JPH0651922A - Method and device for output - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To speedily recover the output device even when any fault is generated at the output device by easily catching the timing of recovery by outputting stored inside state information according to the analyzed result of an inputted command. CONSTITUTION:An information detection part 106 detects a state in the case of printing at a printing part 105. Printing part information is error information such as paper jamming, paper exhaustion or ink exhaustion. When input data are the inside state request command of an output device 1 as the result of analysis at a first analysis part 102, a transmitting data preparation part 107 prepares transmitting data, and a transmission part 108 transmits these transmitting data showing the inside state to a host computer 2. Further, a control part 109 controls respective processing parts constituting the output device 1 according to the control program of a ROM 11. When it is not an error, the output device 1 is transited between an on-line state and an off-line state each time an on-line switch 110 is pressed. Thus, the stored inside information is outputted according to the analyzed result of the inputted command.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an output method and an apparatus which are connected to an external device such as a host computer by a bidirectional communication method and form an image based on print data transmitted from the external device. Is.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Printing data is created by analyzing command format data transmitted from an external device such as a host computer connected by a cable and expanding the data into bitmap data. In the above configuration, the output device performs processing while transiting various internal states. This is, for example, a processable state (hereinafter, ready state), a paper jam (hereinafter, jam), no printing paper, no ink, and a development memory overflow. In addition, when a print-disabled state such as a normal jam or no paper occurs, the printer interrupts the print as an error state and cannot continue until recovery processing is performed by the user.

Such an internal state is displayed on a display panel, such as a liquid crystal (LCD) provided in the output device, as shown in FIG. In the configuration of the conventional example described above, the conventional output device has no way of recognizing the information about the internal state from the external device such as the host computer.

Further, since the conventional output device does not communicate with the external device in the offline state, there is no way to recognize the information regarding the internal state of the output device from the external device such as the host computer by using the transmission / reception data.

[0005]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In the above conventional example,
When the printer and the host computer are located apart from each other, the user cannot recognize that the printer is in the unprintable state, and the intended print result cannot be obtained forever.

In the above-mentioned conventional example, when the output device is in the off-line state, there is no access from the host computer, and it is necessary to go to a place where the output device is located and directly perform some scanning to the output device.

[0007]

In order to solve the above problems, the present invention inputs a print control command, analyzes the input command, stores the internal state information of the output device, and analyzes the print condition. According to a result, an output method and device for outputting the stored internal state information are provided.

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, preferably, the analysis includes checking whether there is an internal state information request command included in the print control command.

In order to solve the above problems, it is preferable to control the input of the print control command, the analysis of the command, and the output of the internal state information so that the output device can operate even when the output device is in the offline state. The output method according to claim 2.

[0010]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an example of an output device according to the present invention. In the figure, 1 is an output device described in this embodiment, and 2 is an external device such as a host computer or a terminal device. Reference numeral 101 is an input unit for receiving data transferred from the host computer 2. The host computer 2 and the output device 1 are RS232
It is assumed that the connection is made by a bidirectional communication protocol such as C.
Reference numeral 102 is a first analysis unit that analyzes the input data. A second analysis unit 103 analyzes input data other than the data analyzed by the analysis unit 1. Reference numeral 104 denotes a development unit that creates bitmap data for one page according to the input data when the analysis unit 2 determines that the input data is data related to printing or print control. A printing unit 105 prints the bitmap data on a printing paper. In the process of the printing unit 105, the bitmap data is converted into a form suitable for printing by the print head, the print paper is fed, the print data is transmitted to the print head, and the print paper is fed. , The process of ejecting the printing paper and moving the print head to the home position. An information detection unit 106 detects various states when the printing unit performs printing. The printing unit information is error information such as paper jam, no paper, or no ink, and head information such as whether the print head is at the home position. 107 is the first analysis unit 102
It is a transmission data generation unit for generating transmission data when the result input data analyzed by is an internal state request command of the output device. Reference numeral 108 denotes a transmission unit for transmitting the transmission data indicating the internal state of the output device to the host computer 2. Reference numeral 109 denotes a control unit that controls each processing unit that constitutes the output device according to the control program of the ROM 111. Reference numeral 110 denotes a switch included in the output device, which is an online switch used by the user to switch between an online state and an offline state. Reference numeral 111 denotes a ROM (Read Only Memory) that stores a control program of a flowchart described below and the like. Reference numeral 112 denotes a status storage unit for storing an internal state (hereinafter, status) of the output device, which is composed of a RAM. Reference numeral 113 is a display unit for displaying the internal state of the output device. Reference numeral 114 denotes a ROM, which is a character string storage unit for preparing and storing a plurality of character strings for display on the display unit 113 in advance. An example of storage is shown in FIG.
Reference numeral 115 denotes a currently displayed character string storage unit for storing the character string currently displayed on the display unit 113, which is composed of a RAM.

In the output device of the present embodiment having the above configuration, the processing steps for the output device to shift to the online and offline states are shown in the flowchart of FIG. 2 and will be described below.

In step 11, it is judged whether or not an error such as a lack of ink or a jam has occurred in the output device. This is performed by referring to the status flag of the form shown in FIG. 3 created by the printing unit information detection unit 106 described later.
If even one of the left three bits in FIG. 3 is ON, it is in an error state. Step 12 if no error
At, it is determined whether or not the online switch 110 has been pressed by the user. When there is no error, the output device transits between the online state and the offline state each time the online switch is pressed. If it has not been pressed, online processing is performed in step 13, and the process returns to step 11. The online processing will be described later. If an error is judged in step 11 or step 1
When it is determined that the online switch is pressed in 2, the process shifts to offline processing. In step 14, the external device is notified that normal data transmission is prohibited. For example, in the case of RS232C, this is a xoff data transmission or transmission prohibition command by a DTR signal. In step 15, offline processing is performed. The offline processing will be described later. In step 16, as in step 12, it is determined whether or not the online switch has been pressed. If it has not been pressed, the process returns to step 15, and if it has been pressed, the process proceeds to online processing. Step 1
In step 4, the external device is notified that normal data transmission is permitted. This is xon for RS232C, for example
This is a data transmission or transmission permission command by a DTR signal.
Thereafter, the process returns to step 11 and the above-mentioned processing is performed. If the error is not canceled here, the process proceeds to step 14 again due to the error determination in step 11. Therefore, normally, the user releases the error and then presses the online switch to go online. The output device transits between the online state and the offline state along the above flow.

The status flag to be referred to when judging an error in step 11 is constructed as shown in FIG.
It is stored in the status storage unit 112. The process of creating the status flag is performed by the printing unit information detection unit 106 periodically detecting information in the printing unit 105. This status flag creation processing will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG.

First, at step 100, it is judged whether or not a jam has occurred. There are various possible methods for detecting jams, but they are not mentioned here. If a jam has occurred, the jam bit of the status shown in FIG. 3 is turned on in step 101. Similarly, the absence of paper or the absence of ink is detected in steps 102 to 105. In step 106, it is determined whether or not the print head is capping. As described above, this output device performs printing by the ink jet method using liquid ink, and the print head is composed of a plurality of ultra-fine nozzles. Therefore, in order to prevent the ink in the nozzles from drying, the print head needs to move to the home position at the left end as shown in FIG. 12 and perform capping except during printing. The user preferably confirms the capping state and turns off the power of the output device. Therefore, this information also informs the user as status information. If capping is in progress, the capping bit is turned on in step 107. In step 108, it is judged whether or not the memory necessary for expanding the bitmap data for printing can be secured. If the memory cannot be secured, the memory over bit is turned on in step 109. The status is configured by the above-described processing flow.

The flowchart shown in FIG. 5 shows the processing in the online state of step 13 in the flowchart of FIG. 2, and is a flowchart for inputting data, outputting one page, or responding.

First, in step 30, the transmission data from the host computer is input by the input unit 101. The input data at this time is character data, and various print control commands for forming a print page,
Further, it is a status request command for requesting transmission of the internal state of the output device. The command has a form as shown in FIG. 6 and is composed of three parts of a command bit, a parameter and a terminator. Normally, there are multiple command bits (1-
It is composed of a combination of (3) command bytes and indicates the type of command. The parameters specify the details of the command, and indicate the end of the command by the terminator. When there are a plurality of parameters, the parameters can be connected by separating them with a separator as shown in FIG. The command types include, for example, print position designation, color designation, character size, line spacing designation, page break, and status request. In step 31, the first analysis unit 102 analyzes only the command types related to the status request. This judgment is made by referring to the command bites mentioned above. If it is not a status request command, it is judged as print data or print control data and the process proceeds to step 33. In step 33, the second analysis unit 103 analyzes the command, performs color processing in accordance with the command, and in step 34, the expansion unit 104 creates bitmap data for printing. At this time, four types of bitmap data are created according to YMCK. When the print data has been created, printing is performed in step 35. Printing is performed by the following procedure. That is, the bitmap data created in step 34 is printed by the printing unit 10.
5, the print head is converted into a form suitable for printing. The suitable form here depends on the shape of the print head. For example, when the print head has 64 nozzles in vertical direction, the above-mentioned bid map data is 6 from the top.
It is divided into blocks of 4 rasters each. After converting the data, the printing unit 105 feeds the printing paper, transmits the data block to the printing head, and drives the printing head to print on the printing paper. The printing unit 105 then feeds the paper by the height of the head (64 dots in this case). After repeating a series of these operations (that is, data block transfer, printing, paper feeding) for one page, the printing unit 10
The sheet 5 is ejected, and the printing for one page is completed.

In step 37, the internal state of the output device is displayed on the panel.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of the display process shown in step 37. In step 300, the display unit 113 refers to the jam bit in the status storage unit 112. If the bit is ON, the character string indicating the jam state in the character string storage unit 114 is stored in the currently displayed character string storage unit 115 in step 301. Make a copy. An example of the character string storage unit is shown in FIG. In this way, a character string is assigned to a fixed address in the ROM so that the character string corresponding to each bit in the status storage unit 112 can be uniquely determined. For example, in the case of a jam, a 16-byte character string starting from the 16th byte from the start address of the character string storage unit is targeted. The method of storing the character string in the character string storage unit is not limited here, but any structure may be used as long as the character string corresponding to the status can be searched as described above. Current display character string storage unit 1
The selected character string is copied to 15 as described above. After copying, the character string stored in the currently displayed character string storage unit 115 is displayed on the LCD in step 310 through step 309. An example of the display at the time of jam is shown in FIG. Thus, the status displayed on the display unit is unique. That is, if the jam bit is not ON in step 300, the paperless bit in the status storage section is referred to in step 302. If the bit is ON, the character string paperless character string in the character string storage section is read as in step 301. After copying to the current display character string storage, step 3
Proceed to 10 to display the character string. At this time, only the paper-free bit is displayed at the same time as the paper-free bit is turned on. Similarly, evaluation is made in step 304 to step 307 and displayed. In step 308, it is determined that none of the bits in the status storage section is ON, and since this is in the printable state, the ready character string is selected and copied to the currently displayed character string storage section. In this way, the display is performed according to the priority order depending on the evaluation order of each bit in the status storage section.

Displaying only one status is for preventing the display area from running out of space. If the display area is sufficiently large, all the statuses that have occurred are displayed in the current display character string. It may be stored and displayed on a disk, which is not against the intent of the present invention.

If the input data analyzed in step 12 of FIG. 2 is a status request command, a response process to the external device is performed in step 16.

If there is a status request command in the command analysis 1 of step 31, a response process to the external device is performed in step 36. A flow chart showing the response process is shown in FIG.

In step 600, the command part is transmitted. As described above, this is a plurality of bytes indicating the type of command of the form shown in FIG. 6, and indicates the status information in this case. The parameter spans multiple bytes when multiple bits indicating the status are ON. Therefore, the data is transmitted in a form using a separator as shown in FIG. The transmission is performed by the transmission unit 108,
Data is transferred to the host computer 2 via the communication cable. In step 601, it is determined whether the jam bit is ON. If it is ON, a parameter indicating jam (1 in this case) is transmitted in step 602. If it is determined in step 601 that there is no jam, or after the processing in step 602, it is similarly determined in step 603 whether or not the paper-out bit is set. If it is set, in step 604 a parameter indicating paper-out (in this case 2 However, if the parameter indicating the jam has already been transmitted at this time, the separator (in this case, a semicolon) is transmitted, and then the parameter without paper is transmitted. Similarly, in steps 605 to 608, the information regarding no ink and capping is transmitted.
Step 6 when all status bits have been evaluated
At 09, the terminator section is transmitted to indicate the end of status information transmission.

The flowchart of FIG. 11 shows the processing in the off-line state of the output device. The processing in the off-line state is the same as the online processing flow shown in FIG. 5, except that steps 33 to 35 are omitted. Therefore, in the offline state, normal analysis of print data, development of the data, and printing are not performed. The print data input in step 50 is the data transmitted in the data transmission prohibited state because the output device is in the offline state. That is, the status request command is executed in a form beyond the normal communication agreement.
02 provides a means for analyzing such a special command regardless of whether the output device is in the online state or the offline state. Steps 51 to 54 are exactly the same as steps 31, 32, 36, and 37 in the online processing described above.

The host computer recognizes the status of the output device by receiving and analyzing the command. Therefore, needless to say, the host computer also needs devices corresponding to the input unit 101 and the analysis unit 102 of the present output device. The host computer periodically sends a status request command to the printer at a fixed cycle to obtain status information. Alternatively, if the printer detects an error occurrence without requesting the host computer, the information may be automatically transmitted to the host computer.

FIG. 12 shows an example of status transmission / reception between the host computer and the output device. Here, it is assumed that the output device is head-capping without ink. That is, when the host issues a status request command [esc] a5n, the output device (offline in this case) processes by the above-described processing, and [esc] b3; 4n is transmitted according to the status information. Where [esc]
As described above, b is a command bit, 3; 4 is a parameter and a separator, and n is a terminator.

Upon receiving the status, the host computer displays a display as shown in FIG. 9 on a display device such as a CRT.

The user visually checks the CRT to recognize that the output device is in the ink-free state and the capping state, and refills the output device with ink or turns off the power.

As a response process to the status request, in addition to the process shown in the flowchart of FIG.
It is also possible to perform management using the memory address in the current display character string storage unit 115. This processing is shown in the flowchart of FIG. 14 and will be described below.

In step 400, the command part is transmitted. As described above, this is a byte representing the type of command of the form shown in FIG. 6, and in this case indicates status information. Since the parameter is a character string, it spans multiple bytes. Therefore, the data is transmitted in a form using a separator as shown in FIG. Transmission is performed by the transmission unit 108, and data is transferred to the host computer 2 via the communication cable. In step 401, the start address of the currently displayed character string storage section is assigned to the pointer ptr. In step 402, it is evaluated whether or not the transmission of all character strings is completed. This is 1 if the character string is fixed at 16 characters
It is an evaluation of whether or not the loop shown after 6 times has passed,
If the character string has a format ending with NULL data, it is an evaluation of whether the content indicated by ptr is NULL. If not, it is evaluated in step 403 whether the character is the first parameter. This is for separator transfer. It is not necessary to send the separator before the first parameter as shown in FIG. 6 (b). Step 404
Then, send the separator before the second and subsequent parameters. In step 405, one byte of the character at the address currently pointed to by ptr is transmitted. In step 406, p
The value of tr is incremented and the process returns to step 402 and the evaluation is performed. If it is determined in step 402 that the transmission of all the characters in the currently displayed character string storage section has been completed, then in step 407 the terminator section is transmitted to indicate the end of status information transmission.

The host computer recognizes the status of the output device by receiving and parsing the command from the output device. Therefore, it goes without saying that the host computer also needs devices corresponding to the input unit and the analysis unit of the present output device. The host computer periodically sends a status request command to the printer at a fixed cycle to obtain status information. Alternatively, if the printer detects an error occurrence without requesting the host computer, the information may be automatically transmitted to the host computer.

When a jam character string "PAPER JAM" is transmitted from the output device according to the status information, the host computer displays a display as shown in FIG.
It is displayed on a display device such as RT.

The user visually recognizes that the output device is in the jammed state by looking at the CRT and cancels the jammed state of the output device.

[0034]

As described above, according to the present invention, the user can recognize the information about the internal state of the output device on the host computer, so that the recovery timing can be easily achieved.

Therefore, even if a failure occurs in the output device, the output can be quickly recovered and the intended print result can be obtained.

As described above, according to the present invention, the user can recognize the information about the internal state of the output device on the host computer regardless of whether the output device is online or offline. Becomes

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of an output device according to an embodiment.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart of the overall processing of the output device.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a configuration example of a status flag.

FIG. 4 is a roule chart of status flag creation processing.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of processing in an online state.

FIG. 6 is a command example diagram.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart of a process of displaying the internal state of the output device.

FIG. 8 is an exemplary diagram of a character string stored in a character string storage unit.

FIG. 9 is an exemplary diagram showing an internal state display of the output device.

FIG. 10 is a first flowchart of response processing to a status request.

FIG. 11 is a flowchart of processing in an offline state.

FIG. 12 is a diagram illustrating an example of transmission / reception between a host computer and an output device and display of a host

FIG. 13 is a conceptual diagram showing the movement of the print head.

FIG. 14 is a second flowchart of response processing for a status request.

FIG. 15 is a view showing an example of status information display on the host computer.

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A print control command is input, the input command is analyzed, internal state information of an output device is stored, and the stored internal state information is output according to the analyzed result. And output method. 2. The output method according to claim 1, wherein the analysis includes checking whether there is an internal state information request command included in the print control command. 3. The print control command input, the command analysis, and the internal state information output are controlled so as to be operable even when the output device is in an offline state. The output method described. 4. An input unit for inputting a print control command, a command analysis unit for analyzing the input command, an internal state information storage unit for storing internal state information of the output device, and an internal state information storage unit for storing the internal state information of the output device according to the analysis result. And an internal state information output means for outputting the stored internal state information. 5. The output device according to claim 4, wherein the analysis of the command analysis unit includes checking for the presence or absence of an internal state information request command included in the print control command. 6. The output device according to claim 4, wherein the input device, the command analysis device, and the internal state information output device are controlled so as to be operable even when the output device is in an offline state. .