JPH09200461A - Image reader - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enable plural users to share the image reader. SOLUTION: A memory card stored with a scan job command file is inserted into the PC card slot 89 of the image reader, a CPU 85 detects the memory card being inserted through a PC card controller 87, makes a search to check whether or not the scan job command file is present on the memory card, and analyzes the scan Job command file when the scan job command file is present and sets an image processing circuit 74 as required; and read document image data are stored as an image data file on the memory card inserted into the PC slot through a buffer memory 74, an image compressing circuit 86, and the PC card controller 87, and the memory card is extracted from the image reader and loaded in a user's personal computer to use the image data.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image reading apparatus used for reading an original image to obtain image data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art An example of a conventional image reading apparatus will be described. FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing the flow of image signals in a conventional image reading apparatus. The image sensor 71 scans a document and converts light reflected from the document into an electric signal.
The A / D converter 72 converts the analog image signal from the image sensor 71 into a digital image signal. The image processing circuit 73 subjects the digital image signal to image processing such as edge enhancement, trimming, halftone processing, pixel density conversion, and gradation number conversion, and edit processing, and outputs image data. The buffer memory 74 buffers the image data from the image processing circuit 73. The CPU 85 includes a RAM and a ROM (not shown) and controls the entire image reading apparatus. CPU85, DMA controller 8
0, SCSI controller 81 and image processing circuit 73
Are connected by a CPU bus 83.

The DMA controller 80 DMA-transfers the image data stored in the buffer memory 74 to the SCSI controller 80. An external device such as a computer transmits a control command of the image reading device to the image reading device via the SCSI controller and receives image data from the image reading device. CPU8
Reference numeral 5 sets the edge emphasis amount, the number of image data gradations, the read density, etc. according to the image read control command.

[0004]

The conventional image reading apparatus is connected to an external device such as a personal computer on a one-to-one basis using an interface such as SCSI. Therefore, the image reading apparatus is used exclusively by the user of the connected personal computer. When another user uses this image reading device, it is necessary to reconnect the image reading device to his / her own personal computer or borrow a personal computer already connected. That is, there is a problem in that the image reading apparatus is used exclusively by one user.

In view of the above problems of the conventional image reading apparatus, the present invention provides an image reading apparatus in which the image input function of the image reading apparatus can be easily used offline by using a removable storage medium. The purpose is to do.

[0006]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, an image reading apparatus of the present invention comprises an image sensor for converting optical information from a document into an electric signal, and an electric signal from the image sensor into a digital image signal. A / D to convert
Based on a converter, an image processing unit for performing desired processing on the digital image signal and outputting image data, a unit for accessing a removable storage medium, and a reading control information stored in the storage medium. It is characterized by comprising means for controlling the image processing means, and storing the image data in the storage medium.

Further, an image sensor for converting light information from a document into an electric signal, an A / D converter for converting the electric signal from the image sensor into a digital image signal, and a desired processing for the digital image signal. Image processing means for performing image data output, interface means for transmitting the image data to an external device,
Means for accessing a removable storage medium, and selecting whether to transfer the image data to an external device using the interface means or to store the image data in the storage medium.

In the present invention having such a configuration, the reading control information (reading gradation number, reading size, image compression method, edge emphasis amount, contrast, reading density, image data file name, etc.) is read by a personal computer or the like. It is stored in a removable storage medium using executable software. The user mounts this storage medium on the image reading apparatus of the present invention and sets the read document on the image reading apparatus. The image reading apparatus of the present invention realizes an offline image input function by reading an original image according to the read control information stored in the storage medium and storing the read image data in the storage medium. The user reattaches the storage medium to the user's personal computer or the like,
The stored image data is read and desired processing is performed.

Further, the image reading apparatus of the present invention has the above-mentioned offline image input function in addition to the conventional one-to-one interface means with an external device. As a result, users who frequently use the image reading device
Image reader and your personal computer 1
Other users who have a one-to-one connection and are not often used,
It is possible to use the image reading apparatus by using the offline image input function.

As described above, the image reading apparatus of the present invention has the offline image reading function,
It can be shared by multiple users.

[0011]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the flow of image signals in the image reading apparatus of the present invention. In FIG. 1, the same components as those in FIG. 8 are given the same numbers. The configuration will be described together with the operation. The image sensor 71 scans a document and converts light reflected from the document into an electric signal. The A / D converter 72 converts an analog image signal (the electric signal) from the image sensor into a digital image signal. The image processing circuit 73 performs image processing such as edge enhancement, trimming, halftone processing, gradation number conversion, and pixel density conversion on the digital image signal and edit processing, and outputs image data. The buffer memory 74 buffers the image data from the image processing circuit 73.
The CPU 85 includes a RAM and a ROM (not shown),
Controls the entire image reading device. CPU85, PC
Card controller 87, DMA controller 80, S
The CSI controller 81 and the image compression circuit 86 are CP
It is connected by the U bus 83.

The DMA controller 80 converts the image data stored in the buffer memory 74 into an image compression circuit 86.
Transfer to The image compression circuit 86 compresses the image data transferred by the DMA controller 80 to generate compressed image data. The compressed image data is DMA-transferred to the SCSI controller 80 by the DMA controller 80. The compression method in the image circuit 86 is determined by the setting of the CPU 85 from a plurality of compression methods. An external device such as a computer transmits a control command for the image reading device to the image reading device via the SCSI controller 81, and receives compressed image data from the image reading device. The CPU 85 sets the edge emphasis amount, the number of image data gradations, the read density, and the like according to the image read control command.

The PC card controller 87 is a CPU 8 together with a memory card mounted in the PC card slot 89.
Access from 5 is controlled. PC card slot 89
If a scan job command file in which the read control information is stored is present in the memory card mounted on the image reading device, the image reading device reads the original image set based on the read control information and compresses the compressed image data into the image data. It is stored in the memory card as a file. After the user sets the original, the user presses a reading start button (not shown) to start reading the original. In the image reading device, the image reading function and the image processing function such as whether or not an optional device such as an ADF (automatic document feeder) is attached may differ depending on the configuration of the optional device. Therefore, the image reading apparatus according to the present embodiment has a function of storing the image reading function information provided as the image scanner in the memory card as an image reading function information file. Details of this offline image input function will be described later.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of the image processing circuit 73 of FIG. Gamma conversion circuit 31, edge enhancement circuit 3
2, the pixel density conversion circuit 33, the trimming circuit 34, and the gradation number conversion circuit 35 are connected to the CPU bus 83, and the CPU 85 sets the processing parameter of each circuit. The gamma conversion circuit 31 performs data conversion of an 8-bit digital image signal. The gamma conversion circuit 31 is a conversion table using a RAM having an 8-bit address line and a capacity of 256 bytes. The data in the RAM is C
It is downloaded from PU85. The CPU 85 can set the reading density and the contrast characteristic by changing the conversion table stored in the RAM.

The edge emphasizing circuit 32 performs an edge emphasizing process on the image data by using a known two-dimensional spatial filtering method. The CPU 85 can set the degree of edge enhancement in the edge enhancement circuit 32 by changing the filter coefficient of the spatial filter. Pixel density conversion 33
The circuit performs pixel density conversion of image data by performing interpolation or thinning of the image data. The CPU 85 can set the pixel density of the output image data by changing the setting values of the interpolation rate and the thinning rate of the pixel density conversion circuit 33.

The trimming circuit 34 cuts out a desired rectangular area from the read image data. CP
The U85 can set the position and size of the cutout area by changing the set value of the cutout area. The gradation number conversion circuit 35 converts 8-bit (256 gradations) image data per pixel into N-bit image data.
N, 1, 4, and 8 are selected by the CPU 85.
When N is set to 1, a simple 2 is used as the binarization processing method.
The value conversion process, the dither process, and the error diffusion process are performed by the CPU 8.
It is possible to select from 5. When N is set to 4, high-order N-bit extraction, multi-value dither processing, and multi-value error diffusion processing can be selected by the CPU 85 as the quantization method.
When N is set to 8, the gradation number conversion circuit 35 outputs 8-bit image data as it is. The gradation number conversion circuit 35 packs the image data whose gradation number has been converted into 8 bits and outputs it.

FIG. 3 shows a connection configuration diagram of the image reading apparatus of the present embodiment and an external device. Image reading device 20
And the personal computer 21 is a SCSI cable 2
They are connected in a one-to-one relationship by means of 2, and the user of the personal computer 21 can directly use the image reading device 20 online. Further, the image reading device 20 is provided with a PC card insertion slot 23, and a memory card 24 can be attached and detached. The memory card 24 can be attached to and detached from the notebook personal computer 25.
Therefore, when the user of the personal computer 25 uses the image reading device 20 to obtain the document image data,
From the image reading device 20 to the personal computer 25
Transfer of image data to and from the device is performed off-line using the memory card 24.

(Offline Image Input Function) An offline image input function in the image reading apparatus of this embodiment will be described. The user attaches his / her memory card 24 to the image reading device 20 in advance and downloads the reading function information file to the memory card. The contents of the read function information file are shown in FIG. The contents of the reading function information file shown in FIG. 4 will be described below.

The format of the reading function information file is described as follows for each line. [Function item] [List of selectable functions] or [Function item] [Capability of function] or if [Selection condition] then [Function item] [List of selectable functions] In the list of selectable functions The setting value written first in is the default value.

The meaning of each line of the reading function information file shown in FIG. 4 is shown below. 1st line: Document size to scan is A4, A4R, B4, A3, B5, B5R
Can be set and the default is Auto. Auto is a mode in which the document size is automatically detected. Second line: The following three types of document placement methods can be specified. A
Documents are fed from the DF (auto document feeder) and scanned until there are no more scanned documents (ADF). Read one document placed on the document table (Flat Bed). If the document is placed on the ADF, the document from the ADF is read; otherwise, the document on the platen is read (Aut
o). The default is Auto. Third line: The maximum reading resolution is 1200 DPI. Line 4: Indicates that the minimum reading resolution is 25 DPI. 5th line: Gray level (number of data bits per pixel)
1,4,8 bits can be selected, and the default value is 1 bit. Sixth line: When gray level 1 is selected, the binarization processing method can be selected from simple binarization processing (BI), dither processing (DT), and error diffusion processing (ED). The default is simple binarization processing. 7th line: When gray level 4 is selected, one of the upper 4 bits extraction process (SIMPLE), multi-level dither process (DT), and multi-level error diffusion process (ED) can be selected as the quantization processing method. . The default is the upper 4 bits extraction processing. 8th line: Image data file format is TIFF, BM
P or JPEG can be selected and the default is TIFF. 9th line: When TIFF is selected as the image data file format and 1 is selected as the gray level, the data compression method is G3 (MH), G4 (MMR), RLE (run length), NO (no compression) Can be selected, and the default is G3. 10th line: TIFF as image data file format
When is selected and 4 is selected as the gray level, LZW or NO can be selected as the data compression method, and the default is LZW. 11th line: TIFF as image data file format
If is selected and 8 is selected as the gray level, the data compression method is LZW, JPEG or NO. 12th line: JPEG as the image data file format.
When is selected or JPEG is selected as the compression method, the compression rate is Normal (normal compression rate), High
(High compression rate) or LOW (Low compression rate) can be selected, and the default is NORMAL. 13th line: There is a contrast adjustment function when reading, and Auto (automatic), -2 (low contrast) to 2 (high contrast) can be selected. The default is Auto. 14th line: There is a reading density adjustment function, and Auto (automatic) and -2 (light) to 2 (dark) can be selected. The default is Auto. Line 15: When reading, there is an edge enhancement amount adjustment function, and Auto (automatic) or -2 (weak edge enhancement) to 2 (strong edge enhancement) can be selected. The default is Auto. Line 16: The reading area can be specified. The default is a setting in which the reading area is not designated (the entire original size is read). Line 17: The designated unit of the reading area is millimeter (mm).

When the document image data is obtained off-line by using the image reading apparatus of the present embodiment, the user inserts the memory card 24 in which the reading function information file is downloaded in the personal computer 25 of the user as described above. Mounting. The user executes the scan job command file creation software for the image reading apparatus which is installed in the personal computer 25 used by the user in advance. This software refers to the reading function information file stored in the memory card 24 to refer to the image reading device 20.
A dialog box is displayed on the display of the personal computer 25 for allowing the user to set the reading function of.

FIG. 5 shows a schematic display of the dialog box corresponding to the reading function information file shown in FIG. In Figure 5, Scanning Resolusion, Scanning A
reaPosition, Scanning Area Length and Data File N
The rectangular area on the right side of ame is an edit box, which has the reading resolution, the upper left XY position of the reading area,
The length of the reading area in the XY directions and the image data file name are input. The circles in the other lines are radio buttons that are selected by alternative. ● The mark indicates the selected item. In FIG. 5, since TIFF is selected as the image data file format and 1 is selected as the gray level, the compression selection items are G3, G4, RLE, and NO.
Is valid. In the case of FIG. 5, JPEG is used as the compression method.
Is not selected and JPEG is not selected as the file format, the selection of the compression rate is invalid. Scanning Area Setting is Y
Only in case of es, the setting values of Scanning Area Upper-Left Position and Scanning Area Length are valid.

The scan job command file creation software uses the MAXResolutio read function information file.
Check the value of n or MINResolution, and warn the user if it conflicts with the Scanning Resolution setting in the dialog box. Similarly, Paper Size and Sc
anning Area Upper-Left Position and Scanning Are
It also warns the user if the set value of a Length is inconsistent.

After setting each item in the dialog box, the user clicks the OK button in FIG. The scan job command file creation software creates a scan job command file based on the settings in the dialog box and stores it in the memory card 24. FIG. 6 shows the contents of the scan job command file corresponding to the dialog box settings in FIG. First line of the scan job command file in Figure 6 (Reset)
Indicates that the reading function setting value is reset to the default value. The item of DataFile describes the image file name that stores the read image data. In the case of FIG. 6, the image file name is sample.tif. In the image file, multi-page (plural pages) images are stored in one file. The scan job command file can combine a plurality of jobs into one file. That is, it is possible to read a plurality of read originals with different reading function settings.

FIG. 7 shows a flowchart of processing of the scan job command file creation software. According to this software, the reading function information file is read from the memory card 24 (step S1), and based on this, a reading function setting dialog box is displayed (step S2). After setting each setting item in the dialog box, the user clicks the OK button (step S3). This software checks the dialog box settings for inconsistencies (step S
4) If there is a contradiction, a warning is displayed (step S5),
Let the user reset the dialog box. If there is no contradiction, a scan job command file is created (step S6) and stored in the memory card 24.

Next, the user removes the memory card 24 storing the scan job command file from the user's personal computer 25 and inserts it into the PC card slot 89 of the image reading device 20. The CPU 85 in the image reading apparatus 20 detects that the memory card 24 has been inserted through the PC card controller 87, and searches for a scan job command file in the memory card 24. If the scan job command file exists, the CPU 85 analyzes the scan job command file, and the image processing circuit 73
Make the necessary settings. The original image data read by the image sensor 71 is stored as an image data file in the memory card inserted in the PC card slot via the buffer memory 74, the image compression circuit 86, and the PC card controller 87.

The user removes the memory card 24 in which the image data file is stored from the image reading device 20 and reattaches it to the user's personal computer 25. The user uses the image creation / image editing software executed by the personal computer 25 to use the image data stored in the memory card 24.

As described above, when the image input function of the image reading apparatus according to the present embodiment is used, original read control data (scan job command file) is stored in a removable storage medium, and this storage medium is stored as a book. It is attached to the image reading apparatus of the embodiment. As a result, the image reading apparatus according to the present embodiment can output the read image data in the desired reading form to the storage medium offline, and can be shared by a plurality of users. Further, the user can easily create the read control data by using the user interface of the personal computer. Especially in the case of a notebook type computer, it is often not directly connected to an external device because it may be carried. Even in such a case, according to the image reading apparatus of the present embodiment,
It is possible to easily read an original image off-line using a memory card or the like.

Further, since the image reading apparatus of the invention can download the image reading function information of the copying machine to the storage medium, the user can use all the image reading functions of the image reading apparatus.

In the embodiment of the present embodiment, the removable storage medium is a memory card.
The same effect can be obtained with a floppy disk, optical disk, removable hard disk, or the like. Further, in the embodiment, the case of the monochrome image reading device has been described, but the same applies to the case of color. Furthermore, although the function information file and the job command file are character data files in the embodiment, they may be files encoded into binary data.

[0032]

As described above, in the image reading apparatus of the present invention, the read control data of the image data of the original image is stored in the removable storage medium, and this storage medium is attached to the image reading apparatus of the present invention. By doing so, the read image data can be output to the storage medium in an off-line in a desired reading form. Therefore, the image reading apparatus can be shared by a plurality of users.

Further, since the image reading apparatus of the present invention can download the image reading function information of the image reading apparatus to the storage medium, the user can use all the image reading functions of the image reading apparatus.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a flow of image signals in an embodiment of an image reading apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an image processing circuit 73.

FIG. 3 is a connection configuration diagram of the image reading apparatus according to the present embodiment and an external device.

[Figure 4] Contents of the reading function information file

FIG. 5: Schematic display of dialog box for setting reading function

[Figure 6] Contents of the scan job command file

FIG. 7: Flowchart of processing of scan job command file creation software

FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing the flow of image signals in a conventional image reading device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 24 Memory Card 71 Image Sensor 72 A / D Converter 73 Image Processing Circuit 81 SCSI Controller 83 CPU Bus 84 Page Memory 85 CPU 86 Compression / Expansion Circuit 87 PC Card Controller 89 PC Card Slot

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. An image sensor for converting light information from a document into an electric signal, and an A / D converter for converting an electric signal from the image sensor into a digital image signal.
Image processing means for performing desired processing on the digital image signal to output image data, access means for accessing a removable storage medium, and the image based on the read control information stored in the storage medium. An image reading apparatus comprising: a control unit that controls a processing unit; and storing the image data in the storage medium. 2. An image sensor for converting light information from a document into an electric signal, and an A / D converter for converting an electric signal from the image sensor into a digital image signal.
Image processing means for performing desired processing on the digital image signal and outputting image data, interface means for transmitting the image data to an external device, and access means for accessing a removable storage medium ,
An image reading apparatus, characterized in that the image data is transferred to an external device using the interface means or is stored in the storage medium. 3. The image data is stored in the storage medium, comprising control means for controlling the image processing means on the basis of the read control information stored in the storage medium. Image reading device. 4. The image reading apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the settable reading function information included in the image processing unit is stored in the removable storage medium. 5. The image reading apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the removable storage medium is a memory card. 6. The image reading apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the image data is data that has been encoded and compressed, and a compression unit that encodes the image data is provided.