JPH01308671A - Document printer system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the productivity of development and maintenance of a program and to obtain a document printer system which can accurately print in a document by merely data-editing by a program for printing in the document and defining a document printing layout independently from the program. CONSTITUTION:Stationary records 41, 42 are composed of four fields of a client, a salesman, a slip number and a remark, and a stationary record 44 is composed of one field of a total. The detailed lines of a relative record 43 is defined as fields of five times of repetitions, and composed of 7 relative fields of date, order number, classification, etc. In a printing layout, the fields of areas of the records 41, 42, 43, 44 are defined by information concerning a format such as a character pitch, a character size, etc. in addition to the informations converting the layout such as position of rows and columns, character type, the number of columns. An actual image can be obtained by executing a program for coating format commands for the records 41 to 44 in the layout.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Object of the Invention] (Industrial Application Field) The present invention relates to a form processing technique in a computer for office processing, and particularly to a form printing system equipped with a print layout function.

(Prior Art) In the past, form design was based on an image of a printout sheet, which was quite different from the actual image. A programmer who edits data to be printed on a form and creates a program for printing on the form looks at the printout sheet and performs coding while taking line control and shift into consideration. Additionally, since printing is done line by line, starting from the top of the printed form, the coding process was done keeping in mind the timing of line printing, which is unrelated to the coding for data editing. .

(Problems to be Solved by the Invention) As described above, conventional devices have the following problems.

■Since the design was based on a spreadsheet, which was quite different from the actual image, the resulting forms were sometimes quite different from the actual ones.

- Since line-by-line processing is performed, only the printing functions of conventional line printers are used, and the advanced printing functions of kanji printers and page printers cannot be used. In addition, the programmer had to code while being aware of the timing of line printing, making program development complicated.

■Even a slight change in the format of a form (position or data attributes) would require a change in the program, requiring an enormous amount of work for the programmer.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances.A program for printing on forms simply edits data, and a form printing layout is defined independently of this program. development·
The purpose of the present invention is to provide a form printing system equipped with a print layout function that improves maintenance productivity and enables advanced form processing and printing.

[Structure of the Invention] (Means and Effects for Solving the Problems) The present invention provides a form printing system that prints a form including a plurality of types of print items. a print layout defining means for defining data types to be printed; a form data editing means for editing data corresponding to the plurality of types of items; and a form data editing means for editing the data edited by the form data editing means. According to the definition, the form data editing means simply edits the data, and the print layout defining means independently edits the form for each item. The configuration defines the print position above and the data type to be printed in the print item.This makes it easy to develop programs for printing on forms, and also provides flexibility when changing form formats. The productivity of program development and maintenance can be improved.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the form printing system of the present invention. In the figure, 1 is a control unit that controls the entire system. 2 stores text that defines the print format and print layout such as the paper size of the form.
This is a layout definition holding unit. Reference numeral 3 denotes a first program holding unit that stores a program for editing data to be printed on a form and printing it on a form. Reference numeral 4 denotes a layout definition processing section that manually inputs the print layout defined from the second layout definition holding section 2, checks for contradictions and errors, and processes the print layout so that it can be easily read in the next stage. 5 is a second layout definition holding unit that holds data processed by the layout definition processing unit 4; Reference numeral 6 denotes a program processing unit that reads information from the program holding unit 3 and the second layout definition holding unit 5, associates the layout with data in the program, and interprets instructions for controlling and processing data.

A second program holding section 7 holds instructions processed by the program processing section 6. The control unit 1 reads information regarding the layout of the form from the second layout definition holding unit 5, processes it, and creates layout control information. 8 is a layout control area that temporarily holds this layout control information.

9 is a print file that prints the form (file for spooling, serial printer, page printer, etc.)
It is. The control unit 1 reads a program from the second program holding unit 7, interprets instructions of the program, and performs control to print data in the program to a print file 9 in accordance with layout control information.

The information held by the layout control area 8 is roughly divided into four types of information. These are a header section, a link table section, a layout attribute section, and a data pool section. The header section stores pointers to other information sections and common information. The link table section stores link information based on the physical positions of fields that are required when actually outputting the -purchasing data to the print file 9. The data pool section stores the data that is actually accumulated.

The layout attribute section stores hierarchical layout information as shown in FIG. 2, and there are entries as many as the number pointed to from the header section.

The layout area has a common layout and a sublayout, and when there is only one form to output, you only need the common layout, but by using the sublayout,
You can print common layouts and sublayouts overlapping each other. There are multiple fixed areas and relative areas for the layout area. Furthermore, there are alternative areas for changing the fixed area and relative area. A fixed area is a collection of print records that are output only to a specific location within a print page. This is used when printing headings and footings of a form. It is also possible to define all consistent areas as fixed print areas, such as screen formats. The relative area is an area for continuous printing of records. Specify the start and end positions of the print area, start from the start line position, and automatically update the line position based on the line feed information contained in the record. This relative area can be defined as a divided area in which the divided area can be treated as one continuous area. This makes it easy to perform double-stitch printing. It is also possible to automatically change the page when there is no more space in the area, or to control the page change yourself. A record is a collection of fields and a logical unit of output. Records are divided into fixed records and )b-to-code. A fixed record is a record that is output to a fixed area. If a fixed record has a continuous print specification, once an output command is issued for that record, records with the same content will be automatically printed on subsequent pages without executing the output command. . Relative records are records that are output to a relative area and are output while performing line control. Therefore, relative records are typically printed multiple times within a print area. A field is the smallest unit that can be handled by a program, and various attributes can be defined. This attribute has nothing to do with the program and its definition can be changed. In the program, only the character type and length of the data are relevant. When the hierarchical structure of the layout shown in FIG. 2 is applied to an actual form, it becomes as shown in FIG. 3.

Next, we will explain how to define the print layout when creating a form as shown in FIG. In the diagram, 4
1.42.44 can be treated as a fixed record. In this example, 41.42 are combined into a heading called 1.
Consists of one fixed record.

Fixed records 41 and 42 contain customer, salesperson, document number,
It consists of four fields: notes. The fixed record 44 consists of one field called total.

Although the detailed line of the relative record 43 can be treated as a fixed record using repetition, it is treated here as a relative record and defined as a field that is repeated five times. The relative record 43 is composed of seven relative fields such as month/day, order number, and classification. In the print layout, the fields in each area of 41, 42, 43, and 44 define information related to the layout such as line column position, character type, and number of digits, as well as information related to the format such as character pitch and character size. Further, in the print layout, the paper size is also defined as information regarding the format.

Further, by executing a program in which write commands for each record 41, 42, 43, and 44 are coded in the print layout defined in this way, an actual image as shown in FIG. 5 can be obtained. In the past, it was not possible to see the printed results until after the program had been created to some extent (6).This allows you to grasp the print image before creating the program, which is useful for coding the program.

Next, the flowchart shown in Figure 6 shows how the print layout defined above is referred to by a program (hereinafter referred to as an editing program) that edits data to be printed on a form and the process is proceeded. This will be explained with reference to.

The editing program first outputs an instruction to open the file holding the print layout (GOI). This command causes the control unit to read the print format. Next, the editing program outputs a print layout initialization command ([1
02). In response to this initialization command, the control unit performs preparations and initial settings for outputting the print layout for the print layout file. Next, the editing program outputs a record output command (603). This causes the control unit to accumulate actual data of records within the form. Next, the editing program outputs the layout output instructions (
804). Thereby, the control unit performs actual printing control on the form. When this layout output command is executed, 6
The print records accumulated in step 03 are combined with the print format and print attributes, and output to an actual print file according to the information in the link table section.

The above steps 603 and 804 are repeated to print a plurality of pages.

Then, when printing on the form is completed, the editing program outputs a termination command (1305). In response to this command, the control unit performs processing to finish the specified print layout.

Now, by executing steps 602 to 005 again,
You can change the layout type. Finally, the editing program outputs a command to close the file holding the print layout (80B).

As described above, this embodiment provides the following effects.

■When designing a form, the first task, ``creating a form image by hand,'' remains the same, but the printing unit for the print layout is the page.

Page-by-page printing differs from conventional line-by-line printing in that there is no need to worry about the timing of line printing. Designers now have unprecedented printing freedom.

■When developing an editing program, the program only needs to be aware of print records and print fields, and the program does not need to think about how records and fields are arranged within a page. Therefore, most of the approximately third part of the entire editing program required for form processing can be omitted.

■In editing program maintenance, changing the form format requires only changing the print layout, so there is almost no need to change the program. Even when changing data processing, fewer changes are required than in the past, similar to programming.

[Effects of the Invention] As described in detail above, according to the present invention, the program for printing on forms simply edits data, and the form printing layout is defined independently of this program. It simplifies the development of printing programs, flexibly responds to changes in form formats, improves productivity in program development and maintenance, and enables advanced form processing and printing. shall be.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the hierarchical structure of layout information in the above embodiment. FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining the hierarchical structure of layout information on a form in the above embodiment. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of how a print layout is defined when creating an actual form in the above embodiment. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a print image output based on the print layout definition in the above embodiment. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the basic processing flow of form printing in the above embodiment. 1 Inu Ding Inu White 1 ... Control section 4 ... Layout definition processing section 6 ... Program processing section °8 ... Layout control area 9 ... Print file

Claims (1)

[Claims] In a form printing system that prints a form including a plurality of types of print items, a print layout definition means for defining a print position of each item on the form and a data type to be printed on the print item; Consisting of a form data editing means for editing corresponding data, and a print control means for controlling printing of the data edited by the form data editing means at a predetermined position on the form according to the definition of the print layout definition means. Form printing system.