JPH10269374A - Device for allocating material prepared as digital data - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To reuse an allocation result about plural materials that are allocated in a group unit by utilizing material information and allocation information. SOLUTION: Material information that becomes an allocation object is prepared in a material information storing means 31 in each group. A material information reading means 21 reads material information that belongs to a designated group. Read material information is shown in a selection window 11. Material information that is selected by a material information selecting means 23 among the displayed material information is allocated to a prescribed position on an edit window 12 by an allocation processing means 24. An allocation result that consists of material information and allocation information is stored in an allocation result storing means 32 and also stored as macro material information M in the means 31. The information M is read like normal material information, and when it is selected, automatic allocation is carried out based on included allocation information.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data, and more particularly to an apparatus for allocating a photograph of a product or a description to each page of a product catalog.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the field of printing, with the spread of computers, so-called desktop publishing (Desk To Publishing) has been proposed.
p Publishing (hereinafter, referred to as DTP) technology is rapidly spreading, and at present, most work up to plate making is generally performed by operating a computer while looking at a display screen. In the field of DTP, various materials are usually prepared in the form of digital data, and an operator performs a process of selecting a desired material and allocating it to a predetermined page. Materials prepared as digital data are various such as photographic images, illustration images, character strings, logos, figures, and the like, and these materials are usually provided in the form of a database.

[0003] For example, when printing a product catalog or a flyer, image information such as photographs and figures relating to the product to be posted and text information such as explanatory text are prepared as digital data in a computer as individual material information. Will be done. A product catalog or a flyer is created by appropriately allocating such material information to a desired position on a page. The operator only needs to perform a task of giving a predetermined assignment instruction to the computer while displaying a catalog or flyer page on the display screen, so that a very efficient work can be performed. When such a layout operation is completed, if the data indicating the layout result is output from the computer, a plate-making film can be created automatically, and if necessary, a plate can be automatically created directly. Therefore, the process can proceed to the printing process in a short time.

Recently, with the spread of so-called multimedia, various media for presenting material information have been used. In other words, whereas flyers and catalogs of paper media have been the mainstream in the past,
-Electronic catalogs using a ROM as a medium, product descriptions via the Internet, and the like have been actively performed. Also in the case of presenting material information through such various media, a layout device using a computer is also used. That is, one page of an electronic catalog or a page for a browser on the Internet is displayed on a display screen, and individual material information is allocated to a desired position in a desired manner. As described above, when the final material is presented not on a paper medium but on a display screen, not only a still image but also a moving image can be used as one type of material information.

[0005]

Generally, individual material information used for creating a product catalog or a flyer is provided in the form of a database. Usually, in such a database, a group of material information related to the same product is treated as one group. For example, as material information belonging to group A, product A
Prepare individual material information such as product name, price, product description, product photo, etc. for each item. If the information is prepared, the allocation processing for each product can be efficiently performed. That is, when creating the catalog page for the product A, the operator only needs to read the material information belonging to the group A from the database and perform a process of allocating desired material information in a desired manner.

[0006] However, in a conventional general allocation device,
Since the result of the assignment operation is not fed back to the original database, even if the same assignment is performed again using the same material, it is necessary to repeat the same assignment operation again. For example, when a catalog in which a large number of products are published is issued every year, some products may be posted with exactly the same materials as in the previous year in exactly the same layout. Conventionally, even in such a case, it is necessary to repeatedly execute the same assignment work every year, and inefficient work has been forced.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data which can reuse the allocation results of a plurality of materials allocated in group units later.

[0008]

[Means for Solving the Problems]

(1) A first aspect of the present invention is to allocate a material prepared as digital data for performing a process of selecting a desired material from a large number of materials prepared as digital data and allocating the material to a predetermined page. In the apparatus, material information storage means for grouping and storing individual material information to be allocated for each related material information, instruction input means for inputting an instruction from an operator, and a group in the material information storage means Out of a specific group based on the instruction of the operator, and a material information reading means for reading material information belonging to the extracted group; In order to assign to each of the material information, a process of adding assignment information indicating the assignment mode to each material information is performed. Allocation processing means for generating an allocation result including the allocation result storage means for storing the allocation result generated by the allocation processing means, wherein the allocation processing means converts the allocation result for the same group into macro material information. When executing processing for storing as one piece of material information in the material information storage means and allocating the macro material information, the allocating processing using the material information and the allocation information included in the macro material information to be allocated is performed. It is something to do.

(2) The second aspect of the present invention is the above-mentioned first aspect.
Display means for displaying an editing window for displaying an allocation result, a selection window for selecting material information to be allocated, in the material allocating device prepared as digital data according to the aspect, Selection window display means for displaying the material information belonging to one group read by the information reading means in the selection window, and a plurality of material information displayed in the selection window based on the instruction of the operator. hand,
Material information selecting means for selecting specific material information to be allocated.

(3) A third aspect of the present invention is the above-mentioned first aspect.
Alternatively, in the device for allocating materials prepared as digital data according to the second aspect, when the allocation processing means stores the macro material information in the material information storage means, each of the individual materials included in the macro material information When performing the process of replacing the information with address information that specifies the same material information already stored in the material information storage means, and when performing the process of assigning the macro material information, the information included in the macro material information is included. In this case, the assignment processing is performed using the individual assignment information and the material information specified by the individual address information included in the macro material information.

[0011]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The present invention will be described below based on an embodiment shown in the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of an apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data according to an embodiment of the present invention. The main components of this device are a display unit 10, a processing unit 20, a storage unit 30, and an instruction input unit 40. Each of these means
In fact, general-purpose computers and their peripherals,
This is achieved by installing dedicated application software. That is, the display means 10
The processing means 20 can be realized by mounting dedicated software on a general-purpose computer main body, and the storage means 30 can be realized by a memory, a magnetic recording device, a magneto-optical recording device, or the like. The instruction input means 40 can be realized by a general computer input device such as a keyboard, a mouse, and a tablet.

On the display screen of the display means 10,
At least the selection window 11 and the editing window 12
And can be displayed. Here, the selection window 11 is a window used for selecting material information to be laid out, as will be described later. The editing window 12 shows a page to be laid out, and specifies an actual allocating position. This is a window used for the work to be performed. Actually, the display means 10 has a function of displaying various other windows (for example, the processing means 2).
0) for inputting various commands for 0), but a detailed description is omitted here. In the present embodiment, the selection window 11 is displayed on the left side of the display screen, the edit window 12 is displayed on the right side,
An example in which each window is displayed is shown, but the display position and size of both windows are arbitrary, and both windows may be partially overlapped and displayed.

The processing means 20 is a central part for executing essential processing in the product information allocating apparatus. Here, attention is paid to individual processing functions, and the processing means 20 is regarded as four functional blocks. I will explain.
That is, the processing means 20 is provided with the material information reading means 2
1. Selection window display means 22, Material information selection means 2
3. It can be grasped by being divided into each functional block of the allocation processing means 24. The specific function of each of these means will be described later.

Here, the storage means 30 is divided into two storage means, a material information storage means 31 and an allocation result storage means 32. Of course, in an actual hardware configuration, it is not always necessary to divide the storage device into such two storage devices, and it is sufficient that two storage areas can be secured in some way to store two types of information. In the material information storage means 31, individual material information to be allocated is stored in a group for each related material information. In the example shown here, a database for creating a clothing catalog is constructed in the material information storage means 31, and material information on one product is stored as one group. Assignment result storage means 32
Has the function of storing the final work result of the layout work using this layout device. In short, the information indicating "what material information is allocated to which position on each page and in what manner" Will be stored. Based on the data finally obtained in the allocation result storage means 32,
It is possible to output a plate making film or directly output a printing plate.

The instruction input means 40 is a means functioning as an intermediary for transmitting an instruction from the operator to the processing means 20, and is constituted by an input device such as a keyboard, a mouse and a tablet as described above. By operating the instruction input means 40, the operator can input various instructions relating to the assignment work.

Next, the function of each means constituting the processing means 20 will be described. First, material information reading means 2
1 has a function of extracting a specific group from the groups in the material information storage means 31 based on an instruction of an operator, and reading out material information belonging to the extracted group. The material information belonging to one group read by the material information reading means 21 is displayed in the selection window 11 by the selection window display means 22. The material information selection means 23 is provided in the selection window 11
Has a function of selecting specific material information to be allocated from among a plurality of material information displayed in the table, based on an instruction of an operator. The material information selected by the material information selecting means 23 is allocated by a layout processing means 24 in a predetermined page. That is, the assignment processing unit 24 assigns the assignment information indicating the assignment mode of the material information selected by the material information selection unit 23 based on the instruction of the operator (for example, to which position if the material information is a character string) , Which information indicates what font is to be allocated and in what size, and if it is material information composed of images, it is information indicating what content should be allocated to which position and at what magnification)). Then, a process of storing information obtained by adding the allocation information to the allocation result storage means 32 as an allocation result is executed.

Next, specific processing performed in the processing means 20 will be described based on an actual example. FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram illustrating an example of a group of material information registered as one group in the material information storage unit 31. Each of the group of material information shown here has a product code “ABC1234”.
5 ", which is material information related to a product named"Women's Suit A ".
Will be referred to as material information belonging to. This group A
, The material information L1 to L5 are material information including characters related to the product, and the material information P1 to P3 are material information including images related to the product. Specifically, the material information L1 is composed of a character string indicating the title of the product, the material information L2 is composed of a character string indicating the standard of the product, and the material information L3 is a character string indicating a description of the product. The material information L4 is composed of a character string indicating a first catch phrase of this product, and the material information L5 is composed of a character string indicating a second catch phrase of this product. In addition, material information P1
P3 is composed of images showing first to third photographs of this product, respectively.

On the other hand, FIG.
It is a conceptual diagram which shows an example of another group of material information registered as one group in one. The group of material information shown here is material information related to a product having a product code “XXX0088” and a product name of “men's business suit X”. Hereinafter, this group of material information belongs to group X. It will be called material information. The configuration of the individual material information belonging to the group X is the group A shown in FIG.
This is the same as the configuration of the individual material information belonging to. As described above, in the material information storage unit 31, a group of material information on one product is set as one group, and material information on many groups, that is, many products is prepared as a database.

In the examples shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, only character strings and photographs are shown as material information. In addition, various logos and figures may be registered in the database as material information composed of images. Further, when material information is presented via a CD-ROM or the Internet, material information of not only a still image but also a moving image or audio can be registered in a database.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of an allocation result obtained by allocating some of the material information shown in FIG. 2 or 3 in one page of a catalog. In this example, material information on two types of products is allocated in one page. That is, the individual material information assigned to the upper part of the figure is selected from the material information belonging to the group A shown in FIG. 2, and the individual material information assigned to the lower part of the figure. The material information is selected from material information belonging to group X shown in FIG. It should be noted that the allocation result as shown in FIG. 4 is displayed in the editing window 12, and the contents thereof are stored in the allocation result storage means 32.

In order to obtain an allocation result as shown in FIG. 4, the operator may perform the following operation using the allocation device shown in FIG. First, in order to perform the allocation work in the upper part of FIG. 4, the material information reading means 21 extracts material information belonging to the group A from a large number of material information stored in a database in the material information storage means 31. read out. Specifically, the commodity code “ABC12345” for specifying the group A may be input. As an input operation for specifying a specific group, for example, a method of inputting a product code from a keyboard can be adopted. However, in the embodiment shown here, a more operable input environment is provided. I have. That is, in the apparatus of this embodiment, a list of products as shown in FIG. 5 is displayed in a list on the display screen of the display means 10, and a column of a product code or a product name in the list is clicked with a mouse to specify the product. Products (specific groups) can be specified. The product list as shown in FIG. 5 can be displayed in the selection window 11, or can be displayed in a separate window.

In the product list shown in FIG. 5, "ABC1
2345 "(or a column for"Women's suit A "to the right) with a mouse.
The material information reading means 21 reads the material information belonging to the group A, and the selection window display means 22 displays the selection window 11 as shown in FIG. In the embodiment shown here, the readout material information is displayed on the selection window 11 after performing the thinning process as needed. For example,
Material information P1 to P3 consisting of the images shown in FIG.
Is not a directly displayed image data read from the database in the material information storage means 31, but is a reduced image (so-called thumbnail) on which pixel thinning processing has been performed. In addition, the material information L composed of the characters shown in FIG. 6 has the original material information L1 to L5 packed and arranged in order to reduce the dead space. A part of the character string may be omitted and displayed. In the first place, the selection window 11 is used to select a material to be allocated (that is, individual material information). Therefore, if an outline of the material information as the material can be transmitted to the operator, it is sufficient. Therefore, in this embodiment, after performing a process of thinning out the information amount as necessary, the selection window 1
1 is displayed. In particular, it is preferable that the material information of an image originally having a large amount of information be subjected to the thinning process as much as possible and displayed in the selection window 11 in a so-called thumbnail format.

The selection window 11 shown in FIG.
With respect to the material information composed of characters, the button areas B1 to B5 corresponding to the individual material information are displayed. As shown in FIG. 2, for this product, a total of five sets of “material information composed of characters” L1 to L5 are prepared, but as described above, the space is efficiently used in the selection window 11. In order to do so, the character strings constituting these five sets of material information are packed and displayed. Instead, the button areas B1 to B5 respectively corresponding to the five sets of material information are displayed to facilitate the work of selecting material information described later.

As shown in FIG. 6, when a plurality of pieces of material information belonging to the group A are displayed in the selection window 11, an operation of selecting specific material information from the plurality of pieces of material information is executed. Is done. That is, the material information selecting means 23 has a function of selecting specific material information from a plurality of material information displayed in the selection window 11 based on an instruction from the operator. In this embodiment, the operation of selecting specific material information can be intuitively performed by clicking one point in the selection window 11 with a mouse. That is, when the operator designates one point in the image area (the area in which the material information P1 to P3 composed of images is displayed) in the selection window 11, the material information selecting unit 23 sets the image including the designated point. Is determined to have been selected. For example, in FIG. 6, 1 in the material information P1 composed of an image.
When a point is specified, the operator recognizes that the material information P1 has been selected. Further, when the operator selects the button areas B1 to B
If one of the points 5 is designated, it is determined that the "material information consisting of characters" corresponding to the button area including the designated point has been selected. For example, in FIG. 6, when one point in the button area B1 is designated, the operator recognizes that the material information L1 has been selected. Generally, the material information composed of images can be easily recognized as a group of material information. Therefore, a selection method of clicking the image itself displayed in the selection window 11 is suitable. Since it is difficult to recognize information as a set of material information, a selection method of clicking the corresponding button area as described above is suitable.

On the other hand, the allocation mode of the selected material information is determined by the allocation processing means 24. In this embodiment, the allocation mode of the material information composed of images is performed by setting an allocation frame W by the allocation processing unit 24. FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a work screen for setting an allocation frame W on the display screen of the display unit 10. In the example of FIG. 7, the selection window 11 (FIG.
Is displayed, and an edit window 12 is displayed on the right side of the screen. An allocation frame W is defined in the edit window 12 (specifically, for example, a vertex is set by a mouse pointer). Just specify the location). When the material information P3 in the selection window 11 is selected after setting the allocation frame W in this manner, the material information P3 is allocated in the allocation frame W, and the allocation result is displayed in the editing window 12 as shown in FIG. Will be displayed in real time.

After all, by setting the allocation frame W, the material information P
This means that the allocation position and the allocation magnification of No. 3 are defined, and the allocation mode of the material information P3 at which position and at what magnification is determined. When allocating material information consisting of characters, it is necessary to determine the layout mode such as which font is to be used, in which character size, and in which position, but here, these layout modes are specified. A description of a specific operation method is omitted. In any case, the allocation processing means 2
As a result of the assignment work by No.4, the material information to be assigned
Predetermined allocation information (information indicating an allocation mode) is added. As a result, the allocation result stored in the allocation result storage means 32 is composed of information obtained by adding the allocation information to the original material information.

In this way, if the material information belonging to the group A displayed in the selection window 11 is selected one by one and allocated in a predetermined manner, the allocation result shown in the upper part of FIG. 4 is obtained. Will be. Subsequently, if the material information belonging to the group X is displayed in the selection window 11 and the same allocating operation is performed, the result of allocating one page as shown in FIG. 4 can be finally obtained. However, instead of performing an operation of designating the layout mode for each material information, a predetermined layout pattern is defined in advance, and the individual material information is automatically allocated based on the layout pattern. It is also possible to adopt such a method.

When the allocation result as shown in FIG. 4 is displayed in the editing window 12, the allocation result storage means 32 stores the allocation result corresponding to this display. Specifically, the allocation result storage means 32
The allocation result stored in the file is the material information P shown in FIG.
3 and its allocation information, material information L1 and its allocation information, material information L2 and its allocation information,... As described above, the information of the allocation result composed of the original material information and the allocation information is obtained by the DTP method.
It is enough information to proceed with the subsequent plate making process, etc.
Based on the information stored in the allocation result storage means 32, the subsequent plate making process proceeds without any trouble.

FIG. 9 is a conceptual diagram showing the processing of the above-described layout work. For example, the operator designates a group A (commodity A) to the material information reading means 21 and selects desired material information a from among the material information belonging to this group A.
It is assumed that the assignment processing means 24 has been used to assign the selected material information a2 and a3. Then, predetermined allocation information α2, α3 is added to the material information a2, a3, and the allocation result storage means 32
Is stored as the allocation result A ^* regarding the group A. FIG. 9 shows the state at this time. As described above, the allocation result A ^* includes the respective material information a2, a3,
Since this is the information including the allocation information α2 and α3, if this allocation result A ^* is given to the DTP system as it is, the subsequent plate making process can proceed without any trouble.

However, in this state, the result of the assignment operation performed by the operator (that is, the assignment information α2, α
3) is not reflected in the original database.
Of course, if there is no possibility that the same assignment work will be executed again at a later date, there is little need to reflect the result of this assignment work in the original database. However, in the field of printing product catalogs and flyers, the same assignment work is often performed on the same material. For example,
When a catalog including a page as shown in FIG. 4 was produced, the corresponding page of the catalog for the following year showed the upper half of the product A
(Women's suit A) will be allocated in exactly the same style, and even if only the lower half of product X (men's business suit X) is to be replaced with a new product, the upper half will be replaced. For the product A, it is necessary to perform the same assignment work again. Of course, if the number of products to be replaced in the catalog for the following year is small, a method of correcting only the replacement part based on the allocation result stored in the allocation result storage means 32 can be adopted. In the case where most of the contents are renewed, it is necessary to perform the assignment work again using the database in the material information storage means 31.

In such a case, the allocating apparatus according to the present invention can eliminate the burden of repeatedly performing the allocating work performed in the past and can improve the efficiency of the work. The basic idea of the present invention is as shown in FIG.
When an allocation result for a specific group is obtained, this allocation result is completely copied and stored in the material information storage means 31 as it is. For example, in the case of the example in FIG. 9, as a result of performing the assignment work regarding the group A, the assignment result A ^* regarding the group A is stored in the assignment result storage unit 32 ^.
However, this allocation result A ^* is copied as it is, and is stored as one of the material information of the group A in the material information storage means 31, as shown in FIG. In this specification, the allocation result regarding the specific group stored in this manner is referred to as “macro material information M”. In the example shown in FIG. 10, the allocation result A ^* regarding the group A is stored as macro material information M1 in the material information storage means 31 as one of the material information belonging to the group A.

As described above, once the operator executes the assignment work, the assignment information indicating the work result is stored in the material information storage means 31 as information in the macro material information M. In other words, the work results will be fed back to the original database. If such feedback processing is performed, when the same assignment operation is performed again for the same material information, a very efficient operation can be performed. That is, in the case of the example of FIG. 10, if the macro material information M1 is taken out from the material information storage means 31, the necessary material information a2, a3 and the allocation information α2, α3 are already included. Therefore, even if the operator does not perform any allocation work, the allocation processing means 24 automatically performs the allocation process using the material information a2, a3 and the allocation information α2, α3 included in the macro material information M1. The allocation result A ^* can be obtained again in the allocation result storage means 32 as shown in FIG.

The above-described inventive concept will be described with reference to a specific allocation result shown in FIG. As described above, the allocation result in the upper half of FIG. 4 is a result obtained using various types of material information belonging to the group A shown in FIG. 2, and the allocation result in the lower half is shown in FIG. This is a result obtained using various types of material information belonging to group X. When such an allocation result is obtained in the allocation result storage means 32, the macro result information M1 and M2 are generated by copying these allocation results. Here, the macro material information M1 is stored as one of the material information belonging to the group A, as shown in FIG.
Is stored as one of the material information belonging to the group X, as shown in FIG.

The material information reading means 21 performs a process of reading the macro material information stored in the same manner as other material information. The selection window display means 22
Also, a process of displaying the macro material information in the selection window 11 like other material information is performed. Therefore, the operator can use the material information selecting means 23 to select normal material information displayed in the selection window 11 or to select macro material information. However, when the normal material information is selected, the assignment work of adding the assignment information by the method described above is necessary.When the macro material information is selected, the work for the assignment is particularly required. Without this, the allocation process is automatically executed. For example, if the macro material information M1 shown in FIG. 11 is selected, an allocation result as shown in the upper half of FIG. 4 can be obtained immediately. For this reason,
When the same assignment processing is performed on the same material as in the past, the work load on the operator is greatly reduced.

However, the allocation processing using such macro material information is not necessarily used only when the same allocation processing as in the past is performed on the same material as in the past. It can also be used when performing allocation processing similar to the past. For example, in the year following the creation of a catalog containing pages as shown in FIG. 4, a catalog was also created in which product information on "Women's Suit A" was allocated in the upper half, but the list price had risen. Assume that it is necessary to replace only the material information relating to the standard (the material information L2 in FIG. 11) with new material information. In this case, the target of re-allocation is not exactly the same material information as in the past, but it is convenient to perform the allocation process using the macro material information M1. That is, for the time being, it is sufficient to use the macro material information M1 to obtain exactly the same allocation result as in the past, and then replace only the material information L2 relating to the standard. Also, when only a part of the past allocation mode needs to be corrected (for example, when only the position of the photo needs to be corrected), the same allocation as the past using the macro material information is used for the time being. After obtaining the result, a process of changing the allocation information for the necessary part may be performed.

Note that the process of creating macro material information may be automatically performed for all the allocation results obtained in the allocation result storage means 32. , May be performed only for the necessary allocation result. If the process of creating macro material information is automatically performed for all allocation results, the number of macro material information stored in the material information storage means 31 increases as the allocation work is performed. Will be.
Therefore, when the storage capacity of the material information storage unit 31 is limited, it is preferable to create macro material information only for a necessary allocation result based on an instruction of the operator.

In the example shown in FIG. 10, the macro material information M1 is a copy of the assignment result A ^* for the group A as it is.
As a result, the material information storage means 31 stores the material information a2 and a3 in an overlapping manner. If the storage capacity of the material information storage means 31 is limited, it is preferable to avoid such duplicate storage as much as possible. In that case, the assignment processing means 24
When the macro material information M is stored in the material information storage means 31, the individual material information contained in the macro material information M is replaced with the same material information already stored in the material information storage means 31. What is necessary is just to perform the process which replaces with the address information to specify. For example, in the case of the example shown in FIG. 10, the material information a2 in the macro material information M1 is replaced with information add2 indicating the address of the existing material information a2 in the material information storage means 31, and the macro material information M2
1 may be replaced with information add3 indicating the address of the existing material information a3 in the material information storage means 31. As a result, the macro material information M1
Is information including address information add2, allocation information α2, address information add3, and allocation information α3. Compared to the data capacity of the material information a2, a3, the address information add
Since the data capacity of the data 2 and add3 is considerably reduced (particularly when the material information is a photographic image), the data capacity of the entire macro material information M1 can be reduced.

When the replacement with the address information is performed as described above, it is necessary to replace the address information with the material information again when performing the process of allocating the macro material information M. That is, at the time of the allocation process, the allocation processing unit 24 recognizes the material information specified by the individual address information, and assigns the individual allocation information included in the macro material information M to the recognized material information. , Is performed.

Although the allocating apparatus according to the present invention has been described as an embodiment for creating a product catalog, the present invention is not limited to the allocating apparatus for merchandise information. Applicable to For example, an apparatus for creating an Internet homepage or the like requires a process of allocating a large number of images and characters on a screen, but the present invention can be applied to such an apparatus.

[0040]

As described above, according to the apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data according to the present invention, the allocation results for a plurality of materials allocated in groups can be reused later. Become.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a basic configuration of an apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram showing an example of material information belonging to a group A registered in a material information storage unit 31 in the apparatus shown in FIG.

FIG. 3 is a conceptual diagram showing an example of material information belonging to a group X registered in a material information storage unit 31 in the apparatus shown in FIG.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of a layout result for one page by the apparatus shown in FIG. 1;

5 is a diagram showing an example of a list display of a product list used to specify a product to be extracted with respect to a material information reading unit 21 in the apparatus shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 shows a selection window display means 2 in the apparatus shown in FIG.
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of a selection window 11 displayed by No. 2.

FIG. 7 shows an editing window 12 using the device shown in FIG.
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a state in which an operation of designating a predetermined allocation frame W is performed.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a state in which images are allocated in an allocation frame W shown in FIG. 7;

FIG. 9 is a conceptual diagram showing a state in which an allocation result is obtained in an allocation result storage unit 32 by performing an allocation operation using an allocation device according to the present invention.

10 is a conceptual diagram showing how macro material information M1 is created based on the allocation result shown in FIG. 9 and stored in material information storage means 31. FIG.

11 is a conceptual diagram showing a state in which macro material information M1 is further added to material information belonging to group A shown in FIG.

12 is a conceptual diagram showing a state in which macro material information M2 is further added to material information belonging to group X shown in FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 ... Display means 11 ... Selection window 12 ... Editing window 20 ... Processing means 21 ... Material information readout means 22 ... Selection window display means 23 ... Material information selection means 24 ... Assignment processing means 30 ... Storage means 31 ... Material information storage means 32 ... Assignment result storage means 40 ... Instruction input means A ^* ... Assignment results related to group A a1-a3 ... Material information add1-add3 ... Address information B1-B5 ... Button area L, L1-L5 ... Material information consisting of characters M, M1 , M2 Macro information P1 to P3 Material information W composed of images W Assignment frames x1 to x3 Material information α2, α3 Assignment information

 ────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Koji Sakai 1-1-1 Ichigaya Kagacho, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo Inside Dai Nippon Printing Co., Ltd.

Claims (3)

[Claims] An apparatus for allocating a material for selecting a desired material from a large number of materials prepared as digital data and allocating the selected material to a predetermined page, wherein information of each material to be allocated is provided. Material information storage means for grouping and storing each material information related to each other, an instruction input means for inputting an instruction from an operator, and a group in the material information storage means, based on the operator's instruction. Material information reading means for extracting a specific group and reading material information belonging to the extracted group; and allocating the material information read by the material information reading means to a predetermined page. An allocation process for performing a process of adding allocation information indicating each allocation mode to information and generating an allocation result including material information and allocation information Means, and an allocation result storage means for storing the allocation result generated by the allocation processing means, wherein the allocation processing means converts the allocation result for the same group into one material information as macro material information. It has a function of storing in the information storage means, and when allocating to the macro material information, performs the allocation process using the material information and the allocation information included in the macro material information to be allocated. Material allocation device prepared as digital data. 2. The layout device according to claim 1, wherein display means for displaying an edit window for displaying a layout result, a selection window for selecting material information to be allocated, and material information. Selection window display means for displaying the material information belonging to one group read by the reading means in the selection window; and selecting from a plurality of material information displayed in the selection window an instruction from the operator. And a material information selecting means for selecting specific material information to be allocated based on the information. An apparatus for allocating materials prepared as digital data, further comprising: 3. The allocating apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the allocation processing means stores the individual material information included in the macro material information when storing the macro material information in the material information storage means. When performing the process of replacing the same material information already stored in the material information storage means with address information specifying the same, and performing the process of allocating the macro material information, the individual information included in the macro material information is A device for allocating materials prepared as digital data, which performs an allocation process using the allocation information of the macro data and the material information specified by the individual address information included in the macro material information.