JPH02190363A - Cut paper printing device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To reduce labor and time by enabling each user to search quickly for his own paper by a method wherein a printing mechanism having a paper selective mechanism and a printing control mechanism having a sequence control circuit are established. CONSTITUTION:A sequence control mechanism 3 is composed of a communication circuit control circuit 5 connecting a communication circuit (a), a switch circuit 6 capable of being operated by a user of a printing device 2, a time counting circuit 7 counting time necessary for control of the printing device, and a sequence control circuit 8 controlling motions of such the communication control circuit 5, the switch circuit 6 and the time counting circuit 7 via respective signals b, c, d. Further, a printing mechanism 4 is composed of a paper selective mechanism 9 sucking paper from either of a paper cassette 12 or a paper cassette 13 following indication from the sequence control circuit 8 via a signal (e), a printing forming mechanism 10 forming a printing image on the paper, and a paper discharge mechanism 11 discharging the printed paper to a paper stacker 14. If the paper of which color or size, etc., differ from those to the paper cassette 12 is preliminarily set to the paper cassette 13, the paper which differs from that of a previous page is discharged.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a printing device, and more particularly to a cut paper printing device having at least two paper cassettes.

[Conventional technology]

Conventionally, this type of printing apparatus, especially a small-sized printing apparatus, generally does not have a sorter or jogger for sorting and classifying printed sheets after being ejected. Therefore, a method has been adopted in which print data received from a host device is printed on paper in a designated paper cassette and stacked on a single paper stacker.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

In the above-mentioned conventional printing devices, when one printing device is shared by several host devices, the printed sheets of multiple users are stacked on the paper stacker for stacking the ejected printed sheets. This required a great deal of effort and time for each user to search through a large amount of printed paper to find all of his or her own paper.

[Means to solve the problem]

The printing device of the present invention includes at least two sets of paper cassettes, a paper selection mechanism that sucks paper from either of the paper cassettes, a line control circuit that connects a communication line from the host device, and the use of the printing device. The print control mechanism includes a switch circuit that can be set by an operator, a time counting circuit, a line control circuit, a sequence control circuit that controls the operation of the switch circuit, and the time counting circuit.

〔Example〕

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of a printing device according to the present invention. A printing device 2 connected to a host device 1 via a communication line a includes a printing control mechanism 3 and a printing mechanism 4. The printing control mechanism 3 includes a communication line control circuit 5 that connects the communication line a, a switch circuit 6 that can be operated by the user of the printing device 2, and a time counting circuit 7 that counts the time required to control the printing device. , and a sequence control circuit 8 that controls the operations of the communication line control circuit 5, the switch circuit 6, and the time counting circuit 7 through signals A, C, and D, respectively. Also, the printing mechanism 4
comprises a paper selection mechanism 9 that sucks paper from either the paper cassette 12 or the paper cassette 13 according to instructions from the sequence control circuit 8 via a signal e; and a print forming mechanism 10 that forms a printed image on the paper. , and a paper ejection mechanism 11 that ejects the printed paper to a paper stacker 14.

FIG. 2 is an operation flowchart of the sequence control circuit 8, and the operation of the printing device 2 will be explained using this figure.

First, the sequence control circuit 8 determines whether there is print data based on a signal from the communication line control circuit 5.

If there is no print data, this determination is repeated, and if there is print data, the process advances to the next step. In the next step, the circuit of the communication line control section 5 is operated to receive print data transmitted from the host device 1 via the signal line. In the next step, it is determined whether or not to print using the paper in the paper cassette 12. If the paper size is not 12, the process proceeds to a determination as to whether or not to use the paper in the paper cassette 13, and if it is OK to use the paper in the paper cassette 12, the process proceeds to the next step.

In the next step, the paper from the paper cassette 12 is sucked in based on the previous determination, the paper is sent to the print forming mechanism 10 to form an image, and the paper is further sent to the paper ejection mechanism 11 to be ejected to the paper stacker 14. In the next step, it is determined whether the state of the additional discharge switch provided in the switch circuit 6 is valid or not. This switch can be set to either enable or disable by the user of printing device 2, if the user wishes to use the mechanism provided to the user by proceeding to the next step. Enable this switch if you want, and disable it if you don't.

Now, if this switch is disabled, the sequence control circuit 8
The status returns to the determination of the presence or absence of print data, and if it is valid, the process advances to the next step. Next step.

Then, after resetting the count value of the time counting circuit 7 to zero via the signal d, counting of the elapsed time t is started. In the next step, it is determined whether there is print data for the next page. If there is print data, the process returns to the step of receiving print data; if there is no print data, the process proceeds to the next step.

In the next step, it is determined whether or not the counted value of the elapsed time for which counting was started earlier is greater than a specific value T. If t is smaller than T, this means that time T has not elapsed since the previous paper was ejected, that is, the previous printing was completed, and in this case, the presence/absence of print data is determined. Returning to the step, the arrival of print data will wait for the elapse of time. If t is larger than T, this means that time T has elapsed since the previous printing was completed, and in this case, the process proceeds to the next step.

In the next step, the paper from the paper cassette 13 is ejected. If you set paper that is different in color or size from the paper cassette 12 in advance in the paper cassette 13, the paper that has different characteristics such as color and size from the previous page will be ejected and will not be ejected from the paper stacker 14. It will be stacked on top of the paper. FIG. 2 shows a similar operation flowchart when printing is performed using the paper cassette 13, but since this is clear from the above explanation, the explanation will be omitted.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, in the printing device of the present invention, after receiving and printing a series of print data, if the print data is not received for a certain period of time, the printing device uses paper different from the paper cassette used for the previous printing. Since paper of different colors or sizes stored in the cassette is automatically ejected, the boundaries between the ejected print paper groups are clear, and the printer can be shared by multiple users or multiple host devices. Each user can quickly search for his or her paper, reducing the effort and time previously required.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a printing apparatus according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a flow chart showing the operation of a sequence control circuit. 1... Host device, 2... Printing device, 3
...Print forming mechanism, 4...Printing mechanism,
5... Communication control circuit, 6... Switch circuit, 7... Time counting circuit, 8... Sequence control circuit, 9...... Paper selection mechanism, 10
...Print forming mechanism, 11...Paper ejection mechanism, 12...Paper cassette, 13...
・Paper cassette, 14... Paper stacker, a.
...Communication line, b-g...flow of electrical signals, h-j...flow of paper. Agent Patent Attorney Shinho Uchihara 2

Claims (1)

[Claims] A cut paper printing device that receives print data from a host device such as a personal computer, workstation, host computer, etc. via a communication line and prints on cut paper according to the print data, at least two sets of paper cassettes; A paper selection mechanism that sucks paper from one of the paper cassettes, a line control circuit that connects a communication line from the host device, a switch circuit that can be set by the user of the printing device, a time counting circuit, and the line control. a printing control mechanism having a circuit, a switch circuit, and a sequence control circuit that controls the operation of a time counting circuit, and prints a series of print data received from the host device on paper in a designated paper cassette and discharges the paper. A cut paper printing device characterized in that the paper from other unspecified paper cassettes is automatically ejected afterwards.