JPH11265360A - Distribution type server - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an effective logical device capable of generating a job under a condition suitable for a physical device such as a printer in a distribution type server. SOLUTION: When any one of at least plural logical devices 21a to 21n is a parallel (broadcast) logical device, the logical device changes a job condition specified from a client (master device) in accordance with respective physical devices 3a to 3n (by referring to respective change tables). Or when any one of at least plural logical devices 21a to 21n is a synthetic logical device, the logical device selects a physical device capable of properly executing a job under a job condition specified from the client by referring to a condition constitution table.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

[0001] The present invention relates to a distributed server.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art With the spread of networks such as LANs (local area networks) in offices and the like, distributed systems in which devices such as printers are arranged on a network and operated in cooperation with each other are being put into practical use.
For example, ISO / IEC 10175-1 DPA (Document Pr
Inting Application is a standard for such a distributed printing system, and can be used as an interface on a network.

In the DPA, a server of the DPA has a plurality of printer objects, and each printer object discloses the capability / function of the apparatus to the outside in the form of an attribute. Also,
This attribute also holds the status of the device. The user can perform printing by creating a job object in the server and specifying and executing printing conditions for the job object.

In the DPA, a printer is a logical printer and a physical printer.
physical printer is a physical device, and logical is to prepare a printer with a different physical printer default. Make certain usage easier (for example, logical
Printer) and a logical device for making a plurality of printers appear as one printer.

Hereinafter, when considering a certain logical device, a device included in the logical device is called a child device, and a logical device including the child device is called a parent device when viewed from the child device. The following logical printers (1) to (6) are conceivable.

(1) Parallel Logic Device This is a logic device for operating a plurality of physical devices in parallel. For example, when printing 10 copies, two copies of 5 copies are printed. (2) Broadcast logical device This is a logical device that allows a plurality of physical devices to perform the same operation at the same time by one designation, and corresponds to an application such as a case where a printer in each department prints simultaneously to distribute a document. . It is considered a variant of the parallel logic device.

(3) Divided Parallel Logic Device This is a logic device that divides the processing of a plurality of physical devices and operates them in parallel. For example, in the case of printing 100 sheets of one document, two sheets of 50 sheets are printed. (4) Synthesized logical device (clustered device) This is a logical device for indicating that the maximum can be achieved by a plurality of printers and for efficiently scheduling and using a plurality of printers. The actual printing is performed by one device.

(5) Failure avoidance logic device This is a logic device having a backup device in the event of a failure. (6) Default value changed logical device This is a logical device in which the default value of the physical device is changed, and is used for the convenience of the user.

[0009]

By the way, it is necessary to convert a job condition specified for a logical device into a job condition of a physical device for realizing the logical device by some method. However, a logical device does not have such a function, and a job cannot be generated under conditions appropriate for a physical device.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and provides an effective logical device that enables a distributed server to generate a job under appropriate conditions for a physical device such as a printer. With the goal.

[0011]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a device management means for managing device information of a plurality of physical devices and a plurality of logical devices in a distributed system, and a job management means for managing jobs processed by these devices. In order to achieve the above object, a distributed server having the following configuration is provided as follows.

According to a first aspect of the present invention, at least one of a plurality of logical devices is provided with a job condition changing means for changing a job condition specified by a host device according to each physical device. According to a second aspect of the present invention, at least one of a plurality of logical devices is provided with a physical device selecting means for selecting a physical device capable of appropriately executing a job under a job condition designated by a higher-level device.

[0013]

Embodiments of the present invention will be specifically described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the entire configuration of a distributed system embodying the present invention. This distributed system includes a plurality of clients (upper devices) 1a,
, A print server 2, a plurality of physical devices (lower devices) 3a, 3b,..., And a LAN (local area network) 4 interconnecting them.

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram (abstract model diagram) showing a main part of the print server 2. The print server 2 is a distributed server, and includes a plurality of physical devices 3a, 3b,..., 3n and a plurality of logical devices 21.
, 21n, and a job management unit (job management unit) 23 that manages jobs processed by those devices. .

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining a table held by the job management unit 23 of FIG. In this embodiment,
One print server 2 includes a plurality of physical devices 3a, 3b,
.., 3n and the plurality of logic devices 21a, 21b,.
To manage 21n, jobs are managed in one table, and have a queue for scheduling jobs for each device.

The job management unit 23 manages jobs registered in the print server 2. All jobs submitted to the print server 2 are registered here. The job has a job condition indicating the job, a job status indicating the progress of the job, and a job ID indicating the job identifier.
have. The job conditions include a device name, a print data position, various designations for printing (paper size, duplex mode, use of a finisher, and the like), a printing result, a progress notification method, and the like.

The device has device information. The device information includes information for management of the function, performance, name of the device, current status of the device, manager, installation location, and the like. In the case of a logical device, it also includes information on a physical device on which an operation is actually performed. For example, a parallel logical device has a list of physical devices that can operate in parallel. When the target device of the job is a logical device, a job condition is specified by the client, and when the job is generated, a job for the physical device is generated based on the device information of the logical device.

At this time, if the logical device is a composite logical device, the composite logical device selects which of the lower-level devices (physical devices) is most appropriate for the printing conditions in order to select an appropriate physical device. Is selected by calculating using a job condition configuration table (condition match table). Table 1 shows an example of the job condition configuration table.

[0019]

[Table 1]

In this embodiment, the IPP (Internet Pr
inting Protocol. IETF Internet Draft). The first condition is a printer (physical device)
A boolean value is returned based on the configuration information and job conditions. The next penalty indicates a penalty when the condition is not satisfied. The action indicates an action to be performed when the condition is not satisfied and the printer is selected.

The condition j.media indicates an attribute “media” of the job condition. p.media-supported indicates an attribute of media-supported in the configuration information of the device. ”J.media in p.
media-supported ”means that the value of j.media is p.medi
Indicates true if included in a-supported. In the operation of selecting a printer, if this condition is not satisfied, a penalty of 100 is imposed. A large value penalty indicates that the condition is severe.

For example, a document format (doc
If the ument format) does not match, you should avoid choosing that printer. When all conditions in this job condition configuration table are checked based on each printer and job conditions, and the total of penalties that are not true is obtained for each printer, the printer with the smallest penalty should be selected. Becomes

Actions indicate the actions that must be taken if a printer for which this condition is false is selected. J.media in Table 1 = near-media (j.media, media-suppor
ted) indicates that paper is set using the built-in function near-media that selects the paper that is closest to the specified paper.

The default action is to delete the condition. That is, the job conditions for the physical printer are removed. For example, if a physical device that does not support number-up is selected, this condition will not be reflected in newly created job conditions. The parallel (broadcast) logical device and the default value changing logical device use a change table for making a change to the designation of a higher-level device (client) in order to give print conditions specific to each lower-level device. Table 2 shows an example of the change table.

[0025]

[Table 2]

The change table shows the attributes to be changed and their values. In this example, the printer name of the job condition is get-ph
Set to the value obtained by the built-in function isical-printer-name () and set sides to 'two-sided-long-edge'. That is, this logical printer is a logical printer that performs duplex printing as a default value.

FIGS. 4 and 5 show an example of job generation processing for a lower-level device by a composite logical device (any of a plurality of logical devices 21a, 21b,..., 21n) using a change table and a job condition configuration table. It is a flowchart shown. The synthesis logic unit has a plurality of clients 1
a, 1b,... and the lower device (physical device 3a, 3b,.
The job condition configuration table is applied to the configuration information of n) to determine whether or not the condition is satisfied. If the condition is not satisfied, a penalty calculation or the like is performed.

In this example, it is determined whether or not each element of the job condition configuration table satisfies the condition. If the condition is not satisfied, an action is added to the action list, and a penalty is added to penalty. This process is sequentially performed for all lower-level devices. Then j.be
Check st-effort. j.best-effort is a job condition indicating whether or not the job condition should be strictly satisfied.

When j.best-effort is FALSE, the condition must be strictly satisfied. Therefore, a lower-level device having the minimum penalty is selected as a candidate for selection, and its penalt
If y is 0, the job is processed, but if it is not 0, the job cannot be executed. j.best-effor
When t is TRUE, if the penalty does not exceed 1000, it becomes a processing target, but if it exceeds, the job cannot be executed, so exception processing is also performed.

On the other hand, when j.best-effort is FALSE and penalty is 0, or when j.best-effort is TR
If the penalty does not exceed 1000 in case of UE,
A lower-level printer (lower-level device) is selected, and a new job (lower-level job) is generated. As the job condition, a condition in which an action list is applied to a higher-order job (job input from a client) condition is set.

Then, the condition e of each change table is taken out, and a condition that matches the condition e with respect to the lower-order job condition is rewritten to the set value. This process is sequentially performed for all the conditions e. FIG. 6 shows a parallel (broadcast) logical device (a plurality of logical devices 21a, 21b,...,
21n) is a flowchart illustrating an example of a job generation process for a lower-level device according to any one of 21.). Since most of the process is included in FIG. 5 described above, description thereof will be omitted.

As described above, at least a plurality of logical devices 2
Any of 1a, 21b,..., 21n is parallel (broadcast)
In the case of a logical device, the logical device changes a job condition specified by a client (upper-level device) according to each physical device (refer to each change table), so that an appropriate Jobs can be created with conditions.

Further, at least a plurality of logical devices 21a,
If any one of the logical devices 21b,..., 21n is a composite logical device, the physical device capable of appropriately executing the job under the job condition specified by the client is selected with reference to the job condition configuration table, and further, By changing the designated job conditions according to the selected physical device, it is possible to generate a job under conditions appropriate for the physical device. Note that only the selection of the physical device can be performed.

[0034]

As described above, according to the distributed server of the first aspect of the present invention, a plurality of logical devices change the job conditions specified by the higher-level device in accordance with each physical device. A job can be generated under appropriate conditions for each physical device, and an effective logical device can be realized.

According to the distributed server of the second aspect of the present invention,
By selecting a physical device in which a plurality of logical devices can appropriately execute a job under a job condition specified by a higher-level device, a job can be generated under an appropriate condition for the physical device, which is effective. Logic device can be realized.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a functional block diagram showing a main part of a print server 2 of FIG.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the entire configuration of a distributed system embodying the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining a table held by a job management unit 23 in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing an example of a job generation process for a lower-level device by a combination logic device using a change table and a job condition configuration table.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the continuation thereof.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating an example of job generation processing for a lower-level device by a parallel (broadcast) logical device using a change table;

[Explanation of symbols]

 1a to 1n: Client 2: Print Server 3a to 3n: Physical Device 4: LAN 21a to 21n: Logical Device 22: Device Management Unit 23: Job Management Unit

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A distributed server comprising: a device management unit that manages device information of a plurality of physical devices and a plurality of logical devices in a distributed system; and a job management unit that manages jobs processed by the devices. A distributed server, characterized in that at least one of the plurality of logical devices is provided with a job condition changing means for changing a job condition specified by a host device according to each of the physical devices. 2. A distributed server comprising: a device management unit that manages device information of a plurality of physical devices and a plurality of logical devices in a distributed system; and a job management unit that manages jobs processed by the devices. A distributed server, wherein at least one of the plurality of logical devices is provided with a physical device selecting means for selecting a physical device capable of appropriately executing a job under a job condition designated by a higher-level device.