JPS6119366A - Printing method of character - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To reduce the fatigue of eyes by determining the height of a character cell in response to a font select command and inverting white and black by the height of the character cell. CONSTITUTION:A first processor 3 receives a character code information, contains it in a page buffer 2 and extracts data corresponding to one line, varies them into parameters for processing, and transmits them over a mailbox 4. A character data row corresponding to one line is arranged in order of a completion code LF in a pre-line, line-dot height (b), a line-base position (c) and a font select command (d, e). Figures, each represent the shapes and size of character patterns. A character pattern ROM5 contains informations representing character-cell height corresponding to figures, and the informations are used on reverse printing (f). A second processor 6 executes processing by employing data in the mailbox 4, and conducts reverse printing at the height dot height of inversion character cells in one line. A process is repeated at every line, and characters in which only reverse characters are printed in a white-black inversion manner are printed. Minimum inversion printing is conducted on inversion printing, fine printing is obtained, and characters are not white-black inverted extending over the whole width of the line, thus resulting in little fatigue of eyes.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (Field of Industrial Application) The present invention relates to a method for printing characters on devices such as printers and CRTs. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method for printing characters when a character pattern is printed with black and white reversed.

(Prior Art) When a conventional printing device such as a printer prints a character by reversing black and white, the character is printed in reverse at the line dot height, regardless of the shape or size of the character.

(Problem to be solved by the invention) Therefore, 12 point characters (character cell height 46.2 am)
For use, 4/Pi (row i!i!6.35mm>
, 3/Pi <Peddler 8.47111111), etc., when the black and white of the characters with the width of the line are reversed, the black part increases with respect to the true character cell, making the printed matter unsightly. FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of printing by a conventional method. (a) shows the case where the row dot height is greater than the character cell height, and (b) shows the case where the row dot height H and the character cell height are equal. As is clear from the figure (a), the more black parts there are compared to the white characters, the harder it is to see the print.

Furthermore, if the character size is changed within the same line and characters of different sizes are printed inverted at the line dot height, it becomes even more difficult to see, as shown in FIG.

The present invention has been made in view of these points, and its purpose is to reverse the black and white characters and print them.
To realize a character printing method capable of performing black and white reversal printing with less eye fatigue.

(Means for Solving the Problems) The present invention that achieves the above object is characterized in that a character cell height is determined in response to a font select command, and black and white is inverted at the character cell height. be.

(Example) Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a recording apparatus for carrying out the present invention. In the figure, 1 is an interface control unit that exchanges data between an external device such as a personal computer and an internal device, and 2 is a page that stores one page of code information sent via the interface control unit 1. 3 is a first processor that controls data transfer between the interface 1 and the page buffer 2; 4 is a mailbox connected to the first processor 3 via the digital bus DB1; 5 is a mailbox connected to the first processor 3 via the digital bus DB1; This is a character pattern ROM connected to box 4.

The character pattern ROM 5 stores character patterns relating to characters of various shapes.

6 takes out the data stored in the mailbox 4, which has been changed into internal processing parameters, via the digital bus DB2, and uses these parameters to create the character pattern R.
a second processor for reading character patterns from OM5, 7
8 is a dot generation control section that receives the character pattern and various parameters read out by the second processor 6 and generates dot data, and 8 receives the dot data generated by the dot generation control section 7 and prints it on recording paper. It is a printing device. As the printing device 8, for example, a dot printer is used. The present invention will be explained using an apparatus configured as described above.

Assume that a character code data string as shown in FIG. 5 is sent from an external device (not shown).

The character code data string shown in the figure is a combination of font selection commands for each character shape, character attribute control codes (black and white inversion, underlining, enlargement, reduction, etc.), and character codes to be printed on the scale afterwards. . A reverse print-on command is placed before the character data to be reversed, and a reverse print-off command is placed at the end of the reverse character data. That is, this indicates that the character data surrounded by these two commands is the data to be inverted. CGI, CG2, and CG3 in the figure indicate the shapes of character patterns, etc. The first processor 3 receives this character code information and stores it in the page buffer 2. When the page buffer 2 becomes full (data amount for one page of recording paper), a print start signal is sent from the first processor 3 to the printing device 8, and the printing device 8 is driven. Next, the first processor 3 uses the page buffer 2
One line of data is extracted from , the character code, character attribute, and line attribute are changed to parameters for internal processing, and the data is sent to the mailbox 4.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing one line of character data string whose parameters have been changed in this manner. Previous line end code LF
After (line feed), data indicating the line dot height is placed, followed by data indicating the line base position, and then a font select command. The numbers 11iu, 11211, 1" in each font command
3'' indicates the shape and size of each character pattern.Character pattern R0M5 contains information indicating the character cell height corresponding to the characters "111ZI"2", 3" in this font select command. , this information is used during reverse printing.Also, the character cell height 4 corresponding to the font select command may be stored as a table value in the program.The line dot height and line base position are A value is obtained by calculation by the processor 3. Each character data is stored as an ASCII code, and 1" is set in the MSB only in the case of character data to be printed in reverse. FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of character code data. MSB is a reverse print flag, and when set to ``1'', it indicates that the character data should be printed in reverse.Reverse printing may be performed based on the information contained in the character data as described above, but there are other For example, a control code like ESCR may be added before character data.

The second processor 6 reads character patterns for each character size from the character pattern ROM 5 using these parameters from the changed character code string shown in FIG. 6 sent to the mailbox 4, and controls dot generation. It is sent to section 7 along with various parameters.

That is, the second processor 6 performs processing using the data in the mailbox 4 according to the method of the present invention, which will be described later.
Find the highest dot height of a reversed character cell in a line and perform reverse printing at that height.

FIG. 1 is a flowchart showing a printing method according to the present invention performed by the second processor 6. As shown in FIG. First, processing at the start of printing is performed, and then printing processing is performed. In the processing at the start of typing, it is checked whether the characters in one line of character string code are reverse characters, and if they are reverse characters, the character dot height is read. Then, the read character dot height is compared with the character dot height of the previous reverse character, and if the latter is 1 larger than the former, the character dot height data and baseline position are replaced with new data and stored.

Repeat the above operation for the number of reverse characters in one line,
Memorize the height of the largest character dot and the baseline position at that time.

Next, the printing process will be explained. Here, an example will be explained in which two characters A and 8 of different sizes are printed in black and white inverted as shown in FIG.

In the printing process, it is first determined whether the character in question is a reverse character. If it is not a reverse character, the next character is printed. If it is a reverse character, then it is determined whether the reverse character is the character at the inversion start position (first) or the second or subsequent character in a series of reverse character strings. If the character is not at the inversion start position, this corresponds to area 2 in FIG. 8, and the printing process for the next character begins.

If the reverse character is a reverse character, the baseline of the reverse character cell is read and compared to the baseline of the highest reverse character cell. When the baseline of the relevant reverse character cell is smaller than the baseline of the highest reverse character cell, this corresponds to area ■ in Figure 8, so dot information is added to match this area to the cell synonyms of the highest reverse character. Make it black and write it to dot buffer 1. If the baseline of the reverse character cell is larger than the baseline of the highest reverse character cell, the process is divided depending on whether the reverse character height ends or not. When the reverse character height ends, the process is further divided into two steps depending on whether the maximum reverse character cell height ends or not.

If the process ends, it corresponds to the area ■ in FIG. 8, so the next character printing process begins. If it doesn't finish,
Since this corresponds to the area (■) in FIG. 8, the dot information is made black and stored in the dot buffer in the dot generation control section in order to match this part to the maximum reverse cell height.

If the character height of the relevant reverse character ends,
Since this is a case of recording a new character, the character pattern RO
The character pattern of the character generator in M5 (FIG. 4) is read out, and the read data is inverted in black and white and written into the dot buffer.The contents of the dot buffer are sent to the printing device 8 to be printed and recorded.

By repeating the process shown in FIG. 1 for each line, only the reverse characters are printed in reverse black and white. FIG. 9 is a diagram showing a character string printed and recorded in this manner. At the time of reverse printing, the necessary minimum amount of reverse printing is performed to obtain beautiful printing, and since black and white is not reversed over the entire width of the line, it is possible to perform reverse printing that is not unsightly and causes less eye fatigue, yet attracts attention. Although page processing has been described above, line processing may be performed using only a line buffer. In addition, in printing operations such as displaying on a CRT or printing on paper, it is relatively rare for the fonts (shape, size, etc.) of the characters included in one line to be mixed, and in many cases the fonts included in one line are The font of the characters displayed is constant. Even in such a case, if the method of the present invention is used, which inverts black and white at the height of character cell dots instead of reversing black and white at line dot height H, the appearance of the print will be good.

Therefore, as an embodiment of the present invention, the process of detecting the maximum character cell height may be omitted during the program shown in Figure @4.

(Effects of the Invention) As described above in detail, according to the present invention, when the character size, character position, etc. are not the same in one line, by reversing black and white at the maximum character cell height of the reversed character in that line, It is possible to realize a character printing method that can perform black and white reversal printing with less eye fatigue.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a flowchart explaining the printing method of the present invention;
Figures 2 and 3 are diagrams showing examples of conventional black and white reversal printing;
FIG. 5 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of a recording device for carrying out the present invention, FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a character data string sent from an external device, FIG. 6 is a diagram showing a converted character string, FIG. 7 is a diagram showing the bit structure of data, and FIGS. 8 and 9 are diagrams showing examples of black and white inversion printing. 1... Interface control unit 2.6... Processor 3... Page buffer 4.
・・Mailbox 5・J・Character pattern ROM7・
...Dot generation control section 8...Printing device patent applicant Roku Konishi Photo Industry Co., Ltd. Representative Patent attorney Fuji Ijima 1 extraterritorial 1 name horse 2 figure (a) figure 3 (b) figure 8 figure I thief

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) A character printing method characterized by determining a character cell height in response to a font select command, and inverting black and white at the character cell height. (2) Obtain the reverse print code from the print code, use the font select command to check the character cell height of the character to be printed in reverse in one line of print code, detect the maximum character cell height, and find the maximum character cell height. 2. A method for printing characters according to claim 1, wherein black and white are reversed.