JP2785567B2 - Printer - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printer, and more particularly to a printer for printing characters using a bitmap font and an outline font.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional printer with a built-in outline font has two fonts, an outline font and a bitmap font, and prints enlarged characters with an outline font which does not cause jaggedness even when enlarged. Prints with a bitmap with a short development time.

[0003]

This conventional printer employs a means for developing a character that can be substituted with a bitmap font when printing an enlarged character and developing the outline character into an outline font. However, there is a problem that the printing time becomes longer due to the need for

[0004]

Means for Solving the Problems The printer of the present invention, characters are usually characters using bitmap fonts, which represents a printer capable of printing enlarged characters using outline font, the character received from the host apparatus data
The received character data is the enlarged character data.
Judge whether the data is enlarged characters or not.
In addition, bitmap phones do not affect printing quality in advance.
Is the enlarged character data specified as replaceable by
Receiving data analysis means for determining whether or not the
Based on the analysis result of the data analyzing means,
Replaceable with the normal characters and the bitmap font
If the character is for an enlarged character specified as
Developed in bitmap font as data and received
Indicates that character data can be substituted with the bitmap font
If the character is an enlarged character other than the specified enlarged character
Expands with outline font as print data
Print data developing means .

[0005]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Next, the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of one embodiment of the present invention. Under the control of the printer control unit 2, a print character string from the host device 1 is stored in the reception data buffer 3. Next, the character information reading unit 4 reads each character stored in the reception data buffer 3. Then, the received data analysis unit 5 first determines whether or not the character is an enlarged character. If the character is an enlarged character, an outline font is normally printed. Therefore, the print data developing unit 6 develops an outline font using data from the outline data 7. Thereafter, the developed characters are stored in the print data buffer 9 and printed by the printing unit 10.

If the character is not an enlarged character at the time of analysis by the received data analyzing unit 5, that is, if the character is a one-size character, a bitmap font is selected as the font and the data from the bitmap data 8 is used. Expands to a bitmap font. The expanded data is stored in the print data buffer 9. Here, the time required for bitmap font development is negligibly short compared to the outline font development time.

Also, when printing enlarged characters, there is a case where there is no problem in print quality even if a bitmap font is used instead of an outline font for some characters.
In such a case, a bitmap font can be substituted for an enlarged character. As a means,
When printing enlarged characters, information on whether or not to substitute a bitmap font is provided for each character, and the received data analysis unit 5 determines this. If the substitution is possible, the font selection is performed. To Therefore, the print data developing unit 6 develops a bitmap font. In printing, particularly when printing an outline font, the development time accounts for a large proportion of the printing time, and if the development time is shortened, that is, it directly leads to the reduction of the printing time. When printing enlarged characters, for example, in the case of ruled line characters,
Since only vertical and horizontal lines are used, printing quality is not affected even if a bitmap font is used instead of an outline font. In the case of such a character, the character data (character code) itself is provided with information indicating that it can be replaced with a bitmap font in advance (for example,
Characters in the range of character codes 2821 to 2840 (hexadecimal)
Can be replaced with a bitmap font),
By registering it in the received data analysis unit 5, a bitmap font is developed according to this information. The printing time is reduced as compared with the case of the outline font.

[0009]

The present invention described above, according to the present invention, at the time of printing the enlarged character, by the character by which enables alternative bitmap fonts without the outline font, eliminates the need for an outline font expansion, This has the effect of shortening the printing time.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of one embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 High-order apparatus 2 Printer control part 3 Receive data buffer 4 Character information reading part 5 Receive data analysis part 6 Print data development part 9 Print data buffer 10 Print part

Continued on the front page (58) Fields surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁶ , DB name) B41J 2/485 B41J 5/44 G06F 3/12 G09G 5/24 620

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] 1. A printer capable of printing using a bitmap font for normal characters and an outline character for an enlarged character , analyzing character data representing a character received from a host device ,
It is determined whether or not this received character data is expanded character data.
Judge, if it is data of enlarged characters, further
Can be replaced with bitmap fonts without affecting print quality
Determines whether the data is for enlarged characters specified as
Receiving data analysis means for performing the reception based on an analysis result of the reception data analysis means.
Character data is the normal character and the bitmap format.
Is an enlarged character specified as a substitute
In case, it is developed with bitmap font as print data
And the received character data is in the bitmap font.
Enlarged characters other than enlarged characters specified as substitutable
If this is the case, outline phone
And a print data developing means for developing the print data .