JPS63160468A - Facsimile equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To facilitate dialing operation by recognizing the telephone number of a remote side entered on an original by a character recognition device, and automatically operating the dial. CONSTITUTION:The character recognition device 3 retrieves data temporarily stored in a buffer memory 2, and recognizes the telephone number of a transmission destination stored with a prescribed format. Whether a recognized numeral is the telephone number of the transmission destination or not is decided by deciding whether the numeral is stored with the prescribed format or not. When the character recognition device 3 recognizes the telephone number of the transmission destination, it transfers this telephone number to a control part 5. The control part 5 supplies this telephone number to an automatic dialling device 11 and the automatic dialling device 11 transmits a dial pulse corresponding to this telephone number to a communication line through a network controller 9. Thereby, the dialling operation can be facilitated.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a facsimile machine, and more particularly to a facsimile machine having a function of automatically dialing a destination telephone number.

[Conventional technology]

Facsimile machines generally use telephone lines to send and receive data, so a dialing operation is required to call the other party when sending. Conventionally, a dialing device built into a facsimile machine or a dialing device of a telephone was used to input the telephone number of the other party and make a call.

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve]

However, the conventional facsimile machine mentioned above has
There is a problem that dialing operations are inconvenient. The operator must enter the recipient's telephone number into the dialing device each time a transmission is made, so
A problem arises when sending to more than one destination. For example, when sending a message to destination A and destination B, first
To call A, the operator enters A's telephone number into the dialing device. Then, when the originals to be sent to A are set on the original stacker, the originals are sequentially sent to A. However, the dialing operation to call B cannot be performed until the transmission to A is completed. Therefore, the operator must wait for the transmission to A to be completed, set the original to be transmitted to B on the document stacker, and perform a dialing operation.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a facsimile machine that allows easy dialing operations to call a destination.

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention provides an input scanning unit that optically scans an image of a transmission document and captures it as digital data, a buffer memory that temporarily stores data input from the input scanning unit, and a buffer memory that temporarily stores data input from the input scanning unit. A facsimile machine that is equipped with a data transmission means that converts the data into a predetermined code and sends it to a communication line, and a dialing means that performs a dialing operation to call the destination, sends the transmitted data stored in a predetermined format on the transmission document. the phone number of the destination,
A character recognition device is further provided to perform character recognition based on the data stored in the buffer memory, and the recognized telephone number is given to a dialing means to call the destination, thereby facilitating easy dialing operation. This is what made it possible.

〔Example〕

The present invention will be described below based on illustrated embodiments.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a facsimile machine according to an embodiment of the present invention. The input scanning section l is a device that optically scans the image of the document fed from the document stacker S and captures it as digital data, and the data captured here is provided to the buffer memory 2. The buffer memory 2 is a memory having a storage capacity sufficient to store image data for at least one page of a document, and input data is temporarily stored here. The data temporarily stored in the buffer memory 2 is retrieved by the character recognition device 3. This character recognition device 3 is a characteristic component of the present invention, and its function will be described in detail later.

The data in the buffer memory 2 is compressed in the data compression section 4, provided as transmission data to the control section 5, and transmitted from the control section 5 to the right side of the figure. On the other hand, from the right side of the figure, control unit 5. The received data that has arrived is decompressed in the data restoration section 6, and is reproduced as the original original image in the image output section 7.

The control unit 5 sends and receives data to and from a modem (MODEM) 8. MODEM 8 modulates transmitted data and demodulates received data, and also controls network control device 9
Sends and receives data to and from the communication line via. The network control device 9 functions to switch and connect the communication line to the MODEM 8 or the telephone set 10. Further, the dialing operation at the time of transmission is performed by the automatic dialing device 11. That is, automatic dialing device 11
functions to generate dial pulses based on commands from the control section 5 and send them to the communication line via the network control device 9.

As described above, the character recognition device 3 is a device that searches the data temporarily stored in the buffer memory 2 and recognizes the destination telephone number stored in a predetermined format. The character recognition device 3 may be configured to perform character recognition using, for example, a character recognition algorithm in a general character reading device.

A determination as to whether the recognized digits are the destination telephone number is made by determining whether the digits have been stored in a predetermined format. For example, as with the postal code recognition method, a predetermined frame may be provided at a predetermined position, and the numbers within this frame may be recognized as the destination telephone number.

When the character recognition device 3 recognizes the destination telephone number in this manner, it transmits this telephone number to the control unit 5. The control unit 5 gives this telephone number to the automatic earring device 11,
Have the user perform a dialing operation for this telephone number.

That is, the automatic dialing device 11 sends a dial pulse corresponding to this telephone number to the communication line via the network control device 9.

Now, an explanation will be given of the operation when using this apparatus to send document a to the other party Δ and then send the document S to the other party. first,
Top sheet) al as the first page of manuscript a, 1 of original 1b
A top sheet b1 is prepared as the first sheet. This top sheet has a unique style that can be distinguished from general manuscripts after the second printing, and in this embodiment, a predetermined frame is provided at a predetermined position.

The operator writes the telephone number of the other party A in the frame of the top sheet a1, and the telephone number of the other party B in the frame of the top sheet bl. This entry operation may be done by hand, but in a font (for example, a measure) that can be recognized by the character recognition device 3. Next, these are stacked with top sheet a1, second and subsequent documents a2, a3, etc. to form document a, and furthermore, after this document a, top sheet) bl, second and subsequent documents are The original documents b2, b3, . . . are overlapped to form a document sheet.

Then, the operator simply sets these stacked documents a1b on the document stacker S and turns on the transmission switch of the facsimile machine.

Subsequent transmissions are done automatically as follows, so
This completes all transmission operations by the operator.

First, the top sheet a1 is fed from the document smoother S to the input scanning section 1. Here, the image on the top sheet)al is taken into the buffer memory 2 as digital data. Here, the character recognition device 3 is connected to the buffer memory 2.
It searches for digital data in the document, determines that it is in a predetermined format, and recognizes that this document is a top sheet.

Furthermore, the number in the frame is read, it is recognized that this is the telephone number of the other party A, and this telephone number is given to the control section 5. Automatic dialing device 11 receiving commands from control unit 5
sends a dial pulse corresponding to this telephone number onto the communication line.

Now, let us assume that the facsimile machine performing the above-mentioned transmission operation is the calling station, and the other party's facsimile machine is the called station, and the transmission and reception of signals between the two is illustrated as shown in FIG. First, the called station transmits a signal DIS indicating the standard function of the facsimile machine to the calling station, and the calling station transmits a response signal DC3 to the called station. continue,
Training consisting of a data sequence for performing automatic modem equalization, etc. is transmitted from the calling station, and a training check TCF is transmitted. When the reception preparation confirmation signal CFR is transmitted from the called station to the calling station, the calling station transmits the training and then transmits the image signal. That is, the top sheet) al output from the data compression unit 4
image data is transmitted to the called station.

When data transmission for one page is completed, the calling station transmits to the called station a code RTC indicating the completion of data transmission for one page and a one page end signal ROM. In response, the called station responds by transmitting a message confirmation signal MCF. In this way, the data of the document a that is successively output from the data compression B4 is transmitted page by page.

Here, the character recognition device 3 stores documents a2, a3...
The data for ・ will also be searched each time it is temporarily stored in the buffer memory 2, but since general manuscripts are not written in a prescribed format like a top sheet, the telephone number of the other party cannot be found. Not recognized. Now, M
When transmitting the top sheet of the ODEM8 original a, the top sheet b of the original is stored in the buffer memory 2.
1 image data will be stored. therefore,
The character recognition device 3 recognizes the telephone number of the next destination B, and reports this to the control unit 5. The control unit 5 recognizes that the current destination A and the next destination B are different, and when the transmission of the final page az is completed, it disconnects the line with the destination destination. Then, □ gives an instruction to the automatic dialing device 11 to call the other party's date.

The automatic dialing device 11 performs a dialing operation for the other party in the same manner as for the other party A. Here again, the document is transmitted as shown in FIG. 2, with destination B as the called station.

When the transmission of the last page bz of the original document is completed, since no data is stored in the buffer memory 2 at this point, all transmission operations are completed.

In the manner described above, the document transmission to both the destination A and the destination date is completed. In addition, in the above-mentioned example,
Although a transmission operation has been described taking transmission to two destinations as an example, communication to three or more destinations can be performed in the same way.

Even in this case, if the operator writes the phone number on the top sheet on the first page of the original to each recipient, the operator can send all the recipients by simply stacking multiple originals and setting them on the document stacker S. will be sent automatically.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As described above, according to the present invention, the facsimile machine recognizes the telephone number of the other party written on the document using the character recognition device and automatically performs the dialing operation. can be facilitated.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of a facsimile apparatus according to the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating the operation of the apparatus shown in FIG. 1. ■...Input scanning unit, 2...Buffer memory, 3...Character recognition device, 4...Data compression unit, 5... control unit,
6... Data restoration section, 7... Image output section, 8... MODEM. 9...Network control device, 10...
・Telephone, 11... Automatic dialing device, S...
・Manuscript stacker.

Claims (1)

[Claims] An input scanning unit that optically scans the image of the transmitted document and captures it as digital data, a buffer memory that temporarily stores the data input from this input scanning unit, and converts the data stored in this buffer memory into a predetermined code. In a facsimile machine that is equipped with a data transmission means that converts the data and sends it to a communication line, and a dialing means that performs a dialing operation to call the destination, the telephone number of the destination written in a predetermined format on the transmission document. A character recognition device is provided to recognize the address by performing character recognition based on the data stored in the buffer memory, and the recognized telephone number is given to the dialing means to call the destination. A facsimile machine with special features.