JPH06143758A - Printer controller - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide a printing controller capable of properly conducting printing even with an input of page discription language information requiring a long time in the development to a bit image. CONSTITUTION:With an input of printing information to a communication protocol control part 7 of a printer controller 6, the communication protocol control part 7 transmits the printing information 5 to an image generation part 8. The image generation part 8 converts the inputted printing information 5 to bit image information 9 of a format required by a recorder 22 and outputs the bit image information 9. The bit image information 9 is transmitted to the recorder 22 through an interface 10 at an appropriate timing. An arithmetic operation part 20 estimates a time required for developing the information using parameters, such as a data amount (the number of bytes), a type of language (post script, inter press, HPGL etc.), the presence/absence of KANJI characters, and graphic information. If the estimated operation amount is larger than a predetermined amount, a signal 21 is outputted for adjusting a timing of a paper supply instruction.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printer control device, and more particularly to a control device for a page description language printer that receives page description language information.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, an increasing number of page description language compatible printers record information from a page description language compatible file.

First, an environment in which the printer compatible with the page description language is used will be described with reference to FIG. In the figure, 1a to 1c are clients such as workstations, 2a to 2c are page description language information output from the clients, 3 is a network, 4 is a printer compatible with the page description language, and 5 is a page description input to the printer 4. This is print information of language information.

The printer 4 comprises a printer control device 6 and a recording device 12. Reference numeral 13 indicates a printed sheet.

Next, the detailed configuration of the printer control device 6 in the printer for page description language will be described with reference to FIG. In the figure, 7 is a communication protocol control unit,
Reference numeral 8 is an image generator, 10 is an interface with the recording device 12, and 11 is a disk. Further, 9 is bit image information output from the image generating unit 8,
Reference numeral 14 is a paper feed instruction signal output from the communication protocol control unit 7.

Next, the operation of the conventional page description language printer 4 having the above construction will be described.

When the print information 5 is input to the communication protocol control unit 7 of the printer control device 6, the communication protocol control unit 7 sends the print information 5 to the image generation unit 8 and instructs the recording device 12 to feed paper. The signal 14 is output.

The image generator 8 converts the input print information 5 into bit image information in the format required by the recording device 12 and outputs it. The bit image information 9 converted by the image generator 8 is sent to the recording device 12 via the interface 10 at an appropriate timing. The bit image information 9 is temporarily stored in the disk 11 as needed.

Upon receiving the paper feed instruction signal 14 from the printer control device 6, the recording device 12 feeds one sheet of paper.
The fed paper is sent to the print position at an appropriate timing, and the bit image information input at the appropriate timing is printed at the print position. Then, the printed paper 13 is ejected.

[0010]

In the conventional printer control device 6 described above, the processing time per page in the image generating section 8, that is, the conversion time into a bit image, is greatly changed depending on the contents of the page description language information. different.

Therefore, a plurality of pages (for example, 7-1
In a high-speed printer that continuously captures two sheets of recording paper into the printing mechanism of the recording device 12 and performs high-speed printing, page description language information that requires a long time to develop a bit image in the image generation unit 8 is generated. When it comes, the bit image development is not completed by the recording timing, and the taken-in paper is output without being printed.

When such a situation occurs, conventionally, a measure has been taken to discard the paper which is output without being printed and to perform the processing again. With this measure, it has become possible to avoid the situation where incomplete print information is output, but there are problems that the processing time is delayed and it takes time to process the discarded paper.

Further, in the case of double-sided printing, if the above-mentioned trouble occurs on the back side even though the front side is printed well, this sheet will be discarded, and printing will be performed again from the front side information. There is a problem that not only is it troublesome to control, but also processing time is wasted and time is wasted.

As the prior art related to the present invention,
For example, JP-A-1-109422 and JP-A-2-71
There is one disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 20.

An object of the present invention is to eliminate the above-mentioned problems of the prior art and to provide a print control device capable of printing correctly even if page description language information that requires a long time for bit image development is input. .

[0016]

In order to achieve the above object, the invention of claim 1 takes print information described in a page description language as input, develops the print information into a bit image, and prints it in a printer. In a printer control device for sending to a mechanism, a work amount predicting means for predicting a work amount required for developing the print information into a bit image for each page, and when the predicted work amount exceeds a planned amount, It is characterized in that it is provided with a means for outputting a signal for adjusting the timing of feeding instruction.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, when the predicted work amount exceeds a predetermined work amount, the hardware or software resource in the printer control device necessary for bit image development is distributed based on the work amount. The feature is that it is equipped with a means for reworking.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, when the predicted amount of work exceeds a predetermined amount, means for distributing the work for developing the print information into bit images to a bit image developing means connected to a network. It is characterized in that it is equipped with.

[0019]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, when the amount of work required to develop the bit image is larger than the planned amount, the timing of the paper feed instruction is adjusted so that the bit image generation is completed. The paper feed timing can be synchronized.

According to the second and third aspects of the present invention, when the amount of work required to develop the bit image is larger than the predetermined amount, the work of developing the bit image is processed in parallel. It is possible to reduce the time required to deploy the.

[0021]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows a block diagram of a first embodiment of the present invention.

In the figure, reference numeral 20 is an arithmetic unit for performing an operation for predicting the amount of work for developing a file described in a page description language into a bit image, 21 is a paper feed instruction signal output from the arithmetic unit 20. 22 is the paper feed instruction signal 21
Is a recording device controlled by. Reference numerals other than these reference numerals indicate the same as or equivalent to those in FIG.

Next, the operation of the arithmetic unit 20 will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. The time taken to develop a file written in the page description language into a bit image varies greatly depending on its contents. Examples of this factor include the amount of data (the number of bytes), the language type (Postscript, Interpress, HPGL, etc.), the presence or absence of Chinese characters, and the presence or absence of graphics information.

The arithmetic unit 20 activates a program for predicting the time required for expansion using these factors as parameters. FIG. 2 shows a schematic flowchart of this program.

First, in step S1, the standard processing time required to develop one byte of Interpress character information is a unit time, and the standard processing time of the same graphics information is b.
Initialize as unit time. This standard processing time is uniquely determined by the performance of the hardware. Also, the standard processing time for alphabets and kana is initially set to 1 unit time. Here, the unit times a, b, and 1 are set as A, B, and C, respectively, where A is a standard processing time required for expansion per character information byte, B is a standard processing time of graphics information, and C is a standard processing time. The standard processing time for alphabet, kana, or kanji information is shown.

In step S2, it is determined whether the language is Interpress. If this determination is affirmative, the process proceeds to step S6, and if the determination is negative, the process proceeds to step S3.

In step S3, it is determined whether the language is Postscript. If this determination is affirmative, the process proceeds to step S5, and if not, that is, if the language is HPGL, the process proceeds to step S4.

In step S5, the processing time of the PostScript file for the Interpress file is 1.
6 times. That is, A = 1.6a and B = 1.6b. Further, in step S4, the processing time of the HPGL language for the Interpress file is doubled. That is, A = 2a and B = 2b.

As described above, in steps S2 to S5, the language type of the print information 5 is determined, and the standard processing time of character information and graphics information for the language type is determined.

In step S6, it is determined whether or not the print information 5 includes kanji information.
If the Chinese character information is included, the process proceeds to step S7 and the value of C is multiplied by 1.6. That is, the standard processing time of a document including 2-byte Kanji information is set to 1.6 times (C = 1.6) for alphabets and kana, and parameters are set.

When the parameter setting is completed as described above, the process proceeds to step S8, the character information amount is counted, and the count value is substituted into D. That is, D = text information amount.

Next, in step S9, the amount of graphics information is counted, and the count value is substituted into E. That is, E = the amount of graphics information.

In step S10, the predicted processing time T of the page description language 1 file input to the communication protocol control unit 7 is calculated by T = A × D × C + B × E. In step S11, the estimated processing time T is given to a system control program group (not shown) to generate the paper feed instruction signal 21.

Next, referring to FIGS. 3 and 4, the recording device 2
The configuration and operation of the main part of 2 will be described. FIG. 3 shows the recording device 22.
4 is a block diagram of a paper feed motor control unit included in FIG.
Shows a timing chart of signals of main parts of FIG.

In FIG. 3, reference numeral 23 is a paper feed timing generation timer, 24 is an AND gate, 25 is a flip-flop, 26 is a delay element, 27 is a driver, and 28 is a paper feed motor.

To one of the input terminals of the AND gate 24, the paper feed start signal a output from the paper feed timing generation timer 23 at a constant interval t1 as shown in FIG. 4 is input. The paper feed instruction signal 21 (hereinafter referred to as paper feed instruction signal b) is input to the other input terminal.

The paper feed instruction signal b is an H (high) level signal when the predicted processing time T is equal to or less than the constant time t1, but the predicted processing time T is longer than the constant time t1. Change to L (low) level before the timing of feeding the print information,
This L level is held for a time corresponding to the predicted processing time T.

As a result, the output signal c from the AND gate 24 is suppressed while the paper feed instruction signal b is at L level, and becomes as shown in FIG.

The flip-flop 25 is set by the rise of the signal c, and the output signal d of the flip-flop 25 becomes H level. The H-level signal d is input to the driver 27 and is also input to the delay element 26.
Therefore, the reset terminal of the flip-flop 25 is
The signal e is input after a certain period of time, and is reset by the rise of the signal e. Therefore, the H-level signal d is output from the flip-flop 25 for a certain period (= t2) to the driver 2
Type in 7.

The driver 27 drives the paper feed motor 28 while the signal d is at the H level. Therefore, the paper feed motor 28 operates for a certain period of time to feed paper, and then stops rotating.

As is clear from the above description, according to the present embodiment, when the predicted processing time T for developing the file of the page description language information, which is the print information, into the bit image is the fixed interval t1 or less, the paper feed is performed. When paper is fed by the paper feed start signal a output from the timing generation timer 23 and the predicted processing time T is longer than the constant interval t1,
Since the paper feed start signal a is thinned out and the paper feed timing is delayed, the problem that the fed paper is ejected without being printed at all is solved.

Next, a second embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 5 is a block diagram showing the configuration of this embodiment.

In the figure, reference numeral 30 is a calculation unit, 31a is an image generation unit, 31b to 31d are preliminary image generation units, and other symbols are the same as or equivalent to those in FIG. The number of the spare image generators 31b to 31d need not be three, and may be one, two, or more than three.

The structure of a specific example of the image generating section 31a will be described with reference to FIG. Image generator 31a
Is composed of a drawing chip 31a1, an address register 31a2 and a memory 31a3. The drawing chip 31a1 is composed of a CPU, a drawing control logic circuit, a floating point arithmetic chip and the like.

The spare image generators 31b to 31 are provided.
Although d may have the same configuration as the image generating unit 31a, it does not necessarily have to include all the hardware resources of the image generating unit 31a, and may be specified according to the required system performance. Only one may be provided.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described. The operation unit 30 operates in the same manner as described in the first embodiment, and calculates the predicted processing time T for expanding the file of page description language information into a bit image. Then, for a page larger than the constant interval t1 of the prediction processing time T, the spare image generating unit 3 is generated during the generation of the bit image of the previous page.
By driving 1b to 31d, bit image generation of the page is performed in parallel.

A specific example of the parallel processing of the bit image generation will be described with reference to FIG. In step S21,
A is initially set to 1. In step S22, it is judged whether or not the predicted processing time T is A times or more of the basic paper feed cycle t1. When this determination is affirmative, the process proceeds to step S23, and when this determination is negative, the process proceeds to step S25.

In step S23, it is determined whether the value of A is equal to the number of image generating units 31a to 31d. If the determination is negative, the process proceeds to step S24,
1 is added to A. On the other hand, when this judgment is positive,
It proceeds to step S25.

In step S25, one page of input data, that is, print information, is divided into A sets, and in step S26, A image generating units are activated, and the input data divided in step S25. Are assigned to each set. In step S27, the image has not been activated.
If there is a data generation section, this is allocated to the processing of the next page data and the preceding processing is started.

In step S28, it is judged whether or not there is an image generating portion whose operation has ended. If there is an image generating portion whose operation has ended, the operation proceeds to step S29 to end the operation. The generated image generating section is assigned to the processing of the next page data.

In step S30, it is determined whether or not the bit image development processing for the page has been completed.
If this determination is negative, the process returns to step S28 and the process is repeated. If the determination is affirmative, the process proceeds to step S31 to proceed to the process of the next page.

For example, the operation when the number of image generating units is four as shown in FIG. 5 and the predicted processing time T is 2.5 times the basic paper feeding cycle t1 will be described in detail. To explain, in step S22, it is determined whether or not the predicted processing time T is at least one time the basic paper feed cycle t1. This determination is affirmative, and step S23
Then, it is determined whether or not the value of A (= 1) is equal to the number of image generating units. This determination is negative, the process proceeds to step S24, 1 is added to A, A = 2, and the process returns to step S22.

Since it is assumed that T = 2.5t1 at this time, the determination in step S22 is affirmative, and the process proceeds to step S23 again. The determination in step S23 is also negative, A is set to 3 in step S24, and step S22
Return to again.

In step S22, the predicted processing time T
Is determined to be three times the basic paper feed period t1 or more. Therefore, this time, this determination is negative, and the process proceeds to step S25 to divide the input data into three sets.
In step S26, three image generating units are activated,
The input data divided into three sets are assigned to each set.

In step S27, one unstarted image generating section is allocated to the processing of the input data of the next page, and the preceding processing is started. Below, the above three images
The image generation unit processes the bit image development processing for one page in parallel.

As a result, the time required to complete the generation of the bit image of the page can be shortened, and the recording device 12
Even when the paper feed start signal a of the above is at the constant interval t1, the bit image development is completed by the recording timing, and the captured paper is printed.

Although a plurality of sets of image generating units are prepared in the above embodiment, instead of this, a software task for virtually generating images of a plurality of pages in parallel is prepared.
By managing the priority of each task, the time until the completion of bit image generation may be adjusted, or the hardware configuration and the software configuration may be combined.

Next, a third embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. In the figure, 9a is bit image information developed by the image generating unit 8, 9b is bit image information developed by the image generating unit of a printer (not shown) connected to the network 3 and sent back to the printer. This is image information. Other reference numerals indicate the same or equivalent parts as in FIG. 1 or FIG.

In the present embodiment, the arithmetic unit 20 calculates the prediction processing time T for expanding the file of the page description language information into a bit image, as in the first embodiment. Then, the page description language information is divided for pages whose predicted processing time T is larger than the predetermined interval t1. The divided first page description language information is expanded by the image generator 8 and the bit image information 9a is stored in the disk 11.

On the other hand, the divided second page description language information is sent to a printer (not shown) connected to the second page description language information via the communication protocol control unit 7 and the network 3, and the printer converts it into bit image information. expand.

The expanded bit image information 9b is returned via the network 3, sent to the disk 11 via the communication protocol control unit 7, and combined with the bit image information 9a.

In the present embodiment, as described above, for a file of page description language information having a large amount of information, this is divided and a part of it is expanded into bit image information by a printer connected to the network. Therefore, it is possible to shorten the time until the completion of the bit image generation, and the bit image development is completed by the recording timing of the recording device 12, and the captured paper is printed.

[0063]

As is apparent from the above description, according to the inventions of claims 1 to 3, a file described in the page description language corresponding to the page is converted into a bit image prior to the feeding instruction. Since the work amount for developing is predicted and when the work amount is larger than the planned amount, this is dealt with, so that there is an effect that the paper feed timing and the completion of bit image generation can be synchronized.

As a result, the conventional device has
It is possible to avoid problems such as discarding paper.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a main part of a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of this embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating an example of a paper feed timing generation unit of the recording apparatus.

FIG. 4 is a timing chart of signals of main parts of FIG.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an essential part of a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example of an internal configuration of an image generation unit.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart for explaining the operation of this embodiment.

FIG. 8 is a block diagram of an essential part of a third embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 9 is a diagram illustrating an environment in which a page description language compatible printer is used.

FIG. 10 is a block diagram showing a specific example of a conventional printer control device.

[Explanation of symbols]

7 ... Communication protocol control unit, 8, 31a to 31d ... Image generating unit, 20, 30 ... Computing unit, 22 ... Recording device,

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A printer control device adapted to input print information described in a page description language, develop the print information into a bit image, and send the bit image to a recording mechanism of a printer. A work amount predicting means for predicting a work amount required for developing for each page, and a means for outputting a signal for adjusting a timing of a sheet feeding instruction when the predicted work amount exceeds a predetermined amount are provided. Characteristic printer control device. 2. A printer controller configured to receive print information described in a page description language as input, develop the print information into a bit image, and send the bit image to a recording mechanism of a printer. A work amount predicting means for predicting a work amount required for developing for each page, and a printer control device in the printer controller required for bit image development based on the work amount when the predicted work amount exceeds a planned amount. A printer control device comprising means for redistributing hardware or software resources so as to shorten the time required to develop the bit image. 3. A printer controller for inputting print information described in a page description language, expanding the print information into a bit image, and sending the bit image to a recording mechanism of a printer. A work amount predicting means for predicting the work amount required for developing for each page, and when the predicted work amount exceeds a predetermined amount, the print information is developed into a bit image in a bit image developing means connected to a network. And a means for distributing the work to be performed to reduce the time required for developing the bit image.