JPS6227161A - Hand printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make the direct printing on not only the plane paper surface but also the curved surface possible, by providing the printing start and stop timing specifying means on a casing and the transfer amount detection means detecting the transfer amount of the casing in conjunction with the casing transfer means. CONSTITUTION:The printing start and stop indicating push button 2 is arranged on the upper surface of a casing 1 and a connecting cable 3 is attached to the side surface part. Further, a pair of cylindrical rollers 4 are arranged on the bottom surface of the casing 1. When this casing 1 is moved in the direction of arrow marks 1 (Japanese) printed on the upper surface of the casing 1, the cylindrical roller 4 is rotated on a printing plane and this printing plane is printed. Further, the rotation of another cylindrical roller 4 is transmitted to an encoder 12 and the pulse corresponding to the transfer amount of a hand printer is generated. This pulse is sent to the printing control unit of the computer via the cable 3. A control unit 15 controls the printing operation according to the signal from the hand printer 14 by obtaining printing data from the printing buffer 16.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] The present invention relates to a hand printer, which is a type of print output device used in computers such as personal computers, word processors, and the like.

[Technical Background of the Invention and Problems thereof] Conventionally, printers have been used in many ways as output devices in computers such as office computers and personal computers, and word processors. However, this printer has the following drawbacks.

(1) There are no low-cost printers that can be connected to low-cost computers.

(2) It can only be printed on a flat paper surface. For example, when printing the destination on the wrapping paper of a package, it is not possible to print directly on the wrapping paper used to wrap the package. The only option was to print the shipping address etc. on a piece of paper and paste it on the wrapping paper of the package.

(3) Printers are usually large enough to have a certain size, so they are generally used as stationary printers, and there are no small printers that can be carried.

[Object of the Invention] In view of the two drawbacks, the object of the present invention is to provide a low-cost hand printer that can directly print by hand not only on flat paper surfaces but also on curved surfaces. There is a particular thing.

"N Essentials of the Invention" The present invention provides a printing means having a print head and a printing ribbon housed in a casing, a traveling means for traveling the casing, and a printing device disposed in the casing and operated by an operator. a start/stop timing specifying means; a movement detecting means for detecting the moving amount of the casing in conjunction with the traveling means; and a printing start/stop timing specifying means for holding print data of a plurality of characters to be printed. When a print start signal is given from the movement amount detection means, a print head drive signal corresponding to each print data of the plurality of characters is sequentially outputted to the print head at a timing based on the movement amount obtained from the movement amount detection means, and from then on, the above print head is When a printing stop signal is given from the start/stop timing specifying means, the printing operation of the print head is stopped, and the printing start/stop timing is started.
When a print start signal is received from the stop timing designation means, printing is performed at a timing based on the movement amount obtained from the movement amount detection means, and the print data corresponding to the print data of the last character among the plurality of characters is printed. It comprises a control means for controlling the printing operation by alternately outputting a head drive signal to the print head in sequence, and a connection means for flexibly connecting the control means and the casing. The above objective is achieved by using a hand printer.

“Embodiment of the invention” An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.
The figure is a perspective view showing an embodiment of the hand printer of the present invention. The hand printer is large enough to be held and moved by hand, and its outer shell is formed by a casing 1 that is shaped so that it can be easily held by hand. A print start/stop instruction push button 2 is arranged on the top surface of the casing 1, and a connection cable 3 is attached to the side surface. This connection cable 3 is for data transmission with a metering machine (not shown).

Further, a pair of cylindrical rollers 4 are arranged on the lower surface of the casing 1, and when the casing 1 is moved in the direction of arrow A printed on the upper part of the casing 1, the cylindrical rollers 4 move over the printed surface. It rotates and prints on this printing surface. The print start/stop instruction push button 2, when pressed, outputs a print start signal if the hand printer is stopping printing, and outputs a print stop signal if printing is in progress.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a detailed example of the hand printer shown in FIG. 1. A print head 5 is located in the center of the casing 1.
is built-in. The side of the printing head 5 on which the printing pin 6 is installed faces the bottom (opening) of the casing 1, and a printing ribbon 7 is stretched across the printing pin 6.

The printing ribbon 7 is stably run by a feed roller 8 and a plurality of ribbon guides 9, and after being provided on the inner side of the casing 1 or once accumulated in a ribbon reservoir 10, it is sent out again to the outside. The feed roller 8 is driven by the rotation of one cylindrical roller 4. Further, a ratchet 11 is provided opposite to the feed roller 8, and when the casing 1 is moved in the opposite direction to the direction indicated by the arrow, the print ribbon 7 is moved in the opposite direction by the rotation of the feed roller 8. This prevents the print ribbon 7 from becoming tangled. Further, the rotation of the other cylindrical roller 4 is transmitted to the encoder 12.

This encoder 12 generates a pulse corresponding to the movement ♀ of the hand printer, and this pulse is transmitted to the cable 3 shown in FIG.
The signal is sent to the print control system of ΔtRIN through the ΔtRIN. Note that the symbol ";Fi13" indicates the printing surface.

Figure 3 is a block diagram showing an example of the printing control system of the calculator connected to the hand printer shown in Figure 1.
be. The hand printer 14 is connected to the control section 15 via the cable 3. The control unit 15 removes print data from the print buffer 16 and displays it on the display unit 11, and also displays the print data of the hand printer 14 according to the number of characters given from the hand printer 14. T
There are some wholesalers.

FIG. 7-1 shows the printing control system shown in FIG. 3, together with the configuration of the control section 15 therein. 20 is
Editing Processing Department, 21f, & Paranon...? 2 is a print control flag; 1): Ball G; , editing processing section 20
is to take out a predetermined number of characters from the print f of character string C stored in the print buffer 16 and output them to the buffer 21. The buffer 21 holds the print data output from the editing processing section 20, and shifts the print data by one character by a signal output from the gate 25, and also transfers the print data held therein. is output to the display section 17 and to the character generator 23 via the character generator 26. Print control flag 2
2 is a print start button provided in the hand printer 14.
When a print start signal is given from the stop instruction push button 2 via the signal line 3A, the hand printer 14 is in a printing state (remembering this); similarly, when a print stop signal is given, the hand printer 14 Reference numeral 14 is for storing that the printing is stopped, and a signal corresponding to the state of the hand printer 14 is sent to groups 1 to 25 and groups 1 to 25.
- output to port 26. When the character generator 23 is given the print data (character code data) held in the buffer 21 via the gate 26, it sends a signal line to the hand printer 14 in response to a signal output from the pulse counter 24. 3C, print pattern data corresponding to the above print data is output. The pulse counter 24 takes the pulse given from the encoder 12 of the hand printer 14 via the signal line 3B as a manual pulse, and outputs a pulse with the same period as this pulse to the character generator 23. It is output to the character generator 23 and Goo 1-25. Signal line 3△.

3B and 3G include the connection cables 3t shown in FIGS. 1 and 2.

Next] The operation of this embodiment will be explained with reference to FIG.

FIG. 5 shows the relationship between the timing of the output pulse of the encoder 12 and the operation of the printing pin 6.
It is ~. In Fig. 5, a is for the encoder 128: F4
H/”T fl No. 7 No. 7 No. 1 Shown on the left 1.
h indicates the operation timing of the printing bin 6, and C indicates an example of a printed character.

Mari”, the editing processing unit 20 of the control unit 15 reads the print data of the print speed character string from the print buffer 16,
This is output to buffer z21. In this example, it is assumed that the character string to be printed is "1st line and 2nd line [puru."]. The buffer 21 holds the print data output from the editing processing section 20 and outputs it to the display section 17.

The display unit 17 displays a character string 4' that reads "Separate the first and second lines." based on the given print data. The operator presses the hand printer 4 while checking the displayed content.
is moved to the desired location and the cylindrical roller 4 is brought into contact with the printing surface 13. The time at this time is assumed to be 11. Next, the operator starts moving the hand printer 4 in the printing direction.

When the hand printer 4 comes to the location where long printing is desired, the time is t2, the operator presses the printing start/stop instruction push button 2. Let the time at this time be t. At this time t3, the print start/stop instruction push button 2 outputs a print start signal to the print control flag 22. The print control flag 22 is activated by this signal (memorizes that the hand printer 4 is in the printing state), and outputs a signal to open the gates 25 and 26. encoder 12
As the hand link 14 moves, it outputs pulses to the pulse counter 24 at intervals corresponding to the amount of movement. Therefore, the pulse counter 24 outputs the pulses to the character generator 23 at the same period, and also outputs the pulses at a predetermined period. The frequency is divided into periods of , and is output to the character generator 23 and to the buffer 21 via the gate 25.

For example, the horizontal dot size of one character printed by the hand printer 14 is 24 dots, and the character interval is 1.
/8 characters, that is, 3 dots 1~. It is assumed that the frequency-divided pulses of 1F outputted from the pulse counter 24 are the pulses outputted after counting 27 pulses outputted from the encoder 12. A signal consisting of these pulses is called a 1/27 signal, and a signal consisting of pulses output at the same period as the pulses output from the encoder 12 is called a 171 signal.

From time t3 onwards, gates 25 and 26 are open.

Therefore, at the timing of the pulse of the 1/27 signal output from the pulse counter 24, the buffer 21 sequentially sends each character of the stored print data, starting from the print data corresponding to the first character, via the gate 26. Output to the character generator 23. At the same timing, the print data held in the buffer 21 is shifted by one character in the direction of the area where the print data corresponding to the first character was stored.

The display section 17 displays characters corresponding to the print data held in the buffer 21. character generator 2
3 generates print pattern data corresponding to this print data when print data for each character (character code data) is given from the buffer 21 via the gate 26 at the timing of the 1/27 signal pulse; This is output one dot row at a time to the print head 5 of the hand printer 14 at the pulse timing of the 1/1 signal.The print head 5 operates the print pin 6 based on this data, and prints the print surface 13 via the print ribbon 7. This printing ribbon 7 is endlessly fed by a feed roller 8 as the cylindrical roller 4 rotates, that is, as the hand printer 14 travels.

The characters displayed on the display section 17 correspond to the character data held in the buffer 21. The character data held in the buffer 21 is sequentially shifted one character at a time in the direction of the area where the character data of the first character was stored at the pulse timing of the 1/27 signal.

Therefore, the first character displayed on the display section 17 is the character to be printed next to the character currently being printed. The operator is on display section 1
Hand printer 14 while looking at the characters displayed in 7.
When the character string to be printed reaches a point in the middle of the character string to be printed where a line break is desired, the print start/stop instruction push button 2 is pressed.J0 at this time is set to 14.

At time t4, a print stop signal is output from the hand printer 14 to the print control flag 22. The stitch print control flag 22 is reset by this signal (memorizes that the hand printer 14 has stopped printing).
, and output signals for closing the gates 25 and 26, respectively.

Therefore, the gates 25 and 26 are closed, the print data held in the buffer 21 is no longer shifted, and no print data is output to the character generator 23 either. In this way, the character generator 23
At that time, the bond that has finished processing the data of one character (output of pattern data for each one dot I-column) no longer outputs anything. Therefore, the print head 5 and the print pin 6 stop their operation after printing all the characters currently being printed at time t4. For example, if the operator presses the printing start/stop instruction push button 2 when the characters "Line 111" displayed on the display unit 17 disappear, the characters "Line 1 and" will be printed on the printing surface 13. After that, nothing is printed and display section 1
7 maintains the state in which "Separate the second line." is displayed.

The relationship between the display result displayed by the display section 17 and the Fl 1u11 result displayed on the printing surface 13 is shown in FIG. 6th
The operator's operation procedure and display results are shown on the left side of the figure, and the print results are shown on the corresponding right side.

Next, the operator lifts the hand printer 14 and separates it from the printing surface 13. The time at this time is assumed to be t5.

and the operator (who then uses the hand printer 14 to print)
The cylindrical roller 4 is brought into contact with the printing surface 13 at that position. The time at this time is assumed to be t6. Next, the operator moves the hand printer 14 in the printing direction.

Let the time of the day be 17. The operator then presses the print start/stop instruction push button 2. The time at this time is 1
8. At time t8, the print start/stop instruction push button 2 outputs a print start signal to the print control flag 22.

The print control flag 22 is activated by this signal (the hand printer 14 remembers that it is in the printing state), and outputs signals to open the gates 25 and 26, respectively.

As the hand printer 14 moves, the encoder 12 outputs pulses to the pulse counter 24 at intervals corresponding to the amount of movement.
4 outputs the 1/11 word to the character generator 23 and outputs the 1/27 signal to the character generator 23 and to the buffer 21 via the gate 25. Therefore, at the timing of the pulse of the 1/27 signal output from the pulse counter 24, the buffer 21 sequentially sends each character of the stored print data, starting from the print data corresponding to the first character, via the gate 26. Output to the character generator 23. At the same time, buffer 21
The print data held in is shifted one character part in the direction of the area where the print data corresponding to the first character was stored. The display section 17 displays characters corresponding to the print data held in the buffer 21. The character generator 23 generates print pattern data corresponding to the given print data and outputs it to the print head 5 of the hand printer 14 one dot row at a time at the pulse timing of the 1/1 signal.

The print head 5 operates the print pin 6 based on this data, and prints on the print surface 13 via the print ribbon 7. At this time, the printing ribbon is sent along with the movement of the hand printer 14.

The operator runs the hand printer 14 while tracing the characters displayed on the display section 17, and when the operator reaches a point where he wants to make a line break in the middle of printing the second line, he presses the print start/stop command at that point. Press button 2.

Let the time at this time be t. At this time t, a print stop signal is output from the hand printer 14 to the print control flag 22. At this time, the print control flag 22 is reset by this signal (memorizes that the hand printer 14 has stopped printing), and outputs a signal to close the gates 25 and 26, respectively.

Therefore, gates 25 and 26 are closed, and buffer 26
The character data held in is no longer shifted, and the character data is also no longer output to the character generator 23. In this way, the character generator 23 stops outputting anything after completing the processing of the data of the one character currently being processed (outputting pattern data for each dot row). Therefore, the print head 5 and the print pin 6 stop their operation after finishing printing the character being printed at time ↑9.

For example, if the operator selects the characters displayed on the display section 17,
If you press the print start/stop instruction push button 2 when "" disappears from the second line, the previously printed "" button will be displayed on the printing surface 13.
A new line is added under "1st line" and "After 1 is printed on the second line, nothing is printed, and the display section 17 maintains the state where "Separate." is displayed.

Thereafter, in the same manner, the operator carries the hand printer 14 to the place where he or she wants to print next, and places the cylindrical roller 4 on the printing surface 13.
, press the print start/stop instruction push button 2, continue to run the hand printer 14 while looking at the display on the display 17, and issue the print start/stop instruction when you want to perform a line feed. Press pushbutton 2. If the operator repeats this operation until all the characters displayed on the display section 17 disappear, a plurality of lines of characters will be printed on the printing surface 13.

According to this embodiment, the hand printer 14 is small and lightweight as shown in FIG. 2, so it can be held in the hand and printed anywhere. In addition, since the cylindrical roller 4 is used in the running part, even if the printing surface is curved, the hand printer 1
4 can be moved in a straight line, and also has the effect of equalizing the printing pressure of the printing pin 6, so that good printing can be performed. Furthermore, since the hand printer 14 can be made relatively inexpensive, it can be used in low-cost computers and the like without any cost problems.

In this embodiment, the AND button is used to output the print start signal and the print stop signal, but two corresponding buttons may be provided to output the respective signals.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, the hand printer of the present invention provides a low-cost printer that can print directly on a flat or curved surface by holding it by hand. can be obtained. Further, according to the present invention, the character string to be printed can be printed with a line break at the location desired by the operator, and after printing has started, printing can be stopped and started at any location. .

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is an external view showing an embodiment of the hand printer of the present invention, Fig. 2 is a detailed view showing an example of the internal structure of the hand printer shown in Fig. 1, and Fig. 3 is a hand printer shown in Fig. 1. A block diagram showing an example of a printing control system that controls the printer, FIG. 4 is a block diagram of the configuration of the control section shown in FIG. 3, and FIG. 5 shows the output pulses of the encoder shown in FIG. Similarly, FIG. 2 shows the timing chart of the operation of the printing pin, and FIG. 6 shows the display results of the display unit shown in FIGS. 3 and 4.
3 is a flowchart for explaining an operator's operation procedure and print results. 1... Casing 2... Printing start/stop instruction push button 3... Connection cable 4... Cylindrical roller 5... Print head 6... Printing bin 7... Printing ribbon
8...Feed roller 9...Ribbon guide 14.
・・Hand printer 15・Control department agent Patent attorney Nori Ken Ken Yudo Sanno − g-plτ^h, 5; Mu1 凰□□□□□Ego) - One. 1 Moo 1ヱJ-]l Suji 1■- 1ヱl- Kokoro↓ 2.

Claims (1)

[Claims] a printing means having a print head and a printing ribbon housed in a casing; a traveling means for causing the casing to travel; a printing start/stop timing specifying means disposed in the casing and operated by an operator; a movement amount detection means for detecting the movement amount of the casing in conjunction with the means; and a movement amount detection means that holds print data of a plurality of characters to be printed, and when a printing start signal is given from the printing start/stop timing specifying means, the movement A print head drive signal corresponding to each print data of the plurality of characters is sequentially outputted to the print head at a timing based on the amount of movement obtained from the amount detection means, and thereafter a print stop signal is output from the print start/stop timing designation means. When a printing start signal is given from the printing start/stop timing specifying means, the printing operation of the print head is stopped, and when a printing start signal is given from the printing start/stop timing specifying means, the plurality of characters are printed at a timing based on the moving amount obtained from the moving amount detecting means. a control means for controlling a printing operation by alternately outputting print head drive signals corresponding to character data of characters that have not yet been printed to said print head; and said control means and said casing; A hand printer comprising: a connecting means for flexibly connecting the hand printer.