JPH05238116A - Printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a printer capable of checking contents of printing before printing on paper by a method wherein a plotted printing image wherein a printing data from an upper device is analyzed, developed, and drawn is displayed on a display CONSTITUTION:A control part 1 controls a function of the whole of a printer and sends a printing data sent from an upper device to a data analysis part. A developing part 3, by referring to a character generator, develops a printing image, and sends it to a plotting part 5. The plotting part 5 plots the developed printing image sent from the developing part 3, and sends it to a printing part 8 via a frame buffer 7. An operation switch panel 6 performs a setting wherein whether or not the printing image is displayed on a display 9 from the frame buffer 7 before printing and whether the printing image is printed or abolished without printing are provided. The set operation is carried out through the control part 1.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

FIELD OF THE INVENTION This invention relates to printers, and more particularly to page printers.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventional page printers have no means for knowing how the print data from the host device is developed in the printer.

[0003]

For this reason, the conventional page printer has a problem that a large amount of paper is wasted because the page printer prints out even if there is an error in the print data from the host device.

An object of the present invention is to provide a page printer capable of checking the print contents based on the print data from the host device before printing on paper.

[0005]

A page printer according to the present invention has means for taking out a print image from a frame buffer and displaying it on a display by setting from an operation switch panel and a display inside or outside the own printer. .

[0006]

By extracting the print image from the frame buffer in front of the printing unit and displaying it on the display, it is possible to check the print contents before printing on the paper.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram of a page printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

The printer of FIG. 1 includes a control unit 1, a data analysis unit 2, a development unit 3, a character generator 4, a drawing unit 5,
Operation switch panel 6, frame buffer 7, printing unit 8
And a display 9. The upper level device 10 also supplies print data to the printer.

The control unit 1 controls the functions of the entire printer, and sends the print data sent from the host device 10 to the data analysis unit 2. The data analysis unit 2 analyzes the character code, character position, character attribute, etc. of the print data sent from the control unit 1 and sends the data to the expansion unit 3. The decompression unit 3 refers to the character code 4, character position, character attributes, and other data sent from the data analysis unit 2 by the character generator 4 to decompress the character outline, character modification, reduction / enlargement, and rotation. Then, the image data is sent to the drawing unit 5. The drawing unit 5 draws the expanded print image data sent from the expansion unit 3 and sends the drawn print image to the frame buffer 7. At this point, the frame buffer 7 stores the print image for one page which is expanded by the expansion unit 3 and drawn by the drawing unit 5.

The operation switch panel 6 displays a print image for one page on the display 9 from the frame buffer 7 or does not display it, and whether the print image is printed by the printing unit 8 or is discarded without printing. Is set, and the set operation is executed through the control unit 1. The display 9 is for displaying the print contents for one page, and does not necessarily have to be installed when a device outside the printer, for example, the host device 10, can be used.

The operation associated with the above setting by the operation switch panel 6 is as follows.

When the contents of the frame buffer 7 are set to be displayed on the display 9 by the operation switch panel 6, the control unit 1 causes the display 9 to display a print image for one page of the frame buffer 7. The display 9 displays the sent print image for one page.

Further, when an instruction to print the print image of the frame buffer 7 is issued from the operation switch panel 6, the control unit 1 sends the print image of the frame buffer 7 to the print unit 8, and the print unit 8 is sent. Print the print image. When the operation switch panel 6 issues an instruction to discard the print image in the frame buffer 7, the control unit 1 erases the print image in the frame buffer 7.

When the operation switch panel 6 is set so that the contents of the frame buffer 7 are not displayed on the display 9, the control unit 1 sets the frame buffer 1 to 1
The print image for the page is sent to the printing unit 8, and the printing unit 8 prints the sent print image.

[0016]

As described above, since the page printer of the present invention can confirm the print contents on the display before actually printing on the paper, there is an error in the print data from the host device. In this case, or when an attempt is made to print an undesired document due to an erroneous operation, printing can be stopped, and wasteful paper can be saved.

[Brief description of drawings]

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

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Control unit 2 Data analysis unit 3 Development unit 4 Character generator 5 Drawing unit 6 Operation switch panel 7 Frame buffer 8 Printing unit 9 Display 10 Upper device

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A data analysis unit that analyzes print data from a higher-level device, a development unit that develops a print image according to the data, and a drawing unit that draws the print image.
In a page printer having a printing unit for printing a drawn print image via a frame buffer and an operation switch panel for inputting an instruction from an operator, the print image is taken out from the frame buffer by setting from the operation switch panel. , A page printer having means for displaying on a display and a display. 2. The page printer according to claim 1, wherein the display is provided outside the printer.