JP4100824B2 - Printing system, control method thereof, and storage medium - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a printing system that interrupts and prints another document having a high priority when printing a document, a control method thereof, and a storage medium.
[0002]
[Prior art]
2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a printing apparatus that interrupts and prints another document having a high priority while printing a document is known.
[0003]
In this printing apparatus, the interrupt document would be intertwined with the document currently being printed, because it is difficult to separate the documents therebetween, by providing a mechanism to separate the sheets, such as sorter or escaping bottles, interrupt document Is put out in a bin different from the document currently being printed, thereby preventing both from being mixed.
[0004]
[Problems to be solved by the invention]
However, in the conventional printing apparatus, a mechanism for separating sheets such as a sorter and an escape bin is provided, which increases the manufacturing cost and increases the size of the apparatus itself and requires a large installation area.
[0005]
The present invention has been made paying attention to this point, and can easily separate a currently printing document and an interrupted document without providing a special sheet separating mechanism, thereby reducing the manufacturing cost. An object of the present invention is to provide a printing system, a control method thereof, and a storage medium that can reduce the installation area.
[0006]
[Means for Solving the Problems]
In order to achieve the above object, the printing system according to claim 1 includes a printing unit for printing a document, a switching unit for a user to switch the printing unit from offline to online or from online to offline, and the printing unit. A receiving unit that accepts interrupt printing of another document having a high priority during printing of the document by the printer, and the printing unit that is online before starting the interrupt printing in response to acceptance of the interrupt printing by the receiving unit. Control means for controlling the printing means to be switched off-line, and the control means controls the printing means from off-line using the switching means when the printing means is controlled to be switched off-line. Switching to, the interrupt printing by the printing means is started.
[0007]
Preferably, the printing means has a time measuring means for measuring an elapsed time from when the printing means is switched to the offline state, and the control means allows the user to switch the switching means within the predetermined time. When the printing unit is not switched from offline to online, the received interrupt printing is deleted, the offline printing unit is switched online, and printing of the document being printed is resumed. To do.
[0008]
In order to achieve the above object, according to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printing system control method that accepts interrupt printing of another document having a high priority during printing of a document by the printing means, and accepts the interrupt printing. Before the printing unit starts the interrupt printing, the online printing unit is controlled to be switched off-line. When the printing unit is controlled to be switched off and is in an offline state, the user uses the switching unit to switch the printing unit. Is switched from offline to online, the interrupt printing by the printing means is started.
[0009]
Preferably, the elapsed time from when the printing unit is controlled to be switched to the offline state is counted, and the user switches the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit within the predetermined time. When the switching is not performed, the accepted interrupt printing is deleted, and the printing unit that is offline is switched online, and printing of the document being printed is resumed.
[0010]
In order to achieve the above object, the storage medium according to claim 5 is provided according to an acceptance procedure for accepting interrupt printing of another document having a high priority during printing of a document by the printing means, and acceptance of the interrupt printing. before the printing unit starts the interrupt printing, storing a program for executing a control procedure for switching control of the printing unit is online offline computer, a computer-readable storage medium In the control procedure , when the printing unit is controlled to be switched off-line and the user switches the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit, the interrupt printing by the printing unit is started. Features.
[0011]
Preferably, a program for causing a computer to further execute a time measuring procedure for measuring an elapsed time from when the printing unit is controlled to be switched to an offline state is stored, and in the control procedure , the elapsed time is a predetermined time. In addition, when the user does not switch the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit, the received interrupt printing is deleted, and the offline printing unit is switched online, and the document being printed Printing is resumed.
In order to achieve the above object, a control device for a printing apparatus according to claim 7 includes: a receiving unit that receives interrupt printing of another document having a high priority level while the document is being printed by the printing device; In response to acceptance of interrupt printing, the printing apparatus includes control means for switching the offline printing apparatus to offline before starting the interrupt printing, and the control means performs switching control by the printing apparatus. In the offline state, when the user switches the printing apparatus from offline to online using the switching means provided in the printing apparatus, the interrupt printing by the printing apparatus is started.
Preferably, the printing apparatus further includes a timing unit that counts an elapsed time from when the printing apparatus is controlled to be switched off-line, and the control unit is configured so that a user can change the switching unit within the predetermined time. When the printing apparatus is not switched from offline to online using the printer, the received interrupt printing is deleted, the offline printing apparatus is switched online, and printing of the document being printed is resumed. And
[0012]
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.
[0013]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of a printing system according to an embodiment of the present invention.
[0014]
As shown in the figure, the printing system according to the present embodiment includes a personal computer (hereinafter abbreviated as “PC”) 1 which is a general-purpose computer and a printing apparatus 2 such as a printer.
[0015]
The PC 1 includes a keyboard 11, a mouse 12, a CPU 13, a ROM 14, a RAM 15, a timer 16, a floppy disk device (FDD) 17, a hard disk device (HDD) 18, and a display 19, as in a normal computer. ˜19 are connected to each other via a bus 20.
[0016]
The CPU 13 loads an application program, a printer driver program, an OS, and the like stored in a storage device such as the HDD 18 and the ROM 14 into the RAM 15 and executes them.
[0017]
The ROM 14 stores a program such as a basic I / O program and various data such as font data used for document printing.
[0018]
The RAM 15 functions as a main memory or work area for the CPU 13 and temporarily stores information, files, and the like necessary for program execution.
[0019]
An FD (not shown) is inserted into the FDD 17, and a program or the like stored in the FD is loaded into the RAM 15 through the FDD 17. A print control processing program (the procedure will be described later with reference to FIG. 3) executed by the printing system of the present embodiment is stored in the FD, and this print control program is loaded from the FD to the RAM 15 and executed. .
[0020]
The HDD 18 stores application programs, printer driver programs, an OS, and the like.
[0021]
Both the keyboard 11 and the mouse 12 are used by the user to instruct the PC 1 to perform operations such as program execution.
[0022]
The display 19 displays the status and information of the printing system of the present embodiment obtained by the PC 1.
[0023]
A printing apparatus 2 is connected to the PC 1. As a connection method, there are a method of connecting via a network in addition to a method of directly connecting with a parallel cable or the like.
[0024]
The printing apparatus 2 can print on both sides of a sheet according to user designation. Further, by printing a reduced document, a plurality of pages can be printed on one side of the paper. Furthermore, by combining these, a plurality of pages can be printed on both the front and back sides of the paper.
[0025]
FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a memory map in a state where the print control processing program stored in the FD is loaded into the RAM 15 and becomes executable.
[0026]
In this embodiment, the print control processing program and the document data to be printed are directly loaded from the FD onto the RAM 15 and executed. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and data having the same contents as the FD is written in the HDD 18. May be loaded into the RAM 15. The medium for storing the print control processing program may be a CD-ROM, an IC memory card, or the like in addition to the FD. Further, a print control processing program may be recorded in the ROM 14 and configured so as to be a part of the memory map, and directly executed by the CPU 13.
[0027]
In FIG. 2, an area A1 is loaded with a basic I / O program, an area A2 is loaded with an OS, and an area A3 is loaded with a print control processing program. The area A4 is used as a work area.
[0028]
When the power of the PC 1 is turned on, the basic I / O program is read from the HDD 18 into the RAM 15. This basic I / O program is a program that provides an IPL (Initial Program Loading) function and the like for starting the operation of the OS.
[0029]
The CPU 13 of the PC 1 loads an application program, a printer driver program, an OS, and the like stored in a storage device such as the HDD 18 into the RAM 15 and executes them. In response to an instruction from an input device such as the keyboard 11 or the mouse 12, the HDD 18 The designated document file stored in the storage device is sent to the printing apparatus 2 for printing.
[0030]
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the procedure of the printing control processing program executed by the CPU 13 of the printing system of the present embodiment, particularly the PC 1.
[0031]
In the figure, first, the currently instructed document is printed (step S1).
[0032]
Next, it is checked whether there is an interruption of another document during the printing (step S2). If there is an interruption, the process proceeds to step S4. If there is no interruption, the process proceeds to step S3 to end the printing. To check.
[0033]
In step S3, when there is a document to be printed, the process returns to step S1 to continue printing the next document. On the other hand, when all the printing is finished, the print control process is finished.
[0034]
In step S4, the online switch (not shown) of the printing apparatus 2 is set offline, and printing is interrupted. In the subsequent step S5, time measurement by the timer 16 is started, and the time since going offline is measured.
[0035]
In step S6 and step S7, it is checked whether or not the printing apparatus 2 has been brought back online by the user's operation within a preset N seconds. If not, the timer 16 stops timing (step S8). After deleting the interrupt document print job (step S9), the process returns to step S1 to resume printing of the document being printed.
[0036]
On the other hand, when the printing apparatus 2 is brought back online by the user's operation within N seconds, the time measurement by the timer 16 is stopped (step S10), printing of the interrupt document is started, and after the end of the printing (step S11) Returning to step S1, the printing of the document being printed is resumed.
[0037]
A program in which a storage medium storing software program codes for realizing the functions of the above-described embodiments is supplied to a system or apparatus, and a computer (or CPU 13 or MPU) of the system or apparatus is stored in the storage medium. It goes without saying that the object of the present invention can also be achieved by reading and executing the code.
[0038]
In this case, the program code itself read from the storage medium realizes the novel function of the present invention, and the storage medium storing the program code constitutes the present invention.
[0039]
Examples of the storage medium for supplying the program code include the floppy disk (FD), hard disk (in the HDD 17), optical disk, magneto-optical disk, CD-ROM, CD-R, magnetic tape, and nonvolatile memory card. ROM14 etc. can be used. Further, the program code may be supplied from a server computer via a communication network.
[0040]
Further, by executing the program code read by the computer, not only the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized, but also the OS running on the computer based on the instruction of the program code performs the actual processing. It goes without saying that a case where the functions of the above-described embodiment are realized by performing part or all of the above and the processing thereof is included.
[0041]
Further, after the program code read from the storage medium is written into a memory provided in a function expansion board inserted into the computer or a function expansion unit connected to the computer, the function expansion is performed based on the instruction of the program code. It goes without saying that the CPU 13 or the like provided in the board or the function expansion unit performs part or all of the actual processing, and the functions of the above-described embodiments are realized by the processing.
[0042]
【The invention's effect】
As described above, according to the first, third, and fifth aspects of the present invention, during the printing of a document by the printing unit, interrupt printing of another document having a high priority is accepted, and the interrupt printing is accepted. Accordingly, before the interrupt printing is started by the printing means, the online printing means is controlled to be switched off-line, and in this offline state, the printing means is changed from offline to online by using the switching means. When switched, the interrupt printing by the printing means starts, so that it is possible to easily separate the document being printed from the interrupt document without providing a special paper separation mechanism, thereby reducing the manufacturing cost. And the installation area can be reduced.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a schematic configuration of a printing system according to an embodiment of the present invention.
2 is a diagram showing a memory map in a state in which a print control processing program stored in an FD is loaded into the RAM of FIG. 1 and can be executed.
3 is a flowchart showing a procedure of the printing control processing program of FIG. 2 executed by the printing system of FIG. 1, particularly a CPU.
[Explanation of symbols]
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Personal computer 2 Printing apparatus 11 Keyboard 12 Mouse 13 CPU
14 ROM
15 RAM
16 Timer 17 Floppy disk device (FDD)
18 Hard disk drive (HDD)
19 Display 20 Bus

Claims (8)

A printing means for printing a document;
Switching means for the user to switch the printing means from offline to online or from online to offline;
A receiving unit that receives interrupt printing of another document having a high priority during printing of the document by the printing unit;
Control means for controlling the printing means that is online to be offline before the printing means starts the interruption printing in response to acceptance of interruption printing by the reception means,
When the user switches the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit when the printing unit is controlled to be switched offline, the control unit starts the interrupt printing by the printing unit. Characteristic printing system. Having time measuring means for measuring an elapsed time from when the printing means is switched and is in an offline state;
The control unit deletes the accepted interrupt printing and, when the user does not switch the printing unit from offline to online by using the switching unit within the predetermined time, and deletes the received interrupt printing. 2. The printing system according to claim 1, wherein the printing unit is switched online and printing of the document being printed is resumed. While printing a document by the printing means, accept interrupt printing of other documents with higher priority,
In response to acceptance of the interrupt printing, before the printing means starts the interrupt printing, the online printing means is controlled to be switched off-line,
When the printing unit is controlled to be switched off-line and the user switches the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit, the interrupt printing by the printing unit is started. Control method. Measuring the elapsed time from when the printing means is switched to the offline state,
When the user does not switch the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit within the predetermined time, the received interrupt printing is deleted and the printing unit that is offline is switched online. The printing system control method according to claim 3, wherein printing of the document being printed is resumed. An acceptance procedure for accepting interrupt printing of another document having a higher priority while the document is being printed by the printing means;
A control procedure for switching the online printing means to offline before the printing means starts the interruption printing in response to the acceptance of the interruption printing;
The storing a program to be executed by the computer, a computer-readable storage medium,
In the control procedure , when the printing unit is controlled to be switched off-line and the user switches the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit, the interrupt printing by the printing unit is started. A storage medium. Storing a program for causing a computer to further execute a time measuring procedure for measuring an elapsed time from when the printing unit is switched and becomes offline.
In the control procedure , when the elapsed time is within a predetermined time and the user does not switch the printing unit from offline to online using the switching unit, the received interrupt printing is deleted and the printing in offline mode is performed. 6. The storage medium according to claim 5, wherein the means is switched online to resume printing of the document being printed. An accepting means for accepting interrupt printing of another document having a high priority while the document is being printed by the printing apparatus;
Control means for switching the online printing device to offline before the printing device starts interrupt printing in response to acceptance of interrupt printing by the accepting unit;
When the user switches the printing apparatus from offline to online using the switching means provided in the printing apparatus when the printing apparatus is controlled to be switched off-line, A control apparatus for a printing apparatus, which starts interrupt printing. Further comprising time measuring means for measuring an elapsed time from when the printing apparatus is controlled to be switched off-line,
The control means deletes the accepted interrupt printing and the offline printing when the user does not switch the printing apparatus from offline to online using the switching means within the predetermined time. 8. The control apparatus for a printing apparatus according to claim 7, wherein the apparatus is switched to online, and printing of the document being printed is resumed.

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