JP7230374B2 - Information processing device and program - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to an information processing device and program.

Patent Document 1 discloses an information processing apparatus that satisfies user requirements such as the end time of an application, calculates resources, and arranges virtual servers and applications so as to minimize operating costs. disclosed.

In Patent Document 2, a virtual machine is activated in a system according to the status of a virtual machine that has been instructed to activate in the past and is in the process of being activated, and the result of monitoring the load of the system to be managed. Disclosed is an information processing apparatus configured to issue an instruction to stop a virtual machine that is in the process of instruction and start-up processing.

JP 2014-115905 A JP 2015-194958 A

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide a method in which, when there are a plurality of processing means having different processing speeds, a user's operation after processing by the processing means can be performed as compared with the case where a processing request from the user is assigned to the plurality of processing means in order of acceptance. To provide an information processing device and a program capable of shortening the waiting time for processing requiring

[Information processing device]
The present invention according to claim 1 provides a receiving means for receiving a processing request from a client device,
The processing request received by the receiving means is processed by a first processing means capable of processing the processing request or a second processing means capable of processing the processing request at a processing speed higher than that of the first processing means. a switching means for switching to be processed by any one of
sending means for sending a result of processing by the second processing means to the client device;
If an operation by the user is required after the processing request received by the receiving means is processed, the switching means is controlled so that the processing request is processed by the second processing means , and the processing request received by the receiving means is controlled. By controlling the switching means so that the processing request is processed by the first processing means when no user operation is required after the processing request is processed, the processing result of the processing request can be processed by a certain service. and a switching control means for controlling transfer to a service providing device that provides a service .

According to a second aspect of the present invention, the activation number control means controls the number of virtual machines activated in the first processing means and the second processing means according to the amount of processing requests waiting for execution. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1 , further comprising:

According to the third aspect of the present invention, the client device is an image forming device,
the transmission means transmits the image data processed by the second processing means to the image forming apparatus;
When a user operates the image forming apparatus on the image data transmitted by the transmission means, the switching control means changes the image data after the user's operation into the first image data. 2. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein said image data is transferred to said service providing apparatus by controlling said switching means so as to be processed by said processing means.

[program]
The present invention according to claim 4 is a receiving step for receiving a processing request from a client device;
The processing request received in the receiving step is processed by a first processing means capable of processing the processing request or a second processing means capable of processing the processing request at a processing speed higher than that of the first processing means. When switching to be processed by any one of them, if an operation by the user is required after processing the processing request received in the receiving step, the processing request is processed by the second processing means. and if no user operation is required after processing the processing request received in the receiving step, the processing request is processed by the first processing means, thereby obtaining the processing result of the processing request. is transferred to a service providing device that provides a specific service ;
and a sending step of sending a result of processing by the second processing means to the client device .

According to the first aspect of the present invention, when there are a plurality of processing means having different processing speeds, processing by the processing means can be compared with the case where a processing request from a user is assigned to the plurality of processing means in order of acceptance. It is possible to provide an information processing apparatus capable of shortening the waiting time for processing that requires subsequent operation by the user.
Further, according to the present invention of claim 1, when there are a plurality of processing means having different processing speeds, compared to the case where the processing requests received from the client device are allocated to the plurality of processing means in order of reception, the client It is possible to provide an information processing device capable of shortening the time until the processing result of processing a processing request received from the device is transmitted to the client device.
Further, according to the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided an information processing apparatus capable of processing a processing request for only transmitting a processing result to a service providing apparatus by the first processing means. be able to.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, information processing capable of controlling the number of virtual machines activated in the first processing means and the second processing means to a number necessary for processing a processing request. Equipment can be provided.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, image data that requires a user's operation after processing is processed by the second processing means, and the processed image data is simply transmitted to the service providing device. can be provided with an information processing apparatus capable of being processed by the first processing means.

According to the fourth aspect of the present invention, when there are a plurality of processing means having different processing speeds, processing by the processing means is significantly reduced compared to the case where a processing request from a user is assigned to the plurality of processing means in the order of acceptance. It is possible to provide a program capable of shortening the waiting time for processing that requires subsequent operation by the user.
Further, according to the fourth aspect of the present invention, when a plurality of processing means having different processing speeds exist, compared to the case of allocating processing requests received from a client device to the plurality of processing means in order of reception, It is possible to provide a program capable of shortening the time until the processing result of processing the processing request received from the device is transmitted to the client device.
Furthermore, according to the fourth aspect of the present invention, it is possible to provide a program capable of processing a processing request for only transmitting a processing result to a service providing device by the first processing means. can.

It is a figure showing the system configuration of the information processing system of one embodiment of the present invention. 1 is a block diagram showing the hardware configuration of a service providing device 10 according to one embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the functional configuration of a service providing device 10 according to one embodiment of the present invention; FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of a task definition table stored in a task definition table storage unit 34; FIG. 4 is a flowchart for explaining the flow of processing in the service providing apparatus 10; FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining how processing requests defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) and expense settlement 2 (no preview required) are processed; FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining a specific processing example when a processing request defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) is processed by the service providing apparatus 10; FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining a specific processing example when a processing request defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) is processed by the service providing apparatus 10; FIG. 10 is a diagram for explaining a specific processing example when a processing request defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) is processed by the service providing apparatus 10;

Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the system configuration of an information processing system according to one embodiment of the present invention.

As shown in FIG. 1, an information processing system according to an embodiment of the present invention includes a service providing device 10, an image forming device 20, a receipt storage server 61, a business card management server 62, and a data storage server 63. They are interconnected by a network 30 such as the Internet.

The image forming apparatus 20 is a so-called multifunction device having multiple functions such as a print function, a scan function, a copy function, and a facsimile function.

The service providing apparatus 10 performs various services such as OCR (Optical Character Reading) processing, translation processing, and storage processing on various image data such as document images read by the image forming apparatus 20. offers. The service providing device 10 cooperates with various server devices such as a receipt storage server 61, a business card management server 62, and a data storage server 63 operated by other companies to provide various services. there is

For example, the image forming apparatus 20 may transfer image data such as receipts read by the image forming apparatus 20 to the service providing apparatus 10, and after performing various processes on the image data, transfer the image data to the receipt saving server 61 for storage. Expense reimbursement service is realized by

Further, for example, by transferring image data obtained by reading a business card in the image forming apparatus 20 to the service providing apparatus 10, the image data is subjected to various processing, and then transferred to the business card management server 62 for storage. is realized.

FIG. 2 shows the hardware configuration of such a service providing apparatus 10. As shown in FIG.

As shown in FIG. 2, the service providing device 10 transmits and receives data to and from an external device or the like via a CPU 11, a memory 12, a storage device 13 such as a hard disk drive (HDD), and a network 30. It has a communication interface (IF) 14, a user interface (UI) device 15 including a touch panel or liquid crystal display and a keyboard. These components are connected to each other via a control bus 16 .

The CPU 11 executes predetermined processing based on control programs stored in the memory 12 or the storage device 13 to control the operation of the service providing device 10 . In this embodiment, the CPU 11 reads and executes a control program stored in the memory 12 or the storage device 13. It is also possible to provide

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the functional configuration of the service providing apparatus 10 realized by executing the above control program.

As shown in FIG. 3, the service providing apparatus 10 in this embodiment includes a processing request receiving unit 31, a switching unit 32, a switching control unit 33, a task definition table storage unit 34, an autoscale control unit 35, 37 , a high-spec storage unit 36 , a low-spec storage unit 38 , processing execution units 39 and 40 , a processing result storage unit 41 , and a processing result transmission unit 42 .

Here, the processing execution units 39 and 40 are processing means capable of processing processing requests transmitted from the image forming apparatus 20 . The processing execution unit 39 has a high-spec function with a high processing speed, and is configured to be capable of starting a plurality of virtual machines 51 for document processing and a plurality of virtual machines 52 for external connection. In addition, the processing execution unit 40 has a low-spec function with a slower processing speed than the processing execution unit 39, and can start a plurality of virtual machines 53 for document processing and virtual machines 54 for external connection. configuration.

Here, a virtual machine means an execution environment created virtually (pseudo) within one physical computer. By using such virtual machines, it is possible to configure a plurality of virtual machines in a physical machine such as a server or device configured by one computer and perform parallel processing on each virtual machine. becomes. Note that this virtual machine may also be called an instance.

The process of controlling the number of activated virtual machines according to the amount of processing to be executed is called auto-scaling. By performing this auto-scaling, when the amount of processing to be executed is large compared to the number of virtual machines started, control (scale out) is performed so that the number of virtual machines started increases. When the amount of processing to be executed is smaller than the number of virtual machines started, control (scale-in) is performed to reduce the number of virtual machines started.

Both the virtual machine 51 and the virtual machine 52 are high-spec virtual machines with fast processing speeds. In other words, if the processing request is processed by the virtual machine 51 or the virtual machine 52, the processing time will be shortened.

The virtual machine 51 is a virtual machine for document processing, and performs various types of processing on document data, such as rectangle extraction processing for extracting a rectangular image included in one image, erection processing for correcting the vertical direction of a document image, and the like. to run. The virtual machine 52 is a virtual machine for external connection, and executes various processes for transferring processed image data to various servers such as the receipt storage server 61, the business card management server 62, and the data storage server 63. do.

The auto-scaling control unit 35 uses information such as the amount of processing requests waiting for execution accumulated as a queue in the high-spec accumulation unit 36, accumulation time, etc., to start the virtual machine 51 in the processing execution unit 39. , 52, respectively.

Both the virtual machine 53 and the virtual machine 54 are low-spec virtual machines with slow processing speeds. That is, when the processing request is processed by the virtual machine 53 or the virtual machine 54, the processing time is longer than when the processing request is processed by the virtual machines 51 and 52. FIG.

However, if the service providing apparatus 10 of the present embodiment is implemented on a cloud service that charges according to the amount of resources used, the charge incurred by starting a high-spec virtual machine will be high. Conversely, the charge for starting a low-spec virtual machine with slow processing speed is lower than the charge for starting a high-spec virtual machine.

The auto-scaling control unit 37 uses information such as the amount of processing requests accumulated as a queue in the low-spec accumulation unit 38 and the accumulation time to determine the number of virtual machines 53 and 54 started in the processing execution unit 40. controlled by each.

In this manner, the autoscale control units 35 and 37 function as activation number control means for controlling the number of virtual machines activated in the process execution units 39 and 40 according to the amount of processing requests waiting for execution. ing.

The processing request receiving unit 31 receives a processing request (processing request) from the image forming apparatus 20, which is a client device.

The switching unit 32 converts the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31 into a processing execution unit 40 capable of processing the processing request or a processing execution unit capable of processing the processing request at a higher processing speed than the processing execution unit 40. 39 to be processed.

Specifically, the switching unit 32 stores the processing requests received by the processing request receiving unit 31 in the high-spec storage unit 36 or the low-spec storage unit 38 as queues.

When a user's operation is required after the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31 is processed, the switching control unit 33 causes the processing request to be processed by the processing execution unit 39 capable of executing processing at high speed. The switching unit 32 is controlled so that For example, after processing image data based on a processing request received from the image forming apparatus 20, a thumbnail image or the like of the processing result is once transmitted to the image forming apparatus 20, and after confirmation by the user, the next processing is continued. In such a case, the switching control unit 33 controls the switching unit 32 so that the processing request is processed by the processing execution unit 39 .

Further, when the user's operation is not required after processing the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31, the switching control unit 33 transmits the processing request to the processing executing unit 40, which has a slower processing speed than the processing executing unit 39. The switching unit 32 is controlled so as to be processed by

That is, the switching control unit 33 stores processing requests that require user operation after processing in the high-spec storage unit 36, and stores processing requests that do not require user operation after processing in the low-spec storage unit 38. The switching unit 32 is controlled to accumulate.

Then, the switching control unit 33 refers to the task definition table stored in the task definition table storage unit 34 to determine whether or not a user operation is required after processing the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31. are doing.

The task definition table storage unit 34 stores a task definition table that indicates the flow of processing that is sequentially executed when processing the processing request for each type of processing request (task). .

An example of the task definition table stored in this task definition table storage unit 34 is shown in FIG.

For example, in the example of the task definition table shown in FIG. 4, it is defined that the processing of rectangle extraction, preview display, and upload is sequentially performed for the task with the definition name "business card management". In other words, for a processing request defined as "business card management", (1) rectangle extraction is performed on the scanned image data to acquire business card data, and (2) the acquired business card data is previewed for the user. (3) transfer (upload) of the business card data to the business card management server 62 after confirmation by the user is executed.

Similarly, in the example of the task definition table shown in FIG. 4, for the task with the definition name "expense settlement 1 (preview required)", it is defined that the processes of rectangle extraction, preview display, and upload are sequentially performed. ing. In addition, for the task with the definition name "expense settlement 2 (preview not required)", it is defined that the processing of rectangle extraction and uploading will be performed in sequence.

It should be noted that when the user scans an image such as a receipt in the image forming apparatus 20 to settle expenses, the user is asked in advance whether or not to check the thumbnail image of the receipt image to be stored in the receipt storage server 61 . can be selected. Therefore, if the user chooses to check the thumbnail image of the receipt image, the processing request is defined as "expense reimbursement 1 (preview required)" and the user chooses not to check the thumbnail image of the receipt image. If so, the processing request will be defined as "expense reimbursement 2 (no preview required)".

The high-spec storage unit 36 stores, as a queue, processing requests to be processed by the high-spec virtual machines 51 and 52 by the switching unit 32 . Similarly, the low-spec storage unit 38 stores processing requests to be processed by the low-spec virtual machines 53 and 54 by the switching unit 32 as queues.

The processing result storage unit 41 stores the processing results after the processing is performed by the processing execution units 39 and 40 .

The processing result transmission unit 42 transmits the processing result stored in the processing result storage unit 41 to the image forming apparatus 20 or various servers such as the receipt storage server 61, the business card management server 62, and the data storage server 63. The processing result transmission unit 42 transmits the processing result of the processing execution unit 39 that requires user operation in the image forming apparatus 20 to the image forming apparatus 20, which is a client apparatus.

Then, when the user's operation is not required after processing the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31, the switching control unit 33 controls the switching unit 32 so that the processing request is processed by the processing execution unit 40. , the processing result of the processing request is controlled to be transferred to a service providing device that provides a specific service among the receipt storage server 61, business card management server 62, data storage server 63, and the like.

Next, the operation of the service providing device 10 in the information processing system of this embodiment will be described in detail.

First, the flow of processing in the service providing apparatus 10 will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.

In the service providing device 10, when the processing request receiving unit 31 receives a processing request from the image forming device 20, which is a client device (step S101), the switching control unit 33 stores the processing details of the received processing request in the task definition table. It is acquired from the task definition table stored in the unit 34 (step S102).

Then, the switching control unit 33 determines whether or not there is a process requiring user operation after this process (step S103).

For example, if the definition name of the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31 is "expense settlement 1" and the next processing to be executed is the rectangle extraction processing, after this processing the user will be prompted to select "preview display". Since there is a process that requires an operation, the switching control unit 33 determines that there is a process that requires a user operation after this process (yes in step S103).

Further, when the definition name of the processing request received by the processing request receiving unit 31 is "expense settlement 2" and the processing to be executed next is the rectangle extraction processing, the subsequent processing is the "upload" processing, After this process, there is no process requiring user operation. Therefore, the switching control unit 33 determines that there is no process requiring user operation after this process (no in step S103).

Then, in step S103, if it is determined that there is a process requiring user operation after this process, the switching control unit 33 changes the received process request so that the high-spec virtual machine processes the process request. The switching unit 32 is controlled so that the data is stored in the storage unit 36 for high specifications. As a result, the processing request is processed by the high-spec virtual machine 51 in the processing execution unit 39 (step S104).

After that, the processing result is stored in the processing result storage unit 41, and if it is set to return the processing to the image forming apparatus 20 which is the client terminal (yes in step S105), the processing result is sent to the processing result transmission unit. 42 to the image forming apparatus 20 (step S106). It should be noted that, if the process to be executed is still set (no in step S105), the process execution unit 39 may further execute the process.

Then, in step S103, if it is determined that there is no processing requiring user operation after this processing, the switching control unit 33 changes the processing request so that the received processing request is processed by a low-spec virtual machine. The switching unit 32 is controlled so that the data is stored in the storage unit 38 for low specifications. As a result, the processing request is processed by the low-spec virtual machine 53 or virtual machine 54 in the processing execution unit 40 (step S108).

With reference to FIG. 6, how the processing requests defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) and expense settlement 2 (no preview required) are processed by the above control will be described.

For the processing request defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required), there is a processing called preview display processing that requires user operation after the initial rectangle extraction processing. Therefore, the rectangle extraction process, which is the process prior to the process requiring user operation, is executed by a high-spec virtual machine. However, upload processing, which is processing after processing requiring user operation, is executed by a low-spec virtual machine.

On the other hand, for the processing request defined as expense settlement 2 (preview not required), only upload processing is performed after the first rectangle extraction processing, and there is no processing that requires user operation. Therefore, in this case, both the rectangle extraction process and the upload process are executed by a low-spec virtual machine.

Normally, when a receipt or the like is scanned for expense reimbursement, the scanned image is transmitted to the service providing apparatus 10, and a preview of the processing result after the processing is performed in the service providing apparatus 10 is displayed, the user , waiting in front of the image forming apparatus 20 until the preview display is performed.

For this reason, even if the charge is slightly high, a high-spec virtual machine can be activated to perform processing that requires user operation, such as preview display processing. will be shortened.

However, for the processing request for expense settlement 2 (preview not required), for which the user does not need to wait for the preview display, even if the processing time is increased by executing the processing, including the rectangle extraction processing, by a low-spec virtual machine. For the user, there is no impact such as increased waiting time. In addition, the charge generated by executing processing by a low-spec virtual machine is reduced.

Next, a specific processing example when the processing request defined as expense settlement 1 (preview required) described above is processed by the service providing apparatus 10 will be described with reference to FIGS. 7 to 9. FIG.

For example, as shown in FIG. 7, a case will be described in which four receipts are placed on the platen glass of the image forming apparatus 20 and scanned. The image forming apparatus 20 is provided with an operation panel 51 configured by a touch panel, and a receipt image transmitted to the receipt saving server 61 is preview-displayed on the operation panel 51 .

An example of a scanned image obtained by the method shown in FIG. 7 is shown in FIG. 8(A). The scanned image shown in FIG. 8 is transmitted from the image forming apparatus 20 to the service providing apparatus 10, and various processing such as rectangle extraction, separation, and erection processing are executed by the high-spec virtual machine 51. Four receipt images are obtained as shown in B).

These four receipt image data are transmitted from the service providing apparatus 10 to the image forming apparatus 20 and displayed on the operation panel 51 of the image forming apparatus 20 .

The user confirms the content of the receipt image displayed on the operation panel 51, and if there is no problem, operates the OK button to permit transmission to the receipt storage server 61 in sequence.

[Variation]
In the above embodiment, the image forming apparatus 20 is the client apparatus that transmits the processing request to the service providing apparatus 10. However, the present invention is not limited to such a case. , a mobile phone terminal, a tablet terminal, etc., can be similarly applied.

10 service providing device 11 CPU
12 memory 13 storage device 14 communication interface (IF)
15 User Interface (UI) Device 16 Control Bus 20 Image Forming Device 30 Network 31 Processing Request Receiving Unit 32 Switching Unit 33 Switching Control Unit 34 Task Definition Table Storage Unit 35, 37 Autoscale Control Unit 36 Storage Unit for High Spec 38 Low Spec Application Storage Unit 39, 40 Processing Execution Unit 41 Processing Result Storage Unit 42 Processing Result Transmission Unit 51 Operation Panel 61 Receipt Storage Server 62 Business Card Management Server 63 Data Storage Server

Claims (4)

receiving means for receiving a processing request from a client device;
The processing request received by the receiving means is processed by a first processing means capable of processing the processing request or a second processing means capable of processing the processing request at a processing speed higher than that of the first processing means. a switching means for switching to be processed by any one of
sending means for sending a result of processing by the second processing means to the client device;
If an operation by the user is required after the processing request received by the receiving means is processed, the switching means is controlled so that the processing request is processed by the second processing means , and the processing request received by the receiving means is controlled. By controlling the switching means so that the processing request is processed by the first processing means when no user operation is required after the processing request is processed, the processing result of the processing request can be processed by a certain service. a switching control means for controlling transfer to a service providing device that provides
Information processing device with 2. The information according to claim 1, further comprising activation number control means for controlling the number of virtual machines activated in said first processing means and said second processing means according to the amount of processing requests waiting for execution. processing equipment. The client device is an image forming device,
the transmission means transmits the image data processed by the second processing means to the image forming apparatus;
When a user operates the image forming apparatus on the image data transmitted by the transmission means, the switching control means changes the image data after the user's operation into the first image data. 2. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1 , wherein said image data is transferred to said service providing apparatus by controlling said switching means so as to be processed by said processing means. a receiving step of receiving a processing request from a client device;
The processing request received in the receiving step is processed by a first processing means capable of processing the processing request or a second processing means capable of processing the processing request at a processing speed higher than that of the first processing means. When switching to be processed by any one of them, if an operation by the user is required after processing the processing request received in the receiving step, the processing request is processed by the second processing means. and if no user operation is required after processing the processing request received in the receiving step, the processing request is processed by the first processing means, thereby obtaining the processing result of the processing request. is transferred to a service providing device that provides a specific service ;
a sending step of sending a result of processing by the second processing means to the client device;
A program that causes a computer to run

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