JPH11275119A - Terminal communication address overlap detection method and device therefor - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To easily specify the terminal equipments whose address overlap by checking the presence/absence of the overlap of communication addresses without using a network test dedicated device. SOLUTION: A host device 2 transmits a terminal identification information request message onto a network 3 with a broadcast address as a transmission destination address. The respective terminal equipments 1-1-1-n which receive the request message respectively transmit response messages to which their own terminal identification information is set onto the network 3 with the communication address of the host device 2 as the transmission destination address. The host device 2 which receives the response message stores the terminal identification information in the response messages and transmission origin addresses in correspondence. Then, when fixed time elapses after transmitting the request message, the presence/absence of the overlap of the transmission origin addresses stored corresponding to the terminal identification information are judged, and in the case that the overlap is present, the terminal identification information corresponding to the overlapping transmission origin address is notified.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a TPC / I using, for example, Ethernet as a network medium.
P (Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protoco
l) The present invention relates to a method for detecting duplication of a communication address arbitrarily set to each terminal device connected to a host device via a network, that is, a so-called IP (Internet Protocol) address and its device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a system in which a plurality of terminal devices are connected to a host device for controlling these terminal devices by a network, a system using a TPC / IP network using Ethernet as a network medium has recently been developed. POS (Point
Of Sales) system. This TPC /
In a network system using an IP network, a system user constructs a system by arbitrarily setting a communication address called an IP address in each terminal device. In this case, if a duplicate communication address is set to a plurality of terminal devices by mistake, normal communication cannot be normally performed. Therefore, conventionally, the presence or absence of a duplicate communication address has been examined using a dedicated device for network test such as a LAN (Local Area Network) analyzer.

[0003]

However, conventionally, a dedicated network test device must be used to check for duplication of communication addresses, and this dedicated network test device is expensive and requires a large amount of time to execute the check. Had to perform the troublesome work of connecting and operating a dedicated network test device to the network. Further, although it is known that the communication addresses are duplicated, the operation of specifying the terminal device set with the duplicated communication addresses has been complicated.

Therefore, the present invention can easily and quickly check for duplication of communication addresses without using a dedicated device for network test, and easily identify a terminal device set with duplicate communication addresses. It is an object of the present invention to provide a terminal communication address duplication detection method and apparatus capable of the same.

[0005]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, a plurality of terminal devices and a host device for controlling each of the terminal devices are connected by a network, and each terminal device has a unique terminal in advance. In a system in which identification information is set, a method for detecting whether or not communication addresses arbitrarily assigned to terminal devices are duplicated. First, a host device transmits a request message for terminal identification information to a broadcast address. Send on the network as the destination address. Next, each terminal device that has received the request message transmits a response message in which its own terminal identification information is set, to the network using the communication address of the host device as the destination address. Next, the host device that has received the response message stores the terminal identification information and the transmission source address in the response message in association with each other. When a certain period of time has passed since the transmission of the request message, the presence / absence of the transmission source address stored in correspondence with the terminal identification information of each terminal device is determined. In this case, the terminal identification information corresponding to the transmission source address is notified. Here, the terminal identification information request message transmitted from the host device to each terminal device has a broadcast address as the destination address, and the response message transmitted from each terminal device to the host device is the communication address of the host device. Is used as the destination address, communication is possible even if the communication addresses are duplicated between the terminal devices.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, a plurality of terminal devices and a host device for controlling each of the terminal devices are connected by a network, and unique terminal identification information is previously set in each terminal device. Is a device for detecting whether or not the communication address arbitrarily assigned to each terminal device is duplicated. When each terminal device receives a request message for terminal identification information through a network, its terminal identification information Response transmission means for transmitting a response message in which the communication message of the host device is set as a destination address on the network, and the host device includes:
Request message transmitting means for transmitting a request message of terminal identification information on a network with a broadcast address as a destination address, and a response message from each terminal device through the network within a predetermined time after transmission of the request message by the transmission means. Address storage means for storing the terminal identification information in the response message and the transmission source address in correspondence with the sentence, and storing the transmission source address stored in correspondence with the terminal identification information of each terminal device by the address storage means; A duplication determining means for determining the presence or absence of duplication, and duplication notifying means for notifying terminal identification information corresponding to the duplicated transmission source address when the duplication is determined by the judging means are provided. The invention according to claim 3 of the present application is the device according to claim 2,
The host device stores terminal identification information set in advance for each terminal device, and a non-response notifying unit for notifying the terminal identification information of the terminal device that has not responded within a predetermined time since the transmission of the request message by the transmission unit. It is added.

[0007]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment in which the present invention is applied to a POS system will be described below with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a schematic view of a POS system according to an embodiment of the present invention, in which n (n ≧ 2) POS terminals (terminal devices) 1-1, 1-2,. A host computer (host device) 2 for controlling the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n is connected to a network 3.

[0010] The network 3 uses a TPC / IP network using, for example, Ethernet as a network medium. Therefore, each POS terminal 1
-1 to 1-n and the host computer 2 have TC
TC which is a protocol for realizing a P / IP network
P / IP4 is implemented. In this embodiment, UDP (User Datagram Protocol) 5 which is a connectionless transport service among the transport layer protocols of TCP / IP is used for each POS.
Terminals 1-1 to 1-n and the host computer 2 are respectively mounted. Also, each POS terminal 1-1 ~ 1
In -n, unique terminal identification information #x (x: 1,
2,..., N) are set.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the functional configuration of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n and the host computer 2. As shown in FIG. Since each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n has the same configuration, only one (POS terminal 1-1) is shown.

Each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n is connected to the T
A program storage unit 11 for storing programs such as CP / IP4 and UDP5, an input / output (I / O) to which various input / output devices such as a keyboard, a scanner, an operator display, a customer display, and a receipt / journal printer are connected.
Output) unit 12, LAN control unit 13 functioning as a network interface, terminal identification information (#
x), IP address (TMIP) assigned to own terminal, IP assigned to host computer 2
A data storage unit 14 for storing data such as an address (HCIP) is mounted.
l Processing control unit)
5 is used.

The host computer 2 is provided with the TCP / I
A program storage unit 21 for storing programs such as P4 and UDP5; an I / O unit 22 to which various input / output devices such as a keyboard KB and a display DP are connected; a LAN control unit 23 functioning as a network interface; And a data storage unit 24 for storing data such as an assigned IP address (HCIP) and an IP address (TMIP) assigned to each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n. It is configured to be controlled by a host control unit 25 mainly composed of a CPU.

In the host computer 2 having such a configuration, the host control unit 25 includes a reception completion timer TM and a transmission counter CT. Further, as shown in FIG. 3, each of the POS terminals 1 is stored in the setting storage unit 24.
-1 to 1-n set terminal identification information (#
IP assigned to the POS terminal corresponding to x)
TMIP table TB storing address (TMIP)
Is formed.

The host computer 2 has a function as a host computer in a normal POS system, that is, a function as a so-called store controller.
The host control unit 25 is configured to start the processing shown in the flowchart of FIG. 5 when the execution of the duplication check operation of the IP address set to 1-n is instructed.

That is, when the host control unit 25 is instructed to execute the duplication check business of the IP address, first, the ST
(Step) As step 1, a terminal identification information request message in which a predetermined terminal identification information request command is set in the data part is created. In this case, as shown in FIG. 4A, the transmission destination address of the request message is a broadcast IP address (BCIP), the transmission source address is an IP address (HCIP) set for itself, and the protocol type is UDP. And Next, as ST2, the LAN control unit 23 is controlled to transmit the terminal identification information request message on the network 3 in accordance with the UDP5 [request message transmission means]. At this time, the count value a of the transmission number counter CT is initially set to 1 as ST3. Further, the reception completion timer TM is started.

Here, in the terminal identification information request message, the transmission destination address is a broadcast IP address (B
CIP), so even if each POS terminal 1-1 ~ 1-n
Can be received by the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n connected to the network 3 even if the IP addresses (TMIP) set in the POS terminals overlap each other. In the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n that have received the request message via the LAN control unit 13, the terminal control unit 15
As shown in (11), when the terminal identification information request command is received from the received message in ST11, the terminal identification information (#x) set in the data storage unit 14 is received in ST12.
Create a response message in which is set in the data section. In this case, as shown in FIG. 4B, the transmission destination address of the request message is changed to the IP address (HP
IP), the source address is the IP address (TMIP) set for itself, and the protocol type is UDP. Thereafter, in ST13, the LAN controller 15 is controlled to transmit the response message on the network 3 in accordance with the UDP 5 [response transmission means]. In this case, in order to prevent the response messages from the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n from being concentrated at one time, each PO
Each of the S terminals 1-1 to 1-n can change the time interval from the reception of the terminal identification information request message to the transmission of the response message based on, for example, the terminal identification information (#x). preferable.

Thus, each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n
The response message transmitted from is an IP address (HPIP) whose destination address specifies only the host computer 2.
Therefore, even if the IP address (TMIP) set in each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n is duplicated, it is received by the host computer 2. Then, after transmitting the terminal identification information request message, the host control unit 25 of the host computer 2 transmits the terminal identification information request message as ST4.
It waits for a response message from the S terminal 1-1 to 1-n. Each time the response message is received, ST5
The terminal identification information (#x) is obtained from the received message, and the TMIP table TB is searched, and set in the IP address area corresponding to the terminal identification information (#x) as the source address of the received message. The IP address is set [address storage means].

Thereafter, if the reception completion timer TM times out in ST6, the count value a of the transmission number counter CT is incremented by 1 in ST7, and whether or not this count value a exceeds a prescribed value N (for example, 3) in ST8. Determine whether or not. If it does not exceed, the process returns to ST2, transmits a terminal identification information request message again, and repeats the processing of ST3 to ST8. This takes into account the missing of the terminal identification information request message.

If the count value a exceeds the specified value N in ST8, the host control unit 25 sets the TMI as ST9.
The P table TB is searched, and each POS terminal 1-1 ~
It is determined whether there is a duplicate IP address among the IP addresses stored corresponding to the 1-n terminal identification information (# 1 to #n) [duplication determination means]. At this time, terminal identification information (# 1 to #n) in which no IP address is stored is also detected. Thereafter, if there is a duplicate IP address in ST10, a plurality of terminal identification information (# x1, # x2,...) Corresponding to the IP address are displayed on the display DP together with the IP address [ Duplicate notification means]. Also,
If there is terminal identification information in which no IP address is stored, the terminal DP is displayed on the display DP together with the terminal identification information [non-response notifying means]. Thus, the duplication check operation of the IP address is completed.

As described above, in the present embodiment, when the IP address (TMIP) of each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n is arbitrarily set by, for example, newly introducing a system or changing the setting, each of the POS terminals 1-1-1 In order to check the presence / absence of duplication of IP addresses in 1-1 to 1-n, the system user operates the keyboard KB of the host computer 2 and instructs execution of duplication check business of IP addresses. Then, the broadcast IP address (BC) is sent from the host computer 2 to each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n.
A terminal identification information request message with IP) as the transmission address is transmitted via the network 3.

Thus, in the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n receiving the terminal identification information request message, a response message including terminal identification information preset for itself is created, and the host computer 2 IP
The address (HCIP) is transmitted via the network 3 as a transmission destination.

In the host computer 2, each PO
Each time a response message is received from the S terminal 1-1 to 1-n, the terminal identification information (#x) in the response message
The P table TB is searched, and the IP address set as the transmission source address of the response message in the IP address area corresponding to the terminal identification information (#x), that is, the IP address set in the POS terminal of the transmission source of the response message. The stored IP address is stored. And this TMIP
IP stored for each terminal identification information in table TB
If the addresses are collated in sequence and a duplicate IP address is detected, the IP address and a plurality of terminal identification information corresponding to the IP address are displayed on the display DP. In addition, when terminal identification information for which an IP address is not stored in the TMIP table TB even after a certain period of time (a set time of the reception completion timer TM) has elapsed since the transmission of the terminal identification information request message, The terminal identification information is also displayed on the display DP.

FIG. 7 is a screen display example of the display DP when the duplication check operation of the IP address is executed.
FIG. 11A is a screen display example when there is no duplicate IP address and there is no unanswered POS terminal, and FIG.
Is a screen display example when there is a duplicate IP address and a POS terminal that has not responded. For example, when a screen as shown in FIG. 2B is displayed on the display DP, the system user can use the P of the terminal identification information # 2.
POS of OS terminal 1-2 and terminal identification information #n
IP address (ZZ) respectively set to terminal 1-n
Z, ZZ, ZZ, ZZZ) are found to be overlapping. Also, there is no response from the POS terminal 1-3 of the terminal identification information # 3,
It can be seen that the P address has not been set.

As described above, in this embodiment, when detecting whether the IP addresses arbitrarily assigned to the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n are duplicated, first, the host computer 2 transmits the terminal identification information. The request message is transmitted on the network 3 according to the UDP 5 using the broadcast address (BCIP) as the destination address. next,
Each POS terminal 1-1 to 1-n that has received this request message
Sends the response message in which its own terminal identification information is set to the IP address (HCIP) of the host computer 2.
Network 3 in accordance with UDP 5 with
Send on. Here, each P
The terminal identification information request message transmitted to the OS terminals 1-1 to 1-n has a broadcast address (BCI
P) is the destination address, and the response message transmitted from each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n to the host computer 2 is the IP address (HCI) of the host computer 2.
Since P) is used as the destination address, communication is possible even if the POS terminals have overlapping IP addresses.

Then, the host computer 2 transmits the TMIP
The terminal identification information in the response message received from the table TB and the source address, that is, the IP address set in the POS terminal that transmitted the response message, are stored in association with each other. When a certain period of time has passed since the transmission of the request message, each PO is stored in the TMIP table TB.
It is determined whether the IP addresses stored corresponding to the terminal identification information of the S terminals 1-1 to 1-n are duplicated. If there is a duplication, the terminal identification information corresponding to the duplicated IP address is displayed. The information is displayed on the DP for notification. Therefore, according to the present embodiment, the presence / absence of duplication of an IP address can be checked easily and in a short time without using a dedicated network test device such as a LAN analyzer. It can be easily identified.

In the present embodiment, terminal identification information preset in each of the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n is stored in the host computer 2 in the TMIP table TB, and the terminal identification information request message is transmitted. The terminal identification information of the POS terminal that has not responded within a certain period of time is displayed on the display DP for notification. Therefore, it is possible to easily determine a POS terminal in which an IP address has not been set or a communication error has occurred.

In the above-described embodiment, the host computer 2 always sends the terminal identification information request message repeatedly N times. However, even if the host computer 2 transmits the terminal identification information request message less than N times, the host computer 2 sends the message from all the POS terminals 1-1 to 1-n. May be configured to shift to the duplicate address determination processing of ST9 at that point in time when the response message is received.

The present invention is not limited to the POS system, but comprises a plurality of terminal devices connected to a host device for controlling each of the terminal devices via a network. The present invention can be applied to any system in which terminal identification information is set.

[0028]

As described above in detail, according to the first aspect of the present invention, the presence / absence of communication address duplication can be checked easily and in a short time without using a dedicated network test device, and the communication address duplication can be performed. A terminal communication address duplication detection method capable of easily specifying a terminal device set as above can be provided. According to the invention of claim 2 of the present application, it is possible to easily and quickly check whether or not a communication address is duplicated without using a dedicated device for network test, and to easily determine a terminal device with a duplicated communication address. A terminal communication address duplication detection device that can be specified can be provided. According to the third aspect of the present invention, not only the same effects as in the second aspect of the invention but also a terminal device in which a communication address has not been set or a communication error has occurred can be easily determined. A possible effect can be achieved.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a POS system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 shows a host computer and a P of the POS system.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a main configuration of an OS terminal.

FIG. 3 is a conceptual diagram of a TMIP table shown in FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a format of a terminal identification information request message and a response message thereof.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a communication address duplication check business process executed by a host control unit of the host computer.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a terminal identification information request message reception process executed by the terminal control unit of the POS terminal.

FIG. 7 is a view showing an example of display on a host computer when a communication address duplication check job is executed.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1-1 to 1-n POS terminal (terminal device) 2 host computer (host device) 3 network 15 terminal control unit 25 host control unit TB TMIP table

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A system in which a plurality of terminal devices and a host device that controls each of these terminal devices are connected by a network, and each terminal device has unique terminal identification information set in advance.
A method for detecting whether or not a communication address arbitrarily assigned to each of the terminal devices is duplicated, wherein the host device transmits a request message of the terminal identification information to the network using a broadcast address as a destination address. The terminal devices that have received the request message each transmit a response message in which their own terminal identification information has been set on the network using the communication address of the host device as a destination address. The receiving host device stores the terminal identification information and the transmission source address in the response message in association with each other, and when a predetermined time has elapsed since the transmission of the request message, the terminal identification of each terminal device. The presence / absence of duplication of the source address stored corresponding to the information is determined. Terminal communication address duplication detection method is characterized in that so as to notify the terminal identification information corresponding to the source address that is the overlap in. 2. A system in which a plurality of terminal devices and a host device that controls each of these terminal devices are connected by a network, and each of the terminal devices is set in advance with unique terminal identification information.
A device for detecting whether the communication address arbitrarily assigned to each of the terminal devices is duplicated, wherein each of the terminal devices receives its request message of the terminal identification information through the network and has its own terminal identification information. Response sending means for sending a response message in which the communication message of the host device is set as a destination address on the network, wherein the host device transmits the request message of the terminal identification information to a broadcast address. A request message transmitting means for transmitting the request message on the network as an address, and a terminal in the response message when a response message from each of the terminal devices is received through the network within a predetermined time from the transmission of the request message by the transmission means. Stores identification information and source address in association with each other Address storage means, duplicate address determination means for determining the presence / absence of duplication of the source address stored in correspondence with the terminal identification information of each of the terminal devices by the address storage means, and A terminal communication address duplication detecting device, comprising: duplication notifying means for notifying terminal identification information corresponding to the duplicated transmission source address. 3. The host device stores terminal identification information preset in each terminal device, and notifies terminal identification information of a terminal device that has not responded within a predetermined time since transmission of a request message by a transmission unit. 3. The terminal communication address duplication detecting device according to claim 2, further comprising a non-response notifying means.