JP4860599B2 - Image processing device - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus that stores a read image.

  When the user obtains a document such as a document or material at an event or a meeting, the user uses the image processing apparatus to save the read document image as electronic data. The user receives a business card from the document provider together with the document. Information such as the name of the provider and the company name is written on the business card.

Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2004-228561 describes that a mail address is read by character recognition from an image of a business card placed on a platen, and the mail address is registered in an address book. An original image is transmitted by e-mail with the e-mail address acquired from the business card as the destination.
JP-A-11-27313

  The document image is saved as a file. In order for the user to confirm the content of the document image, the user needs to operate a personal computer or the like to open the file and display the image. The user cannot immediately know what kind of document image it is.

  By the way, information such as the name written on the business card is information relating to the manuscript as well as information for identifying the provider. However, the business card information is only used as address information as described above.

  Therefore, if information obtained from a business card is used to identify a document image, the contents of the document image can be estimated without opening a file. In view of the above, an object of the present invention is to provide an image processing apparatus that allows a user to easily check the contents of a document image by linking the document image and information acquired from a recording medium such as a business card related thereto. .

  The present invention includes a reading unit that reads an image of a document, a second reading unit that reads an image from a recording medium in which identification information related to the document is described, and a control unit for processing the document image. In this case, when the reading unit and the second reading unit are operated and the read document image file is stored, a file name is given based on the identification information obtained from the image on the recording medium. The control unit acquires identification information from the image on the recording medium by OCR processing.

  The file name includes identification information acquired from the recording medium. The identification information is information related to the manuscript, such as a company name and a name. By looking at the identification information in the file name, the user can guess what the file is without opening the file.

  The reading unit and the second reading unit simultaneously perform a reading operation. Therefore, when the reading of the document is completed, the file name is automatically assigned, and the user only has to confirm the file name.

  The control unit determines a file storage destination based on the identification information. The storage destination is a storage unit in the device or a storage unit outside the device. A storage destination is set in advance based on the identification information. The control unit selects a storage destination related to the identification information included in the named file name, and stores the file in the storage destination. Therefore, the related document image files are accumulated at the storage destination, making it easier to manage the files.

  The control unit includes information unique to the document image in the file name. If a file name is assigned based on identification information acquired from the same recording medium, a file with the same name may be created. By including unique information, part of the file name must be different and the files can be distinguished.

  The control unit searches for a stored document image file based on the identification information. The file name is searched using the identification information as a keyword, and a related file can be easily found.

  When the second reading unit reads images on a plurality of recording media, the control unit creates a plurality of document image files and assigns file names corresponding to the identification information of the recording media for each file. Multiple files with the same contents are created. Each file is stored in a storage location. This is useful for distributing one original image.

According to the present invention, a file name that can be used to guess the content of the read original image can be assigned and saved, so that the target file can be found only by looking at the list of file names. Further, by determining the storage destination based on the identification information, it is possible to accumulate related files, and it becomes easy to organize and manage the files. For example, by making a file for each company, it becomes easy to check the contents of the document image when necessary.

  An image communication system for transmitting an image through the communication line of this embodiment is shown in FIG. The image communication system includes an image processing device 1 and a terminal device. The terminal device is a personal computer 2, a server 3, a printer 4, or a facsimile device 5. The image processing apparatus 1 and the terminal device are connected to a network and can communicate with each other. The network includes a LAN, a WAN, and the Internet. The image processing apparatus 1 is also connected to a telephone line. Network and telephone lines are collectively referred to as communication lines. That is, the image processing apparatus 1 communicates with the terminal device through the communication line.

  The image processing apparatus 1 is a complex machine that performs processing such as copying, printing, scanning, facsimile communication, and document filing. The terminal device has a communication function similar to that of the image processing device 1. The image processing apparatus 1 and the terminal device can perform e-mail, Internet FAX, and data communication. In addition, the terminal device should just be provided with the communication function which can communicate through a network, and may be a mobile telephone and a portable information terminal.

  As shown in FIG. 2, the image processing apparatus 1 includes a main control unit 10, a control memory 11, a control buffer 12, an image storage unit 13, a format conversion unit 14, a reading unit 15, a printing unit 16, and a panel control unit 17. An encoding / decoding control unit 18, a LAN control unit 19, a modem 20, a network control unit 21, an identification symbol processing unit 22 for identifying separator paper, a second reading unit 23, and an OCR processing unit 24.

  The main control unit 10 has a CPU and controls the entire apparatus. The mailer and browser are operated to control transmission / reception of electronic mail and transmission / reception of contents such as images and characters, and process and store the input image. The control memory 11 includes a rewritable non-volatile memory or a battery-backed memory, and stores transmission information related to the control program and the terminal device. The control buffer 12 is composed of a RAM and is used for program data.

  The image storage unit 13 includes a hard disk device, stores encoded image data, and stores data read from the reading unit 15, data received from the terminal device, decoded data, and the like. The format conversion unit 14 converts the encoded image data into a predetermined file format such as TIFF, PDF, or JPEG.

  The reading unit 15 is a scanner using a CCD, and is provided in the upper part of the apparatus main body. The reading unit 15 scans a document, reads it as an image with a predetermined resolution, and outputs dot image data (image data). The printing unit 16 is an electrophotographic printer, and prints image data input by communication or scanning on paper.

  The panel control unit 17 drives and controls a display unit and an operation unit (not shown). The display unit is a liquid crystal display device (LCD), a CRT display, or the like, and displays an operation state of the entire device, a destination during communication, and the like on a screen. The operation unit is a keyboard, a mouse, or the like necessary for the user to operate. Here, the display unit and the operation unit are integrated into a touch panel, which is disposed on the upper surface of the apparatus main body. When the user inputs instructions such as document reading, destination setting, and storage destination setting via the operation unit, a screen corresponding to the input is displayed.

  The encoding / decoding control unit 18 encodes the image data of the read original or decodes the received image data. That is, the encoding / decoding control unit 18 encodes and compresses the image data, and also decodes the encoded and compressed image data to the original image data. The encoding / decoding control unit 18 encodes and decodes image data in accordance with encoding methods such as MH (Modified Huffman), MR (Modified READ), and MMR (Modified Modified READ), which are generally used in facsimile communication. Execute the conversion.

  The LAN control unit 19 includes a LAN interface, and the LAN interface is connected to the LAN. The LAN interface may be a wired or wireless network interface and may be capable of wireless communication. The LAN is connected to the Internet through a router. The LAN control unit 19 controls communication according to a predetermined communication protocol such as TCP / IP. The main control unit 10 transmits / receives an electronic mail to / from a terminal device through the LAN control unit 19, transmits / receives an image by Internet FAX, and transmits / receives an image by HTTP or FTP.

  The modem 20 performs facsimile communication through a telephone line. The modem 20 is connected to a network control unit (NCU: Network Control Unit) 21. The NCU 21 is connected to a telephone line and controls the line. That is, the NCU 21 is hardware that performs an operation of closing or opening a line with respect to an analog public telephone line network (PSTN), and connects the modem 20 to the public telephone line network as necessary.

  In the Internet FAX, the LAN control unit 19 transmits and receives electronic mail via a network. More specifically, the main control unit 10 creates a compressed file by compressing image data read by the reading unit 15, for example, bitmap data in a compression format such as MH. Compression is performed on a page-by-page basis. Next, the format conversion unit 14 converts these compressed files into a single TIFF (Tag Image File Format) file, and attaches the TIFF file to the multipart mail according to, for example, MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension).

  By this processing, the image data is converted into a format that can be handled by electronic mail. The LAN control unit 19 transmits the electronic mail created in this way using a mail transfer protocol such as SMTP via the LAN interface.

  The image processing apparatus 1 transmits an image to a terminal device designated by the user or receives an image from the terminal device by Internet FAX. Therefore, a color image or an image with a large amount of data can be transmitted / received.

  In the image processing apparatus 1, a second reading unit 23 is provided in addition to the reading unit 15. The second reading unit 23 reads an image on a recording medium such as a business card, a postcard, or a card. As shown in FIG. 3, identification information is described on a business card which is a recording medium. The identification information is a company name and a name. Further, the identification information includes a telephone number, a FAX number, a mail address, an address, a domain name, and an IP address.

  The second reading unit 23 is a scanner using a CIS (Contact Image Sensor). The second reading unit 23 includes a paper feed tray (not shown). The paper feed tray can accommodate a plurality of recording media, and the recording media can be sent out one by one. Therefore, the second reading unit 23 can continuously read a plurality of recording media.

  The second reading unit 23 is provided in the upper part of the apparatus main body, and is arranged side by side in the vicinity of the reading unit 15. The user can use both reading units 15 and 23 at the same time, and the main control unit 10 operates the reading unit 15 and the second reading unit 23 simultaneously when transmitting a document image or storing a document image. Process the document image.

  The user obtains a manuscript such as a document or material from a provider. At this time, the business card of the provider is also received. The business card includes identification information such as a company name and a name related to the provider. That is, since the provider is a person related to the manuscript, the identification information of the business card is information related to the manuscript.

  When saving the read original image, a file is created and given a file name. By naming the file names using the identification information, if the file names are listed, the contents of the document image can be estimated, which is useful when checking the document image.

  Therefore, the main control unit 10 operates the reading unit 15 and the second reading unit 23 so as to read a recording medium such as a business card when reading a document. The OCR processing unit 24 identifies characters in the image read from the recording medium by the OCR processing. The main control unit 10 extracts characters related to the identification information from the identified characters, and determines a company name, a name, and the like. Thus, the identification information obtained from the recording medium is stored in the control memory 11. For example, the destination is registered in the address book as destination information. The company name, name, address, etc. are registered as business card information in association with the address book.

  The main control unit 10 assigns a file name to the read document image file, and executes a save process for saving the file in the designated save destination. The storage destination is the image storage unit 13 in the apparatus or the storage unit of the terminal device, and a shared folder for storing files is provided in the storage unit. When saving in the terminal device, the main control unit 10 transmits the file data to any of the personal computer 2, the server 3, and another image processing device 1 connected to the network. The received terminal device saves the file in the shared folder of the storage unit.

  Another storage destination is an individual folder. The individual folder is provided in the image storage unit 13 in the apparatus or in the storage unit of the designated terminal device. The individual folder is provided so that files including common identification information such as a folder for each company name or a folder for each name form a group. The name of the individual folder is named based on the identification information, and the folder name includes identification information such as a company name and a name. By using such an individual folder, the user can easily manage the document image.

  The storage destination is either a shared folder or an individual folder, and which folder is set in advance as a storage mode. The main control unit 10 determines a storage destination according to the storage mode.

  When assigning a file name, the main control unit 10 includes a part of the identification information in the file name. For example, the company name or name obtained from the identification information is entered, or the company name and name are entered. In addition, information unique to the document image is included in the file name. The unique information is the date and time when saving. Alternatively, it may be a date and time at the time of reading, or a character string extracted from a document image. As a result, there is a possibility that the same file name is obtained only by the identification information, but the file can be distinguished by including unique information. In addition, when a file can be distinguished only by identification information, it is not always necessary to include unique information in the file name.

  Next, the operation of the image processing apparatus 1 when executing the storage process will be described with reference to FIG. When the user wants to send a document, the document is set on a document table or an automatic document feeder (S1). Next, the user sets a business card as a recording medium related to the document in the second reading unit 23 (S2).

  Here, when the user wants to change the save destination, the main control unit 10 changes the save mode. That is, when the user performs a mode change operation from the operation unit (S3), the main control unit 10 changes the storage mode (S4) and registers the changed storage mode in the control memory 11.

  When the user instructs the start of the reading operation by pressing the start key or the like (S5), the main control unit 10 operates the reading unit 15 and the second reading unit 23. Reading of the image of the document and reading of the business card are started simultaneously (S6). The main control unit 10 temporarily stores the document image read by the reading unit 15 in the control buffer 12.

  In the second reading unit 23, identification information such as a company name and a name written on the surface of the business card is read as an image. Image data input from the second reading unit 23 is sent to the OCR processing unit 24. The OCR processing unit 24 extracts a character string included in the image of identification information (S7). When a plurality of business cards are set, the second reading unit 23 reads all business cards one by one.

  The main control unit 10 recognizes the identification information based on the extracted character string, and determines the company name, name, address, telephone number, FAX number, and mail address. The main control unit 10 displays the identification information obtained from the business cards as a list on the display unit (S8).

  The user confirms the displayed information (S9). When identification information is acquired from a plurality of business cards, the identification information is displayed for each business card. If the identification information is incorrect due to a reading error, the user directly inputs the information from the operation unit to correct the identification information (S10).

  When the user confirms that the identification information is correct, the main control unit 10 stores the identification information in the destination information and business card information of the control memory 11 based on the user's instruction.

  Then, the main control unit 10 creates a file of electronic data of the read document image, assigns a file name, and saves it in a predetermined folder (S11). That is, the main control unit 10 selects one piece of identification information from among a plurality of pieces of identification information of the business card read at the same time as the document, determines the date and time when the file is created, and combines the identification information and the date and time. Determine the file name. For example, as shown in FIG. 5, a company name is selected as the identification information, and the file name is a name that combines the company name and the date of creation.

  The selection of identification information is set in advance. At this time, by determining the selection order of the plurality of identification information, if there is no first identification information, the second identification information is selected. As a result, a file name related to the original can always be assigned.

  The main control unit 10 performs document image data conversion such as PDF conversion as necessary, creates a document image file under the determined file name, and places this file in a predetermined folder according to the save mode. save.

  When saving the file, the main control unit 10 displays a confirmation screen displaying the file name and the folder name of the save destination. After confirmation by the user, the main control unit 10 saves the file. On this confirmation screen, the user can change the file name or the storage destination.

  When reading a plurality of business cards, the main control unit 10 creates the same number of files as the number of business cards. The original image stored in each file has the same contents. At this time, the main control unit 10 assigns different file names to the identification information obtained from the business cards.

  At this time, the same identification information may be included in the file name, such as the same company name. Since the file creation time is different, a different file name can be given by including the date and time in the file name. In addition, by determining the storage destination based on the identification information, a file having the same content can be distributed to a plurality of terminal devices.

  When the save mode is set to the individual folder, the main control unit 10 determines the save destination individual folder based on the obtained identification information. For example, as shown in FIG. 5, an individual folder named with the same company name as the obtained company name is automatically selected. Then, the main control unit outputs the file to the selected individual folder. When the individual folder is in the terminal device, the main control unit 10 transmits the file to the terminal device by data transmission. The terminal device stores the received file in the designated individual folder.

  Thus, the file name of the document image is automatically assigned based on the identification information acquired from the recording medium related to the document. When the user wants to check the contents of the file, the user can guess what the contents are by looking at the file name. Therefore, the user does not need to perform an operation of opening the file, and can quickly find necessary information.

  Further, by determining the storage destination based on the identification information, related files can be accumulated. Therefore, the user can easily organize and manage files.

  When the user reads a document image file, the user can search for the file based on the identification information. That is, the user inputs identification information related to a required file as a keyword in the terminal device or the image processing device 1. The terminal device or the image processing device 1 issues a search instruction to another terminal device connected to the network and the other image processing device 1.

  In the terminal device and the image processing device 1, the input keyword is compared with the file name of the file in which the keyword is stored to search for the corresponding file. The search result is transmitted to the user terminal device or the image processing device 1, and the result is displayed. Therefore, related files can be searched easily and without omission, and the search process can be performed efficiently.

  In addition, this invention is not limited to the said embodiment, Of course, many corrections and changes can be added to the said embodiment within the scope of the present invention. The recording medium may be a document on which identification information is described. The second reading unit reads an image of the document, and the main control unit acquires identification information from the image of the document.

  The identification information described on the recording medium may be a code image such as a barcode or a two-dimensional code. The main control unit analyzes the read code image and acquires identification information.

Configuration diagram of image communication system of the present invention Block diagram showing schematic configuration of image processing apparatus Diagram showing business card with identification information Flowchart when executing document image saving processing The figure which shows the individual folder which stores the file of the manuscript image

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Image processing apparatus 10 Main control part 11 Control memory 13 Image storage part 15 Reading part 19 LAN control part 23 2nd reading part 24 OCR process part

Claims (8)

A reading unit that reads an image of a document, a second reading unit that reads an image from a recording medium in which identification information related to the document is described, and a control unit that operates the reading unit and the second reading unit to process the document image When the second reading unit reads images on a plurality of recording media, the control unit creates the same number of document image files as the read recording media, and responds to the identification information of each recording medium for each file. An image processing apparatus that stores a file in a storage destination according to identification information of each recording medium . The storage location, the image processing apparatus according to claim 1, characterized in that it is a storage unit or the apparatus outside of the storage unit in the apparatus. Control unit, an image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the inclusion of specific information in the file name to the original image. The file name image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the modifiable from the control unit. Control unit, based on the identification information, the image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 4, characterized in that to search for files of the original image are stored. Control unit, an image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 5, characterized in that to obtain the identification information from the image of the recording medium by the OCR process. Reading section and the second reading unit, the image processing apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 6, characterized in that the reading operation at the same time. A reading unit that reads an image from a recording medium in which identification information related to the document is described; and a control unit that processes the read image, and controls when the reading unit reads images on a plurality of recording media. The unit creates the same number of document image files as the read recording medium when saving the document image file, assigns a file name to each file based on the identification information of each recording medium, and responds to the identification information. An image processing apparatus that stores a file in a storage destination.

Images