JPH0747741A - Printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To confirm the remaining capacity of the form memory for registering form independently and simply by a printer without reference to a host computer. CONSTITUTION:In a form memory 24, data on the form used at the printing with a printer 12 is registered. Whenever a constant period timer 44 outputs a calculation pointing signal 45, a remaining capacity calculating part 43 respectively calculates the number of bytes in the registered data region occupied in the form memory 24 and in the whole region so as to calculate the number of the bytes in the remaining capacity or the percentage of the remaining capacity to the whole capacity for sending it as the data 39 for displaying the calculated result of the remaining capacity to a displaying controlling part 37, resulting in displaying the remaining capacity on a display 27.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printer capable of printing on a sheet of paper by combining ordinary printing information consisting of characters and the like, and particularly, by registering some forms in advance in this printer. The present invention relates to a printer in which these can be appropriately selected and used.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a printing job for printing forms including ruled lines such as printing of forms, some of these standard forms are registered in advance on the printer side and these forms are used for printing. Often printers are used which allow the user to select the desired one of them. On the host computer side connected to such a printer, when sending print data such as characters, it is checked whether the form used for printing is registered in the printer, and if it is registered, the form is displayed. The sending of form data is omitted.
Therefore, by registering as much form data as possible on the printer side, the frequency of transferring the form data at the time of printing is reduced, and efficient printing work can be performed.

However, since many of the forms are composed of complicated line drawings and bit patterns, each form data often has a relatively large amount of data. Therefore, it is not realistic to register all the forms that are supposed to be used in the printer, because of the memory capacity. In addition, since new forms are created one after another along with the print contents, it is impossible to register all these forms in the future. Therefore, a form is adopted in which a newly-needed form is registered while appropriately deleting those that are no longer needed to be used or those that are rarely used.

[0004]

In order to perform such form registration management, it is necessary to know at any time how many forms can be registered in the printer. Therefore, there has been proposed a printer that prints out the remaining capacity as the amount by which the form can be further registered each time there is a request. However, in this printer, the paper is ejected from the printer to check the remaining capacity, so not only the operation up to that is troublesome, but also
It took some time to know the remaining capacity, which was a cause of prolonging the work time required to register the form data.

On the other hand, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 63-59562 discloses a technique for displaying the current degree of registration achievement with respect to the total amount of forms to be registered on a display when registering forms. By sequentially displaying the registration status in this way, it is possible to confirm whether or not a predetermined form has been registered, and it is possible to know that registration could not be completed when the remaining capacity is exhausted during registration. . However, in the technique described in this publication, the registration achievement level is output during the work of registration. For this reason, even when the remaining capacity is small, it is not known in advance, and this may occur when the registration work is started. In such a case, registration could not be performed due to insufficient remaining capacity, and there was a case where the work ended up being useless despite the involvement of the host computer. Therefore,
It is necessary to check the remaining capacity before starting the form registration work, but in this case, there is a problem that the labor-intensive work is required as described above.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a printer which can easily check the remaining capacity of the form memory without the involvement of the host computer.

[0007]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, a desired form is appropriately selected from predetermined forms and the form is combined with other print information such as characters to print. Form data storage means for storing the form data representing the, and the remaining capacity obtained by subtracting the capacity of the form data currently stored in the form data storage means from the predetermined capacity autonomously at a predetermined timing. A remaining capacity calculating means for calculating,
A printer is provided with a display for visually displaying the calculated remaining capacity.

That is, according to the first aspect of the invention, the remaining capacity calculated in bytes is autonomously calculated on the printer side by subtracting the capacity currently used from the total capacity of the form data storage means, for example, at a fixed cycle. The above-mentioned object is achieved by displaying on the display in units such as.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, a predetermined fixed form is appropriately selected, and the form data representing the form is stored in order to print the form in combination with other print information such as characters. A capacity of the form data storage means, a memory usage ratio calculation means for autonomously calculating the ratio of the form data currently stored in the form data storage means to the predetermined capacity at a predetermined timing, and the calculated memory The printer is provided with a display that visually displays the usage rate.

That is, according to the second aspect of the invention, the printer side autonomously obtains the ratio of the currently used capacity to the total capacity of the form data storage means, for example, at a fixed cycle, and displays this on the display, for example, as a percentage. In order to achieve the above-mentioned object.

[0011]

EXAMPLES The present invention will be described in detail below with reference to examples.

FIG. 2 shows a printing system including a printer and a host computer according to an embodiment of the present invention. In this embodiment, the host computer 1
1 and the printer 12 are connected via a cable 13, and necessary data such as print data and form data is transferred from the host computer 11 to the printer 12. In the print system, it is not necessary that the host computer 11 and the printer 12 are associated with each other in a one-to-one manner like this.
It may be configured to be connected to one or a plurality of printers via an AN (local area network).

FIG. 1 shows the essential parts of the printer of this embodiment as functional blocks. The printer 12
The interface unit 21 connected to the cable is provided. The form data 22 output from the interface unit 21 is sent to the form data processing unit 23 and registered in the form memory 24. The printer 12 includes a keyboard 26 as an input unit and a display 27 as an output unit. When deleting an unnecessary form stored in the form memory 24, a form deletion request is keyed in from the keyboard 26. The key input data 28 output from the keyboard 26 is sent to the input control unit 29, is decoded, and the deletion instruction data 31 is output. The deletion instruction data 31 is input to the form deletion unit 32.

The form deletion unit 32 inputs the form search instruction signal 34 to the form search unit 35 accordingly.
Based on this, the form search unit 35 determines the form memory 24.
Search inside and read all the form names registered in it. These form names are input to the display control unit 37 as the search result display data 36. The display control unit 37 includes key input display data 38 output from the input control unit 29 based on the key input data 28,
The remaining capacity calculation result display data 39 described below is also input. The display control unit 37 uses the display data 36, 38, 39 to display data 41.
Is generated and is supplied to the display 27 so that the necessary display is performed.

When all the form names stored in the form memory 24 are sent for deletion, the display controller 37
Causes the display 27 to display a list of these form names. The operator checks whether or not the form name to be deleted exists in this, and if there is, the operator inputs the instruction data to delete it from the keyboard 26. When the form deletion unit 32 receives this, it deletes the corresponding form stored in the form memory 24.
When a form is deleted from the form memory 24, an operation of advancing the address of the form registered in the address after that to the address of the deleted form is performed. This is for easily calculating the remaining capacity of the form memory 24 as will be described later, and is not always necessary.

By the way, the printer 12 is provided with a remaining capacity calculator 43 and a fixed cycle timer 44 for measuring a predetermined cycle. The fixed cycle timer 44 generates a calculation instruction signal 45 at a fixed cycle and inputs it to the remaining capacity calculation unit 43. Remaining capacity calculator 4
3 receives the supply of the calculation instruction signal 45, calculates the remaining capacity of the foam memory 24, sends the result as the remaining capacity calculation result display data 39 to the display control section 37 as described above, and displays it on the display 27. It is designed to display the capacity.

FIG. 3 shows a circuit configuration of this printer. The printer 12 includes a CPU (central processing unit) 51. The CPU 51 is connected to each unit in the printer 12 via a bus 52 such as a data bus. Of these, the ROM 53 is a read-only memory that stores a program for controlling each unit of the printer 12. The work memory 54 is a random access memory that temporarily stores various data. Interface unit 21, form memory 24, fixed-cycle timer 4
4, the keyboard 26 and the display 27 are as described above. The display 27 may be a CRT or a liquid crystal display or other display. The print control circuit 56 controls the print unit 57 to perform combined printing of forms and characters.

FIG. 4 shows a data format of form transfer data for sending a form from the host computer to this printer. Form transfer data 6
1 is a form start signal 62 indicating the start of the form,
Form name 63 and form data 6 of the form name
4 and a form end signal 65 indicating the end of the form are arranged in a line in this order.

FIG. 5 shows the control contents of the interface section when the form transfer data is transferred to the printer. When the interface section 21 receives the form start signal 62 (step S101; Y), the following data (form name 63 and form data 64) is stored in the working memory 54 which constitutes a part of the form data processing section 23. It is temporarily stored (step S102). This storing operation continues until the form end signal 65 in the form transfer data 61 shown in FIG. 4 is received (step S103; N). When the form end signal 65 is received (Y), the interface unit 21 sends a form end notification signal indicating that the reception of the form is completed to the form data processing unit 23 (step S104), and then the next again. Form transfer data 6
It will wait for the arrival of 1 (return).

FIG. 6 shows the registration control of the form data processing unit. If the form end notification signal is sent from the interface unit 21 (step S
201; Y), the form data processing unit 23 stores the form name 63 and the form data 64 stored in the work memory 54 in the form memory 24 (step S2).
02). At this time, these data are stored in the area immediately after the previously stored form data or the like by the thick-line method.

FIG. 7 shows how data is stored in the form memory. In the form memory 24, data in which the form name 63 and the form data 64 (FIG. 4) are set as one set from the first address A _{0 in a} byte unit are sequentially stored without a gap.
In this example, the first form name and form data 7
1 ₁ is stored first, then the second form name and form data 71 ₂ is stored, and then the third form name and form data 71 ₃ is stored. The form end mark 72 indicating the end position of the storage of the form is stored at the address A _N immediately after the data currently stored. A memory end mark 73 indicating the end position in the memory area is stored at the final address A _M of the form memory 24.

Form name 6 is newly added as described in FIG.
3 and the form data 64 are registered from the address (address A _{N in} this example) where the form end mark 72 in FIG. 7 is stored.

FIG. 8 shows a flow for calculating the remaining capacity of the form memory. First CPU 51
(FIG. 3) is a storage area “AD in the work memory 54.
The start address of the form memory 24 in R "(A _{0 in} FIG. 7)
Is stored (step S301). Also, "0" is stored as an initial value in another storage area "CNT" in the work memory 54 (step S302). When the preparation for calculating the remaining capacity is completed in this way, the form end mark
2 and the memory end mark 73 are sequentially detected. If neither of these marks 72, 73 is detected (steps S303, S304; N), the storage area "C
NT "is incremented by 1 (byte) (step S30
5) Further, the address of the storage area "ADR" is similarly incremented by 1 (step S306).

It is assumed that the form memory 24 is in the storage state shown in FIG. In this case, the form end mark 72 is detected immediately after the search for the third form name and the form data 71 ₃ is completed (step S304; Y). Previous storage area "CNT"
Is the total number of bytes in which the data regarding the form in the form memory 24 is stored (step S3).
07).

Then, as a result of the scanning of the form memory 24, the memory end mark 73
Is detected (step S303; Y), the value of the storage area "CNT" at that time becomes the capacity of the entire form memory 24 (step S308).

FIG. 9 shows the display control after the remaining capacity is calculated. The CPU 51 (FIG. 3) checks the display flag stored in a predetermined area of the work memory 54 and determines whether or not this indicates a percentage display (step S401). That is, in the printer 12, if the operator desires to display the remaining capacity as a percentage, the remaining capacity can be displayed as a percentage on the assumption that an instruction therefor is input from the keyboard 26. ing.
In other cases, the remaining capacity of the form memory 24 is displayed in the number of bytes.

When the operator desires a percentage display (step S401; Y), the CPU 51 calculates the ratio of the remaining capacity to the total capacity of the form memory 24, and multiplies this by "100" to obtain the remaining capacity percentage. Obtain (step S402). Here, the remaining capacity is the number of bytes used for registering the form from the total capacity of the form memory 24. Then, the calculated numerical value is sent to the display control unit 37 as the display data 36, and the display 2
No. 7 is displayed (step S403).

On the other hand, when the percentage display is not instructed (step S401; N), the CPU 51 subtracts the number of bytes used for registering the form from the total capacity (bytes) of the form memory 24, and the remaining amount. The capacity is obtained as the number of bytes (step S404). Then, this is similarly displayed on the display 27 (step S403).

10 and 11 show display examples on the display. Of these, FIG. 10 shows an example in which the percentage display is performed.
It can be seen that the remaining capacity of 4 is 99%. Figure 1
1 indicates the remaining capacity in bytes, and in this example, 999 bytes remain.

In the embodiment, the fixed-cycle timer 44 activates the remaining capacity calculation unit 43 at fixed intervals to calculate the remaining capacity and sequentially displays the remaining capacity on the display 27. When it is unlikely that the remaining capacity of the form memory 24 will fluctuate, such as during the work of printing, or when it is necessary for the display 27 to display other contents. Of course, it is not necessary to display the remaining capacity.

[0031]

As described above, according to the first and second aspects of the invention, the printer autonomously calculates the remaining capacity of the form data storage means and displays it on the display, for example, at a fixed cycle. It was to be. Therefore,
It is possible to check the remaining capacity at each time on the printer side without wasting paper. Therefore, the registered contents of the form data storage means on the printer side can be organized before transferring the form data from the host computer, and it is possible to prevent useless transfer work that makes registration impossible as a result.

According to the first aspect of the present invention, since the remaining capacity of the form data storage means is displayed as it is in a predetermined unit such as a byte unit, it is related to the data regarding the form to be transferred. It is possible to appropriately determine whether or not the transfer is possible.

Further, according to the second aspect of the present invention, since the usage rate of the form data storage means is displayed on the display, even a person who does not know details such as the size of data regarding the form can use this form data. There is an advantage that management such as registration and deletion with respect to the storage means can be easily performed.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram functionally showing a main part of a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a system configuration diagram showing a print system including a printer and a host computer in the present embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the circuit configuration of the printer of this embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a data configuration diagram of form transfer data sent from a host computer.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the control contents of the interface unit when the form transfer data is transferred to the printer in this embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a state of registration control of the form data processing unit in the present embodiment.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram showing how data is stored in a form memory in this embodiment.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart showing a state of control for calculating the remaining capacity of the form memory in the present embodiment.

FIG. 9 is a flowchart showing a state of display control of the remaining capacity in the present embodiment.

FIG. 10 is a plan view of the display in a state where the percentage display of the remaining capacity is performed in the present embodiment.

FIG. 11 is a plan view of the display in a state where the remaining capacity is displayed in units of bytes in this embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

11 ... Host computer, 12 ... Printer, 21 ... Interface section, 23 ... Form data processing section, 24 ...
Form memory, 26 ... Keyboard, 27 ... Display, 37 ... Display control section, 39 ... Remaining capacity calculation result display data, 43 ... Remaining capacity calculating section, 44 ... Fixed period timer, 45
... Calculation instruction signal, 51 ... CPU, 53 ... ROM, 54 ...
Working memory, 71 ... (1 set) form name and form data, 72 ... Form end mark, 73 ...
Memory end mark

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A form of a predetermined capacity for storing form data representing these forms in order to appropriately select a desired form from predetermined forms and print it by combining this with other print information such as characters. A data storage means, a remaining capacity calculation means for autonomously calculating the remaining capacity obtained by subtracting the capacity of the form data currently stored in the form data storage means from the predetermined capacity at a predetermined timing, and the calculated remaining capacity And a display for visually displaying the printer. 2. A form data storage means having a predetermined capacity for appropriately selecting a predetermined fixed form and storing form data representing these forms for printing by combining this with other print information such as characters. And a memory usage ratio calculation means for autonomously calculating at a predetermined timing the ratio of the form data currently stored in the form data storage means to the predetermined capacity, and visually displaying the calculated memory usage ratio. A printer comprising: