JPH05333841A - Character generating device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To speed up character generation even when output devices are switched by turns by providing two cache data storage areas corresponding to the output devices and swapping cache data, which are stored for the respective output devices, onto a cache memory. CONSTITUTION:Character data read out of a font storage device 101 are expanded into a bit map font by an outline font generating device 105, and the bit map font is transferred to a display device 109 and also registered in a cache device 106. When the data are outputted on a printing device 110, the contents of the cache device 106 and cache data for printing saved in a swap file storage device 103 are exchanged by a swapping device 107. When the output device is switched to the display device 109 again, the contents of the cache device 106 and swap file storage devices 107 are similarly exchanged. Thus, the control is so performed that cache data corresponding to the output device in use are stored in the cache device 106 at all times.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a character generator using an outline font, which is used in a system such as desktop publishing equipped with a display device and a printing device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional technique is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 1-115647.
As described in the issue, a cache memory for temporarily storing the bitmap font generated from the outline font is provided, and when an output request for the same character is made later, the already stored bitmap font is used. The generation speed was improved.

[0003]

However, the above-mentioned prior art is applied to a single device such as a printing device or a display device, and both display on a display device such as desktop publishing and output to the printing device. In a system that frequently performs the above, there is a problem that the printing device and the display device need to have their own font generation devices. Furthermore, when one cache device is used for the display device and the printing device, when the output device is switched, the resolution of the output device is different even for characters having the same number of points, and thus the size of the expanded bitmap data is different. There was also a problem that the cached data already stored could not be used.

The present invention solves such a problem, and its object is to integrate a display device and a printing device into one system, such as a font storage device, a font generation device, and a cache device. In addition to realizing a low cost by unifying devices related to character generation, even when one cache system is used for the display device and the printing device, the cache data accumulated for each output device is placed in the cache device. By doing so, it is possible to provide a high-speed character generator that does not reduce the hit rate of the cache even if the output devices are switched alternately.

[0005]

A font storage device for storing an outline font representing a contour of a character as coordinate point data, a font generation device for expanding the coordinate point data into bitmap data, and outputting the bitmap data. In a character generator having an output device for display and printing, a cache device for temporarily storing the bitmap data, a swap file storage device for saving the contents of the cache device, and contents of the cache device. A swap device for replacing the contents of the swap file storage device is provided, and the bitmap data for the output device during the output image generation is registered in the cache device, and the output image generation is switched to the other output device. When the contents of the cache device is swapped Characterized in that to replace the contents of Airu storage device.

[0006]

The outline font data read from the font storage device is expanded into bitmap data by the outline font generation device. The expanded bitmap data is transferred to the display device or the printing device during the generation of the output image, and is registered in the cache device in preparation for reuse when the same character generation request is made.
When the transfer destination of the output image to be generated is switched from display to print or from print to display, the swap device replaces the contents of the cache device and the contents of the swap file storage device. Therefore, the devices related to font generation can be unified, the data used in the output device currently in use is cached in the cache device, and the cache data used in the other output device is stored in the swap file storage device. Because it is stored
Even if the image generation for each output device is alternately performed, the cache data accumulated up to that point can be effectively used and the characters can be generated at high speed.

[0007]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS FIG. 1 shows a block diagram of the present invention. In the present embodiment, the characters for which a display or printing request has been generated in the control program 111 are displayed on the display device 109 or the printing device 11.
It is a configuration that is set to 0. In the font storage device 101,
A font file 102 in which outline font data is stored is stored. Font generation device 1
Reference numeral 04 denotes an outline font generation device 105 for expanding the font data read from the font file 102 into bitmap data, and a cache for temporarily storing the expanded bitmap data in preparation for the same character generation request. The device 106, the cache device 10 when the output device for transferring the output image is switched
6 and a swap device 107 for replacing the contents of the swap file storage device 103, and a control device 108 for controlling these operations. The swap file storage device 103 is a file for swapping the contents of the cache device 106.

In the cache device 106, a bitmap font developed from an outline font is registered for a character that appears once in a character string output to an output device (eg, a display device) currently in use. Here, when printing the characters that have been displayed so far, the contents of the cache that have been stored so far are replaced with the swap file storage device 103, and the outline font is expanded character by character for the displayed character string. At this time, the bitmap data corresponding to the printing device 110 is registered in the cache device 106. When the output device is further switched, the contents of the cache device 106 and the swap file storage device 103 are exchanged, and the contents of the cache device 106 correspond to the contents of the display device 109. The display device 109 and the printing device 110 are devices for visualizing the image generated by the font generation device 104 by soft copying and hard copying.

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.
The following embodiment is applied to a character generator using an outline font in a desktop publishing system. In FIG. 2, the main control unit 201 is a known control device including a CPU, a RAM, a ROM and the like, which are not shown, and each device is connected by an internal bus 215. A hard disk drive is used as the auxiliary storage device 202, and the auxiliary storage device 202 stores a font file 203 in which outline font data including a plurality of fonts is stored. The swap file 204 is stored in the hard disk drive, flash memory, RAM, etc., and is used for swapping with the contents of the cache memory 206. The cache memory 206 is reserved in the RAM, and a bitmap font expanded from the outline font is registered for a character that appears once in the character string output to the output device (eg, display device) currently in use. Go DM
The A controller 207 performs CP for data transfer between each device.
Direct memory for high-speed operation without U intervention
It is an access controller. The display frame memory 208 is a bit map memory for one page of the display device 210, and the number of pixels of the display device 210 is 102, for example.
In the case of 4 × 768 dots, monochrome requires a capacity of 96 kilobytes. The display control unit 209 reads the contents of the display frame memory 208, adds a synchronization signal according to the specifications of the display device, and transfers the synchronization signal to the display device 210. The display device 210 is a CRT, LCD, PD
It is a soft copy device that displays bitmaps by technologies such as P and EL.

The printing frame memory 211 is a bitmap memory for one page of the printing device 213. For example, when the printing device 213 can support paper of maximum resolution A4 size with a resolution of 300 dots / inch, a capacity of 1 megabyte. Need. The print control unit 212 reads out the contents of the print frame memory 211, adds a synchronization signal according to the specifications of the printing apparatus, and transfers the synchronization signal to the printing apparatus 213. The printing device 213 is a hard copy device based on technologies such as an electrophotographic method, a thermal transfer method, and an inkjet method.

The operation of the apparatus thus configured will be described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4. 3 is an overall flow chart for explaining the operation of this embodiment, and FIG. 4 is a detailed flow chart of the character generation processing of FIG.

Immediately after the power is turned on, the main control unit 201 initializes the contents of the cache memory 206 and the swap file 204 (S1) and enters the document edit mode. Therefore, the display device 210 is selected as the output device. When a character is input from the operation unit 214 (S2), the character is stored in the document file together with the character modification information (S3). Then, character generation processing (S4) is performed.

Details of the character generation process will be described with reference to FIG. First, the information such as the character code of the character to be generated, the enlargement / reduction ratio, the rotation, the italic, the decoration (shadow, shaded, bold) is obtained (S21), and the cache memory 2
The contents of 06 are searched (S22), and it is confirmed whether the same character has already been expanded (S23). If it is already cached, the bitmap font is acquired from the cache memory 206 (S24). If it is not cached, the font data is read from the font file 203 on the auxiliary storage device 202 (S25), and the outline font is extracted. Development to a bitmap font (S26) is performed using the outline font generation device 205. The outline font generation device 205 is a means for correcting crushing or line width mismatch in a small character, an affine transformation means for performing processing such as enlargement / reduction / rotation / tilt on a character, and a straight line / quadratic shape for discrete contour points. Means for interpolating with curves, cubic curves, arcs, etc., contour point sequence generation means,
It is composed of means for filling the inside of the outline point sequence, and performs expansion from outline phones to bitmap fonts by software processing, hardware processing as described in JP-A-1-191192, or both. .. When the font expansion is completed, the bitmap data for one character is stored in the frame memory (2
08, the print job is transferred to 211) (S27).

Returning to FIG. 3 again, when the generation of one character is completed, it is determined whether the editing of the document is completed (S
5) If the editing is continued, the process between S2 and S5 is repeated, and if the editing is completed, the printing process is started.

Before the print image is generated, the cache memory 20 that has been stored so far when the display image is generated.
The contents of 6 are replaced with the contents of the swap file 204 (S6). This work is performed by software transfer or high-speed transfer that does not go through the CPU using the DMA controller 207 or the like. The contents of the cache memory 206 are initialized and the characters are not registered for the first printing work, but if the printing work has been done in the past, the font data accumulated at that time is stored. Has been done. In the print image generation work, a character code is extracted from the document file for each character together with the modification information (S7), and a bitmap font is generated from the outline font according to the character generation processing described above (S7).
8). After the character generation process for one character is completed, the document file 1
It is determined whether or not the page processing is completed (S9). If not completed, the processing from S7 to S9 is repeated, and if completed, the contents of the print frame memory 211 are read by the print control unit 212 and the printing apparatus 213. Then, printing is performed (S10). If the document is to be edited again (S11), the print cache data registered in the cache memory 206 and the display cache data saved in the swap file 204 are exchanged (S12), and a series of steps from S2 is performed. Repeat the work of.

According to the present embodiment, under the control of the main control unit 201, the characters input from the operation unit 214 are expanded from the outline font data into bitmap data and displayed on the display device 210, and as necessary. WYS, which is indispensable for a desktop publishing device, in which a hard copy output can be obtained from the printing device 213 without changing the displayed image.
IWYG (What You See Is What
You Get) environment can be realized.

Further, the printing device generally has a higher resolution than the display device, and in the present embodiment, the display device has 75 dots / pixel.
Inch, printing device is 300 dots / inch. For example, a character with a size of 10 points is displayed as 10 ×
It consists of 10 dots, while the printing device has 42 ×
Since it is composed of 42 dots, the cache data accumulated at the time of generating the display image cannot be used also for printing. Therefore, the cache memory 206 stores the cache data for the output device currently in use, and when the output device is switched, the cache data saved in the swap file 204 is replaced with the cache data, so that the output device has a different resolution. Therefore, it is possible to avoid the problem that the data cached up to that point is wasted due to the switching of the output device, and a high cache hit rate can always be obtained, so that it is possible to provide a high-speed character generator.

[0018]

As described above, according to the present invention, in the case of a system having both a display device and a printing device such as a desktop publishing device, the font storage memory, the font generation device and the cache memory are used as the display device. Since it is not necessary to provide both for the printing device and it is sufficient to prepare it in one place, it can be realized at a low cost as compared with the case where a system is constructed using a conventional character generator. Further, even if the cache device is shared between the display device and the printing device, the cache data generated at the time of image generation and the cache data accumulated at the time of generation of the printing image are treated as independent files, and the cache memory 206 and the swap file 204 are separated. Stored in
By placing the cache data corresponding to the current output device in the cache memory 106, the cache data accumulated in the past can be used as it is even when the display / printing work is alternately performed when the resolution of the output device is different. There is also an effect that the character hit speed can be improved without reducing the cache hit rate.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of this embodiment.

4 is a detailed flowchart of the character generation process of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 101 font storage device 102 font file 103 swap file storage device 104 font generation device 105 outline font generation device 106 cache device 107 swap device 108 control device 109 display device 110 printing device 111 control program

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A font storage device for storing an outline font representing a contour line of a character as coordinate point data,
A font generation device for expanding the coordinate point data into bitmap data, a character generation device including an output device for displaying and printing for outputting the bitmap data, a cache device for temporarily storing the bitmap data, A swap file storage device for saving the contents of the cache device, and a swap device for exchanging the contents of the cache device and the contents of the swap file storage device are provided, and the cache device outputs the output during generation of an output image. A character generator characterized in that the contents of the cache device are exchanged with the contents of the swap file storage device when the bitmap data for the device is registered and the output image generation is switched to the other output device.