JPH06106794A - Print controller - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a print controller for selecting a print font according to font information stored for variously designated font by storing the font information regarding a font to be set in.out of a printer. CONSTITUTION:A print controller 11 outputs a print control signal to a printer 4 in response to print data and various print command to be input from a host computer 1 through a bus 2. Particularly, when designating a font for printed data claracter data a font image coincident with a designated font or nearer thereto is selected from an external image font set memory 13 or a font image in the printer 4 based on one set information stored in a built-in font set information memory 12 and an external font set information memory 14 by a font selection processing, and a font command is output to the printer 4.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a print control device,
More specifically, the present invention relates to a print control device that prints using a plurality of fonts set inside and outside the printer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a print control device is connected between a host device such as a large computer or personal computer and a printer externally connected via a predetermined bus. In response to various print commands (paper size designation, font designation, margin setting, etc.) input from the host device, control signals are output to the printer to print various characters and graphics.

In recent years, in particular, personal computers, printers, and printing software have become highly functional and low-priced, so that individuals can relatively easily perform advanced printing processing such as DTP (Desktop Publishing) processing. Is starting to appear. In this DTP processing, it is possible to freely select various fonts and set a print layout by using fonts built in the printer in advance or fonts supplied from software.

In order to cope with such advanced printing processing, the print control device is specially developed and designed in accordance with the font function of the printer to be connected. For example, in the print command input from the host device. With respect to the included font designation information, the font image information contained in the printer or the font image information supplied from the outside by software or the like is uniquely selected to control the printing process.

[0005]

However, in such a conventional print control apparatus, since it was developed and designed exclusively for the function of the connected printer, the built-in font of the printer is changed or increased. If
Further, when the fonts supplied from the outside are changed or increased, it is necessary to redesign according to the change or increase of the fonts, which causes a problem that the development cost increases.

Further, since the printer's built-in font or external font is uniquely selected for the font information designated by the print command, if the designated font does not exist, the printing process is stopped. However, there is also a problem in that it cannot flexibly respond to user requests.

An object of the present invention is to store font information relating to fonts set inside and outside the printer and select a print font according to the stored font information for various designated fonts.

[0008]

The means of the present invention are as follows.

Designated font identifying means for identifying font information such as font type and size designated at the time of printing, font storage means capable of setting a plurality of types of fonts, and font typeface set in the font storage means , Font information such as size, internal font information storage means, external font information storage means for storing font information such as font type and size set in an externally connected printer, and the designated font identification means Based on the font information stored in the internal font information storage means and the external font information storage means, the designated font information identified by is searched for whether the designated font is set, and when it is not set, the designated font information is searched. Font selection means for selecting font information closer to And control means for controlling the printing operation of the external printer by selecting from a set of fonts corresponding to the font information selected in said font storage means or the external printer font by cement selecting means,
It is characterized by having.

In this case, for example, as described in claim 2, when the font corresponding to the designated font is not set, the font selection means stores in the internal font information storage means and the external font information storage means. The selected font information may be searched in a predetermined order and the font information closer to the designated font may be selected.

[0011]

The operation of the means of the present invention is as follows.

The designated font identification means identifies font information such as the font face and size designated at the time of printing, and the internal font information storage means stores the font faces, sizes, etc. of plural kinds of fonts set in the font storage means. External font information storage means stores font information such as font type and size of a font set in an externally connected printer, and the font selection means identifies by the designated font identification means. Based on the font information stored in the internal font information storage means and the external font information storage means, the designated font information is searched to see if the designated font is set. If not, a font closer to the designated font is found. The information is selected, and the control means controls the phone corresponding to the selected font information. Selects and from the font memory means or font set in the external printer to control the printing operation of the external printer.

Therefore, a change or increase in the font set inside or outside the printer can be dealt with simply by changing or increasing the stored content of the font information.
Development cost can be significantly reduced, and even if there is no specified font for various font specifications, it is possible to continue printing with a font close to the specified font without stopping the printing process. A high print control device can be provided.

Further, in this case, when the font corresponding to the designated font is not set, the font selection means searches the font information stored in the internal font information storage means and the external font information storage means in a predetermined order. By selecting the font information closer to the designated font, the font selection can be performed more efficiently, and the usability of the print control device can be improved.

[0015]

EXAMPLES Examples will be described below with reference to FIGS.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an embodiment of a print control apparatus of the present invention, which is an example applied to a print system in which a print control apparatus 3 is connected to a bus 2 to which a host computer 1 is connected.

First, the structure will be described. FIG. 1 is a block configuration diagram of a printing system. In this drawing, the printing system includes a host computer 1 that outputs various print commands including print data and font designation information to a print control device 3 via a bus 2, and various types of data input from the host computer 1 via the bus 2. The print control device 3 selects a font to be printed by the printer 4 by a font selection process described later according to the font designation in the print command, and outputs a font instruction and a print control signal to the printer 4, and the print control device 3 inputs the print control signal. And a printer 4 that executes printing according to print data, a font instruction, and a print control signal.

In FIG. 1, the host computer 1 is
Print data such as various character data and graphic data input from a keyboard and various print commands such as paper size designation, font designation and margin setting are output to the print control device 3 via the bus 2.

The print control device 3 includes a print control unit 11, a built-in font set information storage unit 12, an external image font set storage unit 13, and an external font set information storage unit 1.
It is composed of 4.

The print controller 11 is a host computer 1
A print control signal is output to the printer 4 in response to the print data and various print commands input from the printer 2 via the bus 2. Particularly, for font designation regarding character data in the print data, a font selection process described later is performed. Accordingly, based on the font set information stored in the built-in font set information storage unit 12 and the external font set information storage unit 14, a font image that matches or is closer to the designated font is stored in the external image font set storage unit 13 or the printer 4. It selects from the font images and outputs the font instructions to the printer 4. The built-in font set information storage unit 12 stores a font size and a typeface, for example, as shown in FIG. 2, as information about the font set built in the printer 4. The external image font set storage unit 13 stores font data that supplements the font set built in the printer 4, and uses this font data to form a font image on the printer 4 via the print control unit 11. The external font set information storage unit 14 stores information about the font set stored in the external image font set storage unit 13 as shown in FIG.
The font size and typeface are stored as shown in.

The printer 4 stores the font size and typeface font set shown in FIG. 2 in a ROM (Read Only Me).
mory) and the like, and executes various prints in accordance with print control signals, print data, and font instructions input from the print control unit 11.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described.

The font selection process in the print control unit 11, which is a feature of the present invention, will be described with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG.

First, when the font designation information is received from the host computer 1 (step S1), it is searched whether the designated font exists in the font set information stored in the built-in font set information storage section 12 (step S2). ). If the specified font exists in the built-in font set, the font information is confirmed (step S
3) The print data input from the host computer 1 is accepted, the print data and the print control signal are output to the printer 4 to execute the printing, and the present process ends (step S4). If the specified font does not exist in the built-in font set set information in step S2, it is searched whether or not the specified font exists in the font set information stored in the external font set information storage unit 14 (step S5). ). If the specified font exists in the external font set, the font information is confirmed (step S
3) The print data input from the host computer 1 is accepted, the print data, the confirmed font designation information, and the print control signal are output to the printer 4 to execute printing, and this processing is ended (step S4).

If the specified font does not exist in the external font set information in step S5, it is determined whether or not the font size changing process is being performed immediately before (step S6), and the font size changing process is performed. If the designated font size is the smallest, it is determined whether the designated font size is the smallest (step S7). If the designated font size is the smallest,
The font information is fixed (step S3), the print data input from the host computer 1 is accepted, the print data, the fixed font designation information, and the print control signal are output to the printer 4, and printing is executed. It ends (step S4). If the designated font size is not the minimum in step S7, the font size is designated to be decreased by one level (step S8), the font is returned to the typeface at the time of acceptance, and the process returns to the internal font set information search process in step S2 (step S8). S9). Also, step S6
If the font size changing process has not been performed immediately before, it is determined whether the designated typeface is Mincho type (step S1).
0), when it is not Mincho type, the process returns to the search process of the built-in font set information in step S2. When the designated typeface is Mincho typeface, the typeface is changed to the Gothic typeface, and the process returns to the search process for the built-in font set information in step S2 (step S1).
1).

By the above font selection processing, a font set that matches the font designation information input from the host computer 1 is stored in the internal font set information storage unit 12
In addition, if the font size is not stored in the external font set information storage unit 14, for example, if 48 dots and Mincho font are specified, there is no matching font set. Designated, and then the change of typeface to Gothic,
The font size change and the font change are sequentially specified repeatedly, and when the font size becomes the minimum, the change specification is stopped and the font set to be finally printed is selected and confirmed. As mentioned above, when 48 dots, Mincho type is specified, even if the matching font set does not exist in the internal font set and the external font set, 24 dots, Mincho type will be selected finally. The printing process is executed, and a font set closer to the designated font is automatically selected and printed without stopping the printing process.

Therefore, in the print control device 3, even if the internal font set and the external font set are changed or increased, the contents stored in the internal font set information storage unit 12 and the external font set information storage unit 14 are changed or increased. It is possible to deal with various font specifications by itself, and it is possible to significantly reduce the development cost of the print control device 3 which was conventionally developed exclusively for the connected printer 4. Even if there is no designated font, it is possible to continue printing with a font close to the designated font without stopping the printing process, and it is possible to provide a highly versatile print control device 3.

In the above embodiment, when the print control device 3 does not have a designated font, the process of automatically selecting a font set closer to the designated font is always executed. However, this font selection processing function is activated. If the host computer 1 can be instructed, the user can set not to activate the font selection processing function in advance when the user does not want to print with a font set other than the specified font set. The font selection processing function of the present invention can be used more effectively.

[0029]

According to the present invention, when the designated font is not set, the font information closer to the designated font can be selected and printed based on the font information stored in advance, and the set font can be changed or increased. It is possible to deal with the problem simply by changing or increasing the stored content of the font information, and it is possible to significantly reduce the development cost of the print control device and to make the print control device highly versatile. it can.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a printing system to which a print control device according to the present invention is applied.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing the contents of built-in font set information stored in a built-in font set information storage unit of FIG.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the content of external font set information stored in an external font set information storage unit of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of font selection processing executed by the print control apparatus according to the present embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Host computer 2 Bus 3 Print control device 4 Printer 11 Print control unit 12 Built-in font set information storage unit 13 External image font set storage unit 14 External font set information storage unit

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A designated font identification means for identifying font information such as a font face and size designated at the time of printing, a font storage means capable of setting a plurality of types of fonts, and a font set in the font storage means. Typeface,
An internal font information storage means for storing font information such as size; an external font information storage means for storing font information such as a font face and size set in an externally connected printer; and the designated font identification means. Based on the font information stored in the internal font information storage means and the external font information storage means, the identified designated font information is searched to see if the designated font is set. If not, the designated font information is used. Font selection means for selecting close font information, and a font corresponding to the font information selected by the font selection means is selected from the font storage means or the font set in the external printer to control the printing operation of the external printer. And a control means for And a print control device. 2. The font selecting means, when the font corresponding to the designated font is not set, searches the font information stored in the internal font information storing means and the external font information storing means in a predetermined order to perform the designation. The print control device according to claim 1, wherein font information closer to the font is selected.