JP2867635B2 - Serial scanning printer / plotter - Google Patents

Description

Description: BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a serial scanning printer / plotter for drawing a drawing or an image by scanning a recording pen in a direction substantially perpendicular to a direction in which recording paper is to be fed.

2. Description of the Related Art As is well known, in a system such as CAD, the final output when creating a drawing is drawn by a known pen plotter or the like, but the drawback of the pen plotter is that the drawing speed is slow. Yes, the drawing time increases in proportion to the number of line segments. The reason for this is that there is a limit to the moving speed of the pen in a drawing mechanism that draws line segments one by one by moving the pen.

By the way, a known serial scanning printer / plotter draws a drawing or a screen by, for example, scanning an ink jet recording pen having a multi-nozzle head having a plurality of nozzles in a direction substantially perpendicular to the direction in which recording paper is to be fed. That is, FIG. 3 shows the relationship between the recording paper 1 and the recording pen 2 in the basic serial scanning type printer / plotter, wherein the arrow P indicates the moving direction of the recording paper 1 and the arrow Q indicates the moving direction of the recording pen 2. , 3 indicate a plurality of drawing lines.

Therefore, in this serial scanning type printer / plotter, the recording pen 2 is moved in a direction orthogonal to the feed direction of the recording paper 1 to form a drawing line 3 equal to the number of nozzles of the recording pen. The paper is fed at the turning point 2 and the scanning is repeated until the predetermined number of lines is reached, so that a full view or an entire image is drawn.

Therefore, when a drawing or an image is drawn using such a serial scanning printer / plotter, a plurality of drawing lines are simultaneously recorded by a recording pen such as a multi-nozzle ink jet. Recording may be performed in a shorter time than a plotter.

Problems to be Solved by the Invention However, the serial scanning printer / plotter described above may take much time with respect to a drawing having a small number of line segments, since there are many useless scanning areas. In order to solve such a difficulty, it is effective to perform a serial scan of only a range where data exists. More specifically, when the data to be recorded exists only at the center of the scanning range of the recording pen on the screen, the scanning of the recording pen 2 may be reciprocated only at the central portion, and the amount of image data is small. Drawings and images can be recorded faster than otherwise.

However, in the same serial scanning printer / plotter, there is no place to skip up and down and left and right even in a drawing or image with a small amount of information to be recorded, in a drawing or image with an outer frame or a border. At the paper feed position, data exists at the start point and the end point, and eventually the entire area must be scanned. as a result,
There is a problem if the same recording time is required for a large data amount.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide a serial scanning printer / plotter capable of recording drawings and images having a small amount of information to be recorded in a short time in view of the problems of the conventional serial scanning printer / plotter described above.

Means for Solving the Problems In order to solve this problem, the present invention provides a means for sending a recording paper, a means for scanning a recording pen in a direction substantially perpendicular to a recording paper sending direction, and the presence or absence of an outer frame or border. Means for recognizing data, an outer frame drawing means for performing outer frame drawing processing according to the result, means for recognizing the presence or absence of data relating to data other than the outer frame or border, and an inner area according to the recognition result. The present invention proposes a serial scanning printer / plotter which includes an internal area drawing means for executing the drawing processing of (1), and separately draws the outer frame drawing processing and the internal area drawing processing.

Function Conventionally, when there is an outer frame, regardless of the amount of data inside, scanning with a recording pen and paper feed must be performed over the entire screen, and it takes a long time for recording with a small amount of data. However, according to the present invention, the outer frame drawing process can be performed separately from the drawing process of the inner region (the outer frame and the data region other than the border). The drawing time of the internal area can be reduced, and the total recording time can be shortened.

Embodiment Hereinafter, an embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2. FIG.

FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram of a serial scanning printer / plotter according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of the serial scanning printer / plotter.

Data supplied from the outside is supplied to a control device 10 shown in FIG. 1, and the control device 10 makes a determination based on the supplied data as described below, and a recording paper feeding device 11 for feeding a recording paper. A recording pen scanning device 12 that scans a pen in a direction perpendicular to the recording paper, and a recording pen driving device 13 that lowers the recording pen on the recording paper to draw on the recording paper
Is controlled as needed to draw a drawing or image based on the data. The positional relationship between the recording paper and the recording pen is the same as the principle described above with reference to FIG.

The controller 10 receives the supplied data, performs determination as to the presence or absence of data in step S ₁ of FIG. 2, if the data is present, the procedure proceeds to step S _2. In this case, if there is no data, the control operation of the recording pen is not performed. In step S _2, when it is determined that there is an outer frame or border in the data performs outer frame rendering process proceeds to step S _3. If when there is no outer frame or border in step S _2, the procedure proceeds to step S _4. This step S ₄ is also performed after the outer frame rendering process of step S ₃ is finished. In step S _4, the presence or absence of data is determined, if there is data goes to step S _5, the internal area (outer frame in accordance with the data,
The drawing process of the data area other than the border is executed, and thereafter, the control operation of the recording pen ends.

Further, in step S _4, if the data is not even end the control operation of the recording pen.

In the outer frame rendering process of step S ₃ described above, the moving direction of the line of the recording pen, the movement of the recording pen, also the paper feeding direction of the line is done by returning the paper feed or feed, hatching both It is performed in combination of.

In the above-described embodiment, the control device automatically identifies that the outer frame or the border is included in the data, but the outer frame drawing process is performed by manually specifying the outer frame record. Good.

With this configuration, since the outer frame drawing and the drawing of the inner area are performed separately, the time can be reduced as compared with the conventional case. Even in the drawing of the inner area, the recording time is not hindered by the existence of the outer frame. Be shortened.

As described above, according to the present invention, when recording a drawing or image having an outer frame or a border, the presence or absence of the outer frame or the border is recognized, and the outer frame drawing processing and the inner area (other than the outer frame and the border) are performed. The recording time can be effectively shortened by separately performing the drawing processing of (data).

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a conceptual view of a serial scanning printer / plotter according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a flowchart of the serial scanning printer / plotter, and FIG. It is a perspective view which shows the relationship of. 10 ...... controller, 11 ...... paper feeder, 12 ...... recording pen scanning device, 13 ...... recording pen drive, S ₁ -S ₅ ...... step.

Continuation of the front page (58) Field surveyed (Int. Cl. ⁶ , DB name) B43L 13/00 B41J 29/00 B41J 21/00 G06F 3/12

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] A means for feeding a recording paper; a means for scanning a recording pen in a direction substantially perpendicular to a recording paper sending direction; a means for recognizing the presence or absence of an outer frame or border; and an outer frame according to the result. Outer frame drawing means for performing drawing processing, means for recognizing the presence or absence of data related to data other than the outer frame or border, and internal area drawing means for performing drawing processing of the internal area according to the recognition result, A serial scanning type printer / plotter which separately draws an outer frame drawing process and an inner region drawing process.