JP3360375B2 - Facsimile machine - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a facsimile machine, and more particularly, to a facsimile machine having an automatic cover letter creation function.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As a conventional facsimile apparatus, there is known a facsimile apparatus in which a cover letter is automatically created on a transmission side.

[0003] As related techniques, there are "facsimile information display / selection output system" described in JP-B-63-40069 and "Facsimile apparatus" described in JP-A-63-305660.

Among them, the invention described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 63-40069 discloses a telephone number of a transmitting side, a corresponding company name, a personal name,
The section name, etc. and image information are displayed on the display on the receiving side so that they can be selectively printed out.

In the invention described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 63-305660, identification information is printed on a document when a document is read on the transmission side, thereby facilitating communication management on the transmission side.

[0006]

However, the above-mentioned Japanese Patent Publication No. Sho 63-40069 and Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. Sho 63-30566.
The invention described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 0 does not automatically create a cover letter on the receiving side. In particular, if the transmitting facsimile machine does not have a function for automatically creating a cover letter, the transmitting side manually creates the cover letter. Without attaching to the document,
If the operator on the transmitting side felt this manual operation troublesome and did not attach the cover letter to the document, the receiving side could not obtain the cover letter. For this reason, if the receiving operator is away or if facsimile communication is flooded at one time and multiple documents are stored in the outlet, the receiving side instantly sends the sender information of the document, the recipient It is difficult to recognize such information, and there is an inconvenience that reception management is inefficient.

The present invention has been made under such circumstances, and an object of the present invention is to provide a facsimile apparatus capable of obtaining a cover letter on a receiving side in any case.

[0008]

[0009]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a facsimile apparatus for transmitting / receiving data to / from a facsimile apparatus, an image information storage unit for storing image information,
Editing means for analyzing and editing information obtained from a communication protocol when the transmitting / receiving unit receives document information from the other party's facsimile apparatus; and image information of the received document for each page stored in the image information storage unit. To the received document
Identification information adding means for adding identification information for identifying the creation of a cover letter, and reception result information indicating whether or not the editing result information and the image information of the received document have been stored in the image information storage unit. A management information storage unit to be stored;
A cover letter creating unit that creates cover letter information based on information corresponding to the input identification information stored in the management information storage unit when the identification information is input from an operation unit; and the image information storage unit. Output means for outputting the image information and the created cover letter information accumulated on the recording paper.

[0010]

[0011]

According to the facsimile apparatus of the first aspect , when the transmitting / receiving section receives the document information from the other party's facsimile apparatus, the image information of the received document is sequentially stored in the image information storage section. At this time, the editing means analyzes and edits information obtained from the communication protocol. Further, the identification information adding unit adds the identification information to the document information for each page stored in the image information storage unit. The management information storage unit stores the editing result information and the reception result information indicating whether the image information of the received document has been stored in the image information storage unit. Then, the document information stored in the image information storage unit is output to recording paper by the output unit.

On the other hand, when the identification information is inputted from the operation unit, the cover letter creating means creates cover letter information based on the information corresponding to the inputted identification information stored in the management information storage unit. The created cover letter information is output from the output means.

[0013]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS.

FIG. 1 shows a schematic configuration of a facsimile apparatus 10 according to one embodiment of the present invention.

The facsimile apparatus 10 includes a control unit 12 for controlling the entire system, an operation unit 14 for an operator to input various instructions, a display unit 16 for displaying various instructions to the operator, and a document image. A reading unit 18 for reading out the received information, an output unit 20 for printing out the transmitted information on recording paper, a transmitting / receiving unit 22 for transmitting / receiving to / from a facsimile apparatus connected via a line N, a destination ID, A management information memory 24 as a management information storage unit for storing management information such as a communication mode, an arrival time, and a communication result, and received document information or image information (image data) read from a document by the reading unit 18 are stored. An image information memory 26 serving as an image information storage unit for storing cover letter information based on information stored in the management information memory 24; A cover letter creation unit 28 as over creation means is configured to include a.

Of these, the control unit 12 actually controls the CP
It is constituted by a microcomputer having U, ROM, RAM, I / O and the like, and is connected to the above-mentioned respective parts via a system bus 30. The control unit 12 manages the job flow of each unit.

The operation unit 14 is an input device in which a large number of operation keys are arranged. In this embodiment, an automatic ejection mode of a cover letter and an identification information addition mode described later are set by key input of the operation unit 14. Is configured to be possible.

The display section 16 is actually constituted by a liquid crystal display or the like, and constitutes an operation panel together with the operation section 14.

The reading unit 18 is provided with a CC for reading a document.
The scanner comprises a D sensor and a document transport system.

The output section 20 is constituted by a high-speed printer such as a laser printer or an ink jet printer.

The transmitting / receiving unit 22 is actually a modem, an NC,
U (network control device) and the like.

Next, the operation of the facsimile apparatus 10 constructed as described above for producing a cover letter will be described with reference to FIG.
4 will be described with reference to a flowchart showing a control algorithm of the CPU in the control unit 12 shown in FIG. These control algorithms are stored in the ROM. Here, it is assumed that the transmitting-side facsimile machine does not have a function of automatically creating a cover letter.

In the main routine of FIG. 2, after the control is started, the process waits for a job to be started in step 100. If the job is started, the process proceeds to step 102 to determine whether or not the received job has been started. If the receiving job has not been activated, the process proceeds to step 104 to execute the instructed operation (for example, transmission, copying, etc.) and terminate the control.

On the other hand, if the receiving job has been activated, the flow advances to step 106 to determine whether or not the cover letter automatic discharge mode is set. If the mode is the cover letter automatic discharge mode, the process proceeds to the cover letter automatic discharge subroutine in step 108.

In the cover letter automatic discharge subroutine, as shown in FIG. 3, after analyzing the information on the communication protocol in step 200, the process proceeds to step 202, where the analyzed information (the destination ID, communication mode, incoming call Time, etc.), and edits the edited result information into the management information memory 24.
To memorize.

In the next step 204, the image data for one page is temporarily stored in the RAM, transferred to the image information memory 26 and stored, and then the process proceeds to step 206 to determine whether or not it is the last original. . The determination as to whether the document is the final document is made by detecting a signal sent from the other party's facsimile machine at the end of transmission.

If it is not the last original, the process returns to step 204 to sequentially accumulate image data for one page in the image information memory 26.

If it is determined that the document is the final document, step 2
In step 08, the management information memory 24 stores information indicating whether the image information has been successfully stored in the image information memory 26, that is, reception result information corresponding to each page.

In the next step 210, the information stored in the management information memory 24, that is, the information of the editing result and the reception result information are transferred to the cover letter creating section 28 to create the cover letter information.

In step 212, the created cover letter information is transferred to the output unit 20, and then, in step 21
The program proceeds to step S4, where the image information stored in the image information memory 26 is transferred to the output unit 20, and then the process returns to the main routine of FIG. As a result, the recording sheet on which the cover letter information is recorded as shown in FIG. 6A, that is, the cover letter is discharged from the output unit 20, and then the recording sheet on which the received document information is recorded is sequentially discharged. You.

On the other hand, if the determination in step 106 is denied, that is, in the case of the identification information addition mode, the flow proceeds to the identification information addition subroutine of step 110.

In this subroutine, first, as shown in FIG. 4, after analyzing the information on the communication protocol in step 300, the flow proceeds to step 302 to analyze the information (the destination ID, the communication mode, the arrival time, etc.). Is edited, and the information of the edited result is stored in the management information memory 24.

In the next step 304, the image data for one page is temporarily stored in the RAM, and in step 306, a document number as identification information is added to the image data and transferred to the image information memory 26 for storage.

In the next step 308, it is determined whether or not the document is the last document. If the document is not the last document, the flow returns to step 304 to sequentially add the document numbers of one page to the document data and store them in the image information memory 26.

If it is determined that the document is the final one, step 3
10, the management information memory 24 stores the image information memory 2
6 stores information on whether or not the image data has been successfully stored, that is, reception result information, corresponding to each page.

In the next step 312, the image data stored in the image information memory 26 is transferred to the output unit 20 to discharge the document, and then the process returns to the main routine to terminate the control.

When the control is completed in this manner, when the operator inputs the document number from the operation unit 14, the flowchart of FIG. 5 starts.

It is determined whether or not the document number input in step 400 matches the document number added to the image data stored in the image information memory 26. If not, control is terminated. But if they match,
Proceeding to step 402, the information of the document number is read from the management information memory 24 and transferred to the cover letter creating section 28 to create cover letter information of the received document corresponding to the document number.

In the next step 404, after transferring the created cover letter information to the output unit 20, the control is terminated. As a result, a cover letter as shown in FIG.

As described above, according to the present embodiment,
In the cover letter automatic discharge mode, the cover letter relating to the received document is output from the output unit 20 prior to the discharge of the received document, so that the number of received documents, destination information, and the like can be recognized in advance, which is convenient. In the identification information addition mode, the operator can obtain a cover letter of a received document of a document number whose contents he / she wants to know, if necessary, which can be useful for organizing and managing facsimile received documents.

In the above embodiment, the case where the cover letter automatic discharge mode and the identification information addition mode can be set with one facsimile is exemplified. However, the case where only one of the cover letter discharge modes can be set. However, it is possible to create a cover letter on the receiving side, which has been difficult in the past.

[0042]

As described above, according to the present invention,
In any case, the cover letter can be obtained on the receiving side, so that the number of received documents, destination information, etc. can be recognized in advance or as necessary after the received documents are ejected, and the received documents can be organized by facsimile. There is an unprecedented superior effect that it can be used for management.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a main control algorithm of a CPU in a control unit.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a subroutine of automatic cover letter ejection in FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a subroutine for adding identification information in FIG. 2;

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a control algorithm when a cover letter is discharged according to an instruction of an operator.

FIG. 6A is a diagram illustrating an example of a cover letter in a cover letter automatic discharge mode, and FIG. 6B is a diagram illustrating an example of a cover letter in an identification information adding mode.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 Facsimile apparatus 12 Control part (editing means, identification information addition means) 20 Output means (output part) 22 Transmission / reception part 24 Management information memory (management information storage part) 26 Image information memory (image information storage part) 28 Cover letter creation part

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuation of front page (72) Inventor Takaya Sato 3-7-1, Funai, Iwatsuki-shi, Saitama Fuji Xerox Co., Ltd. Iwatsuki Office (56) References JP-A-4-145576 (JP, A) JP-A-63-238759 (JP, A) JP-A-1-106574 (JP, A) JP-A-4-157967 (JP, A) JP-A-4-185065 (JP, A) JP-A-1-288158 (JP) JP-A-3-106259 (JP, A) JP-A-62-171371 (JP, A) JP-A-3-256424 (JP, A) JP-A-4-333994 (JP, A) (58) Field surveyed (Int.Cl. ⁷ , DB name) H04N 1/00-1/00 108 H04N 1/32-1/36 H04N 1/42-1/44

Claims (1)

(57) [Claims] A transmission / reception unit for transmitting / receiving data to / from a facsimile apparatus of the other party; an image information storage unit for storing image information; and a communication protocol when the transmission / reception section receives document information from the facsimile apparatus of the other party. Editing means for analyzing and editing information; and reception for each page stored in the image information storage unit.
Create a cover letter for the received document in the image information of the document
Information adding means for adding identification information for identifying
When the management information storage unit for image information of the received document and the editing result information the image information or not accumulated in the storage unit whether the reception result information and is stored, the identification information from the operation unit is input If the said management
Corresponding to the input identification information stored in the information storage unit
Cover letter that creates cover letter information based on the information
A facsimile apparatus comprising: a creation unit; and an output unit that outputs the image information stored in the image information storage unit and the created cover letter information to recording paper.