JPH04367928A - Business form printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To constitute the printer so that plural business forms can be subjected to printing output in parallel by dividing printing paper in lines, in the case width of the business form is shorter than the printing paper by a simple instruction. CONSTITUTION:In the case of printing a business form, whether width of a designated business form is shorter than length of half of width of paper or not is decided (step A4), and when it is decided to be YES, the next business form is designated (step A5), length of half of width of paper is added to start point coordinate data of the designated business form, and it is written in a start point' register as a corrected start point coordinate at the time of printing the designated business form (step A6). Subsequently, based on the start point coordinate written in the start point register, designated business form data is written in an address of a page memory 17 (step A7), and two business form data written in the page memory 17 are printed (step A8).

Description

[Detailed description of the invention]

0001

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a form printing device.

0002

2. Description of the Related Art When a conventional form printing device prints a form on paper, it sets print formats such as paper size, number of characters per line, top margin, bottom margin, left margin, right margin, etc.

0003

By the way, if the width of the form is shorter than the paper width, two pages of the form can be printed in parallel on one sheet of paper. In such cases, the user has conventionally had to decide for himself whether or not parallel printing is possible.

[0004] An object of the present invention is to make it possible to print out a plurality of forms in parallel by dividing the printing paper into columns when the width of the form is shorter than the printing paper using a simple instruction.

[0005]

[Means for Solving the Problems] The means of the present invention are as follows. A form storage means 1 (see the functional block diagram of FIG. 1, the same applies hereinafter) stores a plurality of forms. The starting point storage means 2 presets and stores an output starting point for each form stored in the form storage means 1. The determining means 3 determines whether a plurality of pages of forms can be printed in parallel on designated paper. If the determining means 3 determines that it is possible, the correcting means 4 corrects the output start points of the second page and subsequent pages stored in the starting point storage means 2, respectively. The printing means 5 prints the first page of the form from the set output starting point on the specified paper, and prints the second and subsequent pages from the corrected output starting point on the same specified paper as the first page of the form in parallel. Print.

[0006]

[Operation] The operation of the means of the present invention is as follows. The starting point storage means 2 stores in advance the output starting point of each form stored in the form storage means 1, and when printing a form, the judgment means determines whether a plurality of pages of forms can be printed in parallel on designated paper. 3, and if the determining means 3 determines that it is possible, the correcting means 4 corrects the output starting points of the second and subsequent pages of the form stored in the starting point storing means 2, respectively. Based on the corrected output start point, the first page of the form and the second and subsequent pages are printed in parallel on the same designated paper by the printing means 5. Therefore, with a simple instruction, if the width of the form is shorter than the printing paper, the printing paper can be divided into columns and a plurality of forms can be printed out in parallel.

[0007]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. 2 to 5. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the circuit configuration of a form printing device to which the present invention is applied. The input unit 11 includes various keys for inputting each item data in the form. Then, when a key is operated on the input unit 11,
A key input signal corresponding to the key operation is input to the CPU 12. The CPU 12 controls each section based on a control program stored in advance in a ROM (not shown). CPU1
2 includes, in addition to the input section 11, a work memory 13, a form starting point coordinate memory 14, a form data file 15, and a display section 16.
, page memory 17, printer 18, paper width memory 19
and a data memory 20 are connected. The work memory 13 is composed of, for example, a RAM, and includes work areas necessary for various processes. Form start point coordinate memory 1
Reference numeral 4 denotes a memory that stores the starting point coordinates of a plurality of forms. The form data file 15 is a file memory that stores form data, form width data, etc. for a plurality of forms. The display unit 16 displays a form based on display data output from the CPU 12. Page memory 17
is a print buffer memory that stores print data in units of one page. The printer 18 prints the print data stored in the page memory 17 page by page. The paper width memory 19 stores a plurality of papers on which forms are printed (for example, A4, B
This is a memory that stores paper widths of 4, B5, etc.). The data memory 20 is a memory consisting of an A register, a B register, and a start point' register. Here, the starting point' register is a register that stores corrected starting point data for the second page of the form when two forms are printed in parallel on the same sheet of paper.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained. Figure 3
is a flowchart showing the operation of print I processing. In this case, it is assumed that each printed form has the same starting point coordinates and the same form width.

[0009] In step A1, the form data file 1
5. Specify the form to be printed first from among the plurality of forms stored in 5. In step A2, the starting point coordinates corresponding to the specified form (first page) are read from the form starting point coordinate memory 14, and the form data is written to the address in the page memory 17 indicated by the starting point coordinates. As a result, the first page of form data has been written in the left side area of the page memory 17.

[0010] In step A3, it is determined whether column division designation is set in the print format. If it is determined YES in step A3, proceed to step A4,
If NO, proceed to step A8.

If there is no column division designation, the process advances from step A3 to step A8. In step A8, the first page of the form written in the page memory 17 is printed on the left side of the paper as shown in FIG. 4, for example.

If there is a column division designation, the process advances to step A4. In step A4, it is determined whether the width (width) of the designated form is shorter than half the paper width, that is, whether two pages of forms can be printed in parallel on the same paper. If YES is determined in step A4, step A
If the answer is NO, the process proceeds to step A8.

If the width of the designated form is longer than half the paper width, parallel printing is not possible, so the process advances from step A4 to step A8, and as shown in FIG. 4, the first page written in the page memory 17 is The form is printed on the left side of the paper.

[0014] If the width of the specified form is shorter than half the paper width, YES is determined in step A4 and the process proceeds to step A5. In step A5, a form to be printed next is specified from among the plurality of forms stored in the form data file 15. That is, the second page of the form is specified.

In step A6, the starting point coordinates of the form specified in step A5 are read from the form data file 15, and the paper width corresponding to the specified paper is read out from the paper width memory 19, and half of the paper width is added to the starting point coordinates. The lengths are added and the calculation result is written into the start point' register of the data memory 20 as the corrected start point coordinates when printing the second page of the form.

In the following step A7, the designated form data is written to the address of the page memory 17 indicated by the starting point coordinates stored in the starting point' register. As a result, the second page of form data has been written in the right area of the page memory 17. In step A8, the two forms data written in the page memory 17 are printed. That is, as shown in FIG. 5, the first page of the form written in the page memory 17 is printed on the left side of the paper.
In parallel with this, the second page of the form is printed on the right side of the paper. The processing in FIG. 3 is ended by executing step A8.

[0017]

[Other Embodiments] Next, another embodiment will be described based on FIG. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the operation of Print II processing in another embodiment. This embodiment differs from the above embodiments in that the starting point data of the next document is corrected according to the width of the previous document.

In step B1, the form data file 1
5. Specify the form to be printed from among the plurality of forms stored in step 5. In this case, one form or multiple forms is specified. In step B2, the starting point coordinates corresponding to the first form data (first page) are read from the form starting point coordinate memory 14, and the first form data is written to the address in the page memory 17 indicated by the starting point coordinates. As a result, the first form data has been written in the left area of the page memory 17. In step B3, the width (width) data of the first form is read from the form data file 15 and written to the A register of the data memory 20.

In step B4, it is determined whether there is a next form to be printed. In step B4, YE
If the determination is S, the process proceeds to step B5, and if the determination is NO, the process proceeds to step B15.

If there is no next form, the process advances from step B4 to step B15. In step B15, the form data written in the page memory 17 is printed on paper.

[0021] If there is a next form, the process advances from step B4 to step B5. In step B5, the next form is specified, and the form data, form width data, etc. of the specified form are read from the form data file 15. In step B6, the width data of the read form and the width data of the first form stored in the A register are added,
Store in B register.

In the next step B7, it is determined whether the width data (width for two forms) stored in the B register is shorter than the paper width, that is, whether two pages of forms can be printed in parallel on the same paper. will be judged. If YES is determined in step B7, the process proceeds to step B8, and if NO, the process proceeds to step B11.

[0023] If the width of two forms is shorter than the paper width,
The process advances from step B7 to step B8. In step B8, the width of the first form stored in the A register is added to the specified starting point coordinate data of the next form, and this calculation result is used as the starting point coordinates for printing the second page form as the starting point of the data memory 20. ´Write to register.

In the following step B9, the next form data is written to the address of the page memory 17 indicated by the starting point coordinates written in the starting point' register. As a result, the second form data of the second page is written in the right side area of the page memory 17.

In step B10, the width data stored in the B register is written to the A register. After executing step B10, the process returns to step B4.

[0026] Then, if the third form is specified and the width data for three forms is stored in the B register, or if the width of two forms is longer than the paper width, N is selected in step B7.
It is determined as O and the process proceeds to step B11.

In step B11, one page or a plurality of pages of form data written in the page memory 17 is printed on paper. For example, when a first form and a second form are written in the page memory 17, the first form and the second form are printed in parallel, as shown in FIG.

In step B12, the A register,
The B register and page memory 17 are cleared. In step B13, the specified second form data (2
Form start point coordinate memory 1
4 and the page memory 17 indicated by this starting point coordinate.
Write the second form data to the address. As a result, the second form data has been written in the left area of the page memory 17. In step B14, the second
The width data of the form is read from the form data file 15 and written to the A register of the data memory 20. After executing step B14, the process returns to step B4.

Thereafter, as described above, a plurality of form data are sequentially stored in the page memory 17 until it is determined in step B7 that the total width of the plurality of forms accumulated in the B register exceeds the paper width.

[0030]

[Effect of the invention] According to this invention, with simple instructions,
If the width of the form is shorter than the printing paper, the printing paper can be divided into columns and multiple forms can be printed out in parallel.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a circuit configuration of a form printing device to which the present invention is applied.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the operation of print I processing.

FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example of form printing.

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of form printing.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing operations in another embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

1... Form storage means 2...Starting point storage means 3...Means of judgment 4...Correction means 5...Printing means 11...Key input section 12...CPU 13...Work memory 14... Form start point coordinate memory 15...Form data file 16...Display section 17...Page memory 18...Printer 19…Paper width memory 20...Data memory

Claims (1)

[Claims] Claim 1: A form storage means for storing a plurality of forms; a start point storage means for presetting and storing the output start point of each form stored in the form storage means; a determining means for determining whether or not printing is possible; and a correcting means for correcting the output start point of the second page and subsequent pages stored in the start point storage means when the determining means determines that printing is possible; Printing means that prints the page of the form from a set output starting point on a specified paper, and prints the second and subsequent pages of the form from the corrected output starting point in parallel on the same specified paper as the first page of the form. A form printing device characterized by: