the data can be changed.

Description

  The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus that processes a document in which data is variably inserted into a predetermined area on the document, a data editing method in the information processing apparatus, and a program.

  Variable printing (variable printing) is known in which a plurality of data is variably inserted into a document and printed based on a layout template that defines the layout of data on the document. In such variable printing, if you try to insert text longer than the width that can be displayed in the text box laid out on the document, part of the text will be lost and printed. The phenomenon of running out of characters will occur.

  As a method for confirming the presence or absence of such character breakage, there is a method in which the user visually confirms by preview display. In Patent Document 1, the maximum number of characters is measured for each item of data stored in a database, dummy characters corresponding to the maximum number of characters are assigned to layout portions, a preview image is generated, and it is easy for a user to find out of characters. How to do is described. In Patent Document 2, a range of the allowable number of characters is set in advance in a text box on the layout, data outside the allowable number of characters is extracted from all data, and the width of the text box corresponding to the data is widened. A method is described.

JP 2008-134961 A

  However, in Patent Document 1, the user can correct the character cut by expanding the text box, but there is a problem that the layout is changed by expanding the text box.

  An object of the present invention is to solve such conventional problems. In view of the above points, an object of the present invention is to provide an information processing apparatus that facilitates data editing by a user when laying out data on a document, and a data editing method and program in the information processing apparatus. To do.

  In order to solve the above problems, an information processing apparatus according to the present invention includes a database that holds a plurality of data that can be laid out in a predetermined area on a document, and a size that is laid out in the area among the plurality of data. Specifying means for specifying data having a maximum value, layout means for laying out the data specified by the specifying means in the area, and display for displaying the document in which the data is laid out in the area by the layout means And display control means for controlling the display means so that the size of the data can be changed.

  According to the present invention, when data is laid out on a document, the user can easily edit the data.

It is a figure which shows the structure of a variable printing system and information processing apparatus. It is a figure which shows the structure of a printing apparatus. It is a figure for demonstrating the outline of variable printing. It is a figure which shows the flow of the data in variable printing. It is a figure which shows the procedure of the process of character cut confirmation and character cut correction. It is a figure which shows the user interface screen on which a preview image is displayed. It is a figure which shows an example of the process of S501-S504 of FIG. It is a figure which shows an example of the process of S503-S508 of FIG. It is a figure which shows an example of a process of S501-S510 of FIG. 5, and S501-S504 of the 2nd time.

  Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. It should be noted that the following embodiments do not limit the present invention according to the claims, and all combinations of features described in the present embodiments are not necessarily essential to the solution means of the present invention. . The same constituent elements are denoted by the same reference numerals, and the description thereof is omitted.

  FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of a variable printing system and an information processing apparatus 100 according to an embodiment of the present invention. The variable printing system includes an information processing apparatus 100 such as a PC and a printing apparatus 109. The information processing apparatus 100 and the printing apparatus 109 are connected via a network 110 so that they can communicate with each other. In the information processing apparatus 100, an operating system (OS), a printer driver that is software for controlling the printing apparatus 109, and an application for creating various documents and the like are installed in a hard disk (HDD) 102.

  The CPU 101 of the information processing apparatus 100 controls each unit connected to the system bus 103 by executing a control program held in a storage unit such as the HDD 102. For example, display control can be performed so that the user can edit the preview screen on the print preview screen, which will be described later. The CPU 101 activates and operates an OS, an application, a printer driver for print control, and the like. The RAM 104 is mainly used as a work area for the CPU 101. In the RAM 104, an OS, a device driver including a printer driver, and the like reside as a system program. The external memory 105 is a recording medium such as a flexible disk (FD), CD-ROM, or MO.

  The input unit 106 can accept various instructions from the user, and is, for example, a pointing device or a keyboard. A command indicating an instruction input from the user is accepted directly or via icons, buttons, etc. on various windows provided by the user interface. The display unit 107 is, for example, a CRT display or a liquid crystal display, and displays a user interface screen such as an OS, an application, and a printer driver. In addition, the display unit 107 can accept various instructions from the user via icons on a window displayed on the user interface screen, touch buttons, and the like. The communication unit 108 is an IEEE 1284 parallel interface, or a serial interface such as IEEE 1394 or USB. The communication unit 108 can exchange data with the printing apparatus 109 via a network 110 such as a LAN. For example, the information processing apparatus 100 generates image data that can be processed by the printing apparatus 109 by performing image processing such as color space conversion and gamma correction, and transmits the print data to the printing apparatus 109 via the communication unit 108.

  FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a configuration of the printing apparatus 109. The printing apparatus 109 prints an image or document on a recording medium such as printing paper based on print data transmitted from the information processing apparatus 100 and subjected to image processing as necessary. Here, FIG. 2 shows a configuration when the printing apparatus 109 is an inkjet recording apparatus. In this embodiment, in addition to the ink jet recording apparatus, other types of printing apparatuses such as an electrophotographic system may be used.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the control unit 210 includes an MPU 212, a ROM 213 storing a program corresponding to a control sequence, a required table, and other fixed data, a carriage motor 260 control, a transport motor 270 control, and a recording head. A special purpose integrated circuit (ASIC) 215 that generates a control signal for control 281; a RAM 216 provided with a development area for image data, a work area for program execution, and the like; and an analog signal from each sensor group is input. A / D converter 211 that performs A / D conversion and supplies a digital signal to MPU 212 is included. The above-described units are connected via a system bus 214 so that they can communicate with each other. A host device 290 in FIG. 2 corresponds to the information processing apparatus 100 in FIG. Image data, commands, status signals, and the like are communicated between the host apparatus 290 and the printing apparatus 109 via an interface (I / F) 291.

  The switch group 220 is a power switch 221, a print switch 222 for instructing the start of printing, and a recovery for instructing start of processing (recovery processing) for maintaining the ink ejection performance of the recording head 281 in a good state. The switch 223 and the like are configured to accept a user command input. The position sensor 231 of the sensor group 230 is a photocoupler or the like for detecting the home position. The temperature sensor 232 is a temperature sensor provided at an appropriate location of the printing apparatus in order to detect the environmental temperature of each part of the recording apparatus.

  The carriage motor driver 240 drives a carriage motor 260 for reciprocally scanning the carriage 280 in a direction orthogonal to the recording medium conveyance direction. Further, the transport motor driver 250 drives a transport motor 270 for transporting the recording medium. The ASIC 215 transfers drive data of the recording element (discharge heater) to the recording head 281 while directly accessing the storage area of the ROM 213 during recording scanning by the recording head 281.

  As a form of the printing apparatus 109 in the present embodiment, a copying apparatus combined with a reader or the like as well as a facsimile apparatus having a transmission / reception function are provided as an image output terminal of an information processing apparatus such as a computer. It may take a form.

  FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining the outline of variable printing. The variable data 301 is divided into a plurality of items A to C, and is associated with each other for each row. In this embodiment, a combination of data associated with each other is called a record. The fixed layout data 302 is data indicating a plurality of data insertion areas (fields) defined on a document, for example. As shown in FIG. 3, the fixed layout data 302 has a plurality of data insertion areas, and the variable data 301 can be laid out in each data insertion area on the fixed layout data 302. The variable data 301 is associated with each field of the fixed layout data 302 for each column. The variable data 301 is assigned to the associated field of the fixed layout data 302 for each record, and is printed by the printing apparatus 109 or previewed on the display unit 107 of the information processing apparatus 100.

  FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating a data flow in variable printing in the present embodiment. The information processing apparatus 100 includes a longest character string extraction unit 401, a variable data editing unit 406, a data insertion unit 403, a preview image generation unit 404, and a printer driver 407 as modules on an application for processing data in variable printing. The longest character string extraction unit 401 specifies and extracts the longest character string for each field (that is, for each column of the variable data 301) from the variable data 301, and generates extracted variable data 402. For example, when the variable data 301 is text data, data having the largest number of characters is specified. For example, when the variable data 301 is image data such as a thumbnail, the data having the maximum image size is specified. The data insertion unit 403 assigns the variable data 301 or the extracted variable data 402 to the associated field on the fixed layout data 302 and inserts it. The preview image generation unit 404 generates preview image data 405 having a layout to which the variable data 301 or the extracted variable data 402 is assigned by the data insertion unit 403. The generated preview image data 405 is displayed on the display unit 107. The variable data editing unit 406 accepts editing of the extracted variable data 402 by the user on the preview image data 405 generated by the preview image generation unit 404. The printer driver 407 converts the fixed layout data 302 into which the variable data 301 is inserted by the data insertion unit 403 into print data 408 that has been binarized, for example, into a format that can be processed by the printing apparatus 109. The converted print data 408 is sent to the printing apparatus 109 and printed as a printed material 409.

  FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a procedure of character cut confirmation and character cut correction processing in this embodiment. Each process illustrated in FIG. 5 is executed by the CPU 101 of the information processing apparatus 100, for example. In step S <b> 501, the longest character string extraction unit 401 extracts the longest character string for each column from the variable data 301. In S502, the longest character string extraction unit 401 generates extracted variable data 402 by combining the extracted character strings. At that time, the association between each extracted character string and each field of the fixed layout data 302 is maintained.

  In S503, the data insertion unit 403 allocates each data of the extraction variable data 402 to each associated field of the fixed layout data 302, and the preview image generation unit 404 uses the allocated layout to generate the preview image data 405. Generate. The generated preview image data 405 is sent to the display unit 107, and a preview image is displayed. FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example of a user interface screen on which a preview image is displayed.

  In step S <b> 504, the user visually checks the preview image on the display unit 107 and confirms whether or not characters are cut off. At this time, when it is confirmed that there is no character break in all fields on the fixed layout data 302, the user presses the character break correction end button 603 to instruct the end of the character break correction. On the other hand, if the user confirms that the characters are cut in one or more fields, the process proceeds to S505.

  In S505, the user designates a field for correcting character breakage. For example, the user designates the position of the field on the preview image by clicking or the like. When a field is designated by the user, the variable data editing unit 406 arranges an edit box for editing at the position of the field designated by the user on the preview image data 405 and displays it on the user interface screen.

  In S506, the user edits the character string on the displayed edit box. At that time, the user can change, for example, a character string protruding from the edit box to another character string and place it in the edit box. After editing, the user presses the edit reflection button 601 in FIG. In step S <b> 507, the variable data editing unit 406 reflects the character string edited in the edit box in the extracted variable data 402. In step S <b> 508, the data insertion unit 403 inserts the extracted variable data 402 reflecting the edited character string into the fixed layout data 302. Then, the preview image generation unit 404 generates preview image data 405. The generated preview image data 405 is displayed on the display unit 107. With such a configuration, the user can confirm whether or not the character breakage correction has been successful by pressing the edit reflection button 601 in FIG. 6 after editing.

  In S509, as in S504, the user confirms whether or not there is a character break while viewing the preview image displayed in S508. At this time, if it is confirmed that one or more fields are out of character, the process returns to S505, and the user is allowed to re-edit the character string again. On the other hand, when it is confirmed in S509 that there is no character interruption in all fields, the user presses the database update button 602 in FIG.

  In step S <b> 510, the variable data editing unit 406 reflects the character string edited on the edit box in the variable data 301. Thereafter, the process returns to S501, and the variable data 301 that has been corrected for character breakage is repeatedly checked for the presence or absence of character breakage by the user.

  In S504, by repeating the process until the user confirms that there is no character break for all fields, that is, until the character break correction end button 603 in FIG. You can check and correct the character break on the field.

  FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating an example of the processing of S501 to S504 in FIG. In this example, the fixed layout data 701 (corresponding to the fixed layout data 302) has three fields. Further, as shown in FIG. 7, eight data of variable data 702 are associated with each field. That is, the eight data of the item name item are associated with the field near the center of the fixed layout data 701. Also, the eight data items of the price item are associated with the lower field of the fixed layout data 701. Further, the eight data of the production area items are associated with the upper field of the fixed layout data 701.

  In the case of FIG. 7, the longest character string extraction unit 401 sets “pineapple”, “1800”, and “Australia” as the longest character string from the items “item name”, “price”, and “origin” of the variable data 702, respectively. And extraction variable data 703 is output. The preview image generation unit 404 generates longest character string preview image data 704 obtained by combining longest character strings from the extracted variable data 703 and the fixed layout data 701. The user can confirm the presence or absence of character breakage in a plurality of fields at a time using the longest character string preview image displayed on the user interface screen.

  FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating an example of the processing of S503 to S508 in FIG. As shown in FIG. 8, it can be seen that in the longest character string preview image data 704, characters are cut off in two of the three fields (name of product and place of production). When the user designates each field position on the longest character string preview image data 704 by clicking or the like, edit boxes 801 and 802 are displayed at the designated positions. The user can edit the character string that has been cut off in the edit boxes 801 and 802, and can instruct the reflection of the edit after the editing is completed. For example, FIG. 8 shows an example in which the user edits “pineapple”, which has caused a character break, to “pine”. After the editing reflection instruction, the longest character string preview image data 803 reflecting the edited character string on the edit box and the extracted variable data 604 reflecting the edited character string on the edit box are generated. In this way, in this embodiment, the user does not need to edit the layout between the fields, such as moving the “pineapple” field to widen the display of “pineapple” as it is, and easily corrects the character breakage. It can be performed.

  FIG. 9 is a diagram illustrating an example of processing in S501 to S510 in FIG. 5 and S501 to S504 in the second iteration. As shown in FIG. 9, the longest character string extraction unit 401 extracts “pineapple”, “1800”, and “Australia” by the longest character string extraction in the first S501. Then, the user can correct the character string on the longest character string preview image data 803 in which the extracted data is inserted. For example, the user can modify “Pineapple” to “Pine” and “Australia” to “Australia”. As a result, it is possible to eliminate the occurrence of character breakage in the extracted data.

  However, at this time, there is a possibility that characters other than the data extracted as the longest character string may be cut off, and it cannot be said that the correction of the cut of characters is completed. For example, even if “Pineapple” is corrected to “Pine”, the characters may be cut off for other “cherries”.

  Therefore, in this embodiment, the data corrected by the user is reflected in the variable data 702 in S510. That is, the variable data 702 is updated to the variable data 901 as shown in FIG. Thereafter, the longest character string extraction process of S501 is performed again on the variable data 901. By repeating such processing until the character breakage is no longer confirmed when the preview display is performed, the character breakage correction can be efficiently performed for all data entered as variable data.

  In the present embodiment, the problem is that characters are cut off in each field. That is, the case where the number of characters is larger than the size of the field or the image size is large is an issue. In the present embodiment, in order to solve such a problem, the aim is to fit the number of characters within the size of the field. Therefore, when the variable data is image data such as thumbnails, when inserting image data larger than the field size into the associated field, a preview is displayed on the user interface screen so that the user can change the size of the image data. indicate.

100 Information processing apparatus 101 CPU
102 HDD
103 System bus 104 RAM
105 External Memory 106 Input Unit 107 Display Unit 108 Communication Unit 109 Printing Device 110 Network

Claims (7)

A database that holds a plurality of data that can be laid out in a predetermined area on the document;
A specifying means for specifying data having a maximum size laid out in the region among the plurality of data;
Layout means for laying out the data specified by the specifying means in the area;
Display means for displaying the document in which the data is laid out in the area by the layout means;
Display control means for controlling the display means so that the size of the data can be changed;
An information processing apparatus comprising: The document has a plurality of the areas,
The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the database holds a plurality of data that can be laid out for each of the regions. Accepting means for accepting the size change;
Storage means for storing the data whose size has been changed in the database instead of the data held in the database;
The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising:   The specification unit is characterized in that after the data whose size has been changed by the storage unit is stored in the database, data having the maximum size laid out in the region is specified again. 3. The information processing apparatus according to 3.   The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a print control unit that causes the printing apparatus to print the document displayed by the display unit. A data editing method executed in an information processing apparatus having a database that holds a plurality of data that can be laid out in a predetermined area on a document,
A specifying step in which the specifying unit of the information processing apparatus specifies data having a maximum size laid out in the region, among the plurality of data;
A layout step in which layout means of the information processing apparatus lays out the data specified in the specifying step in the area;
A display step in which the display unit of the information processing apparatus displays the document in which the data is laid out in the region in the layout step;
A display control step of controlling the display step so that the display control means of the information processing apparatus can change the size of the data;
A data editing method characterized by comprising:   A program that causes a computer to function as each unit of the information processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5.

Images