JPH03210598A - character generator - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] [Industrial application field] The present invention uses data indicating the shape of the outline of a character.

The present invention relates to a character generation device that generates character data by converting it into raster format data after performing conversion such as affine transformation, and particularly relates to a character generation device suitable for improving the quality of characters.

[Prior Art] Conventionally, as described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 63-208899, this type of device has character data serving as a reference as a string of coordinate data on a contour line, and the above-mentioned contour line coordinate data string Based on the coordinate values between two consecutive contour line coordinate data in By applying arithmetic processing to enlarge or reduce the thickness relationship of vertical lines to be equal to the thickness relationship in standard character data, variations due to quantization errors are corrected, and even after expansion or reduction, horizontal and vertical lines This made it possible to output high-quality images with uniform thickness.

Specifically, making the relationship between the thicknesses of the horizontal and vertical lines equal to the thickness relationship in the reference character data means that a reference point is set at the lower left corner of the rectangle circumscribing the reference character data, and the reference point is set at the lower left corner of the rectangle circumscribing the reference character data. This means that the coordinates are transformed so that the relative coordinates from a point to each horizontal line and vertical line are equal.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] In the above-mentioned conventional technology, if the theoretical line width at the character size to be generated is close to the boundary of quantization in arithmetic processing, the quality may not necessarily be affected due to the characteristics of the printer, etc. The line width may not have a good number of dots.

For example, in an electrophotographic printer using a regular development method, the printed dots generally tend to be smaller than the theoretical dot size, and the line width tends to be thinner. It is also an electrophotographic printer that uses a reversal development method.

In wire dot printers and the like, the dot size is generally larger than the theoretical size, and the line width tends to be thick.

Furthermore, if there are variations in the outline coordinate data of the reference characters, there is a problem in that the coordinate data after conversion will also vary.

Furthermore, since lines are converted using relative values, if conversion errors accumulate, even if the errors are absorbed by the line spacing, the structure of the characters may become uneven or the sizes may become uneven. , there was a problem of deteriorating character quality.

An object of the present invention is to improve the quality of characters by adjusting the line width to an optimum value according to the character size to be generated.

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the present invention converts data indicating the shape of the outline of a character into character data expressed in raster format after coordinate transformation. In a character generating device that generates characters, a table is provided that indicates the thickness of horizontal lines and/or vertical lines corresponding to the size of the character, and data indicating the shape of the outline of the character is set to the specified size. When converting coordinates, horizontal lines and/or vertical lines are detected from the data indicating the shape of the outline of the character, and the detected horizontal lines and/or vertical lines are configured.
Among the lines of the book, the coordinates of one line are determined by coordinate transformation, and the coordinates of the other line are determined by the thickness from the coordinate value after coordinate transformation of one of the lines. The thickness corresponds to the size specified above.

Also, when checking the thickness corresponding to the specified size above in the table showing the thickness, check the difference between the specified size above and the size of the character whose thickness is shown in the table showing the thickness above. It is preferable to allow a predetermined error in between.

In addition, regarding the above two lines, the coordinates of the line with the smaller coordinate value can be moved to the larger one by the coordinates equivalent to 17 n pixels of the size before coordinate conversion, or the coordinates of the line with the larger coordinate value can be moved It is possible to move the coordinates smaller by a coordinate amount corresponding to 1/n pixels of the size before coordinate conversion.

Note that if data indicating that the character is a horizontal line or a vertical line is added to the data indicating the shape of the outline of the character, the above-mentioned detection process can be omitted.

Note that it is preferable that the table indicating the thickness is variable depending on the characteristics of the output device, such as created based on the results of an experiment of outputting to the output device, or can be changed by the user.

In addition, if the specified size is larger than the predetermined size, the coordinates of one of the two lines will be converted to the absolute value, and the coordinates of the other line will be changed to one of the two lines. The relative coordinates from the coordinates of the line can be coordinate-transformed, and the other coordinate value can be added to the coordinate-transformed values.

Furthermore, the present invention provides data indicating the shape of the outline of one character,
In a character generator that generates one character by converting the coordinates into character data expressed in raster format, the coordinates are converted so that the data indicating the shape of the outline of the character has the specified size. 2, which detects a horizontal line and/or vertical line from the data indicating the outline of the character, and configures the detected horizontal line and/or vertical line.
Among the lines of the book, the coordinates of one line are determined by coordinate transformation, and the coordinates of the other line are determined by coordinate transformation of the relative coordinates from the coordinates of one line, and the coordinates of the other line are transformed. It can also be added to the coordinate transformed values.

Note that it is preferable that the coordinates of lines that are not detected as horizontal lines or vertical lines move in a direction that becomes thinner by the coordinates corresponding to 1/n pixels.

[Effect] The table indicating the thickness is created based on the results of experiments in which the thickness is output to the output device in advance, so the quality is optimal, unlike when it is calculated.

In addition, among the detected horizontal lines and/or vertical lines, the coordinates of one line are determined by coordinate transformation of the coordinate values themselves, and the coordinates of the other line are determined after the coordinate transformation of the above-mentioned one line. Since the thickness from the coordinate value of is set to the thickness shown in the table showing the thickness above, compared to the conventional case where coordinate conversion is performed relative to the reference outline coordinate data, , it is possible to eliminate variations in thickness and generate characters of better quality.

Also, among the two lines mentioned above, the coordinates of one line are obtained by converting the coordinate value itself, and the coordinates of the other line are obtained by converting the relative coordinates from one of the above coordinates, and the coordinates of the other line are obtained by converting the relative coordinates from one of the above coordinates. is added to the coordinate-converted value, the thickness will be relative to the thickness in the standard character data, regardless of the table showing the thickness above, but if the coordinates of one line are Since the coordinate values themselves are transformed, the coordinate values that serve as the reference point for relative transformation can be the coordinates of the line that has undergone this coordinate transformation.

Therefore, compared to the conventional case, since the reference point is a part of the character, it is possible to generate characters of higher quality. Furthermore, even when a character size whose thickness is not indicated in the thickness table is specified, processing can be performed in this manner, so that arbitrary character data can be processed.

Note that the two lines constituting the horizontal line and/or the vertical line can be determined, for example, by checking their thickness, length, overlap, and side to be filled.

[Example code] An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a character generator according to an embodiment of the present invention.

In the figure, 1 is a character generator, 2 is a processor, 3 is a host interface, 4 is a host computer, and 5 is a RAM.
, 6 is character pattern memory, 7 is program ROM, 8
is the engine interface, 9 is the bitmap memory,
10 is a DMA controller, 11 is a printer engine,
12 is a pass.

In FIG. 1, a host computer 4 transfers the character code of the character to be printed and the control code necessary for printing to the character generator 1. The character code and control code are transferred to the bus 12 via the host interface 3, and the processor 2 processes the character code and control code transferred from the host computer 4 according to the algorithm of the program stored in the program ROM 7. Interpret and process.

The RAM 5 is a memory used to temporarily store data necessary for the processor 2 to perform processing. The character pattern memory 6 is a memory in which outline coordinate data indicating the shape of the outline of a character to be printed is stored.

The bitmap memory 9 is a memory that stores dot data corresponding to the position on the paper to be printed, and processes the outline coordinate data stored in the character pattern memory 6 according to the algorithm of the program stored in the program ROM 7. It is used to store dot data converted by the processor 2, or, when a code for printing a figure is transferred from the host computer 4, to store data converted into dots corresponding to the figure.

The DMA controller 10 controls reading out the dot data stored in the bitmap memory 9 at a timing synchronized with the printing by the printer engine 11.

The engine interface 8 transfers the dot data output from the bitmap memory 9 to the printer engine 11, or
This is a circuit for receiving information indicating the status of the processor 2.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of a character pattern stored in the character pattern memory 6 as outline coordinate data.

The character pattern is represented by one contour line, and the contour line is a line connecting the coordinate values of the bending point indicated by P2° from Po.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing the data contents of the character pattern shown in FIG. 2 in the character pattern memory 6.

In FIG. 3, for example, the point P is represented by the X coordinate and the X coordinate is Cxot yo), and below Pl is
*yx) and Pg are stored in an order that traces the outline of the character, such as (Xz*)'i)''.

The data cut of one closed contour can be distinguished from the coordinate value, for example, by the loop end code.

6 shown as a negative value. Also, at the end of the character data,
A character end code is stored to indicate the end of character data.6 When character pattern data is printed, it is printed after performing affine transformation such as enlargement, reduction, or italic transformation to the size specified by the host computer 4. , converted to dot data, and transferred to the bitmap memory 9.

In this example, a table is provided that shows the thickness of horizontal lines and vertical lines corresponding to the specified character size, and this table is used when performing affine transformation on horizontal lines or vertical lines detected from outline coordinate data. I am trying to convert it so that the thickness follows the table that shows the thickness. It is assumed that the table indicating the thickness is stored in the character pattern memory 6.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a part of the thickness table stored in the character pattern memory 6.

At the top of the table, 30 types of line widths used when designing character data are stored. For characters, use only the width specified in this table, and do not use lines of other widths in the character design. The number of data strings that follow is equal to the number of types (30).

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of the part in which horizontal line and vertical line data are detected from character pattern data and reduction processing is performed while correcting the line width.

The processing contents of this embodiment will be explained below with reference to FIG.

Note that the processing is exactly the same for horizontal lines and vertical lines, only the coordinates are interchanged, so only the processing for horizontal lines will be described below.

First, the processor 2 reads character pattern data from the character pattern memory 6 according to the character code instructed by the host computer 4.

Here, when reading the character pattern data, the processor 2 detects a horizontal line under the following two conditions, and temporarily stores the coordinate value of the detected horizontal line and the position stored in the character pattern memory 6 in the RAM 5. (Step 5)
01).

Condition 1: Adjacent y coordinates and values are equal.

Condition 2: When condition 1 is satisfied, the difference in the X coordinate values is greater than the maximum thickness value shown in the thickness table shown in FIG.

In the case of the characters in Figure 2, PlP,, P3P,, P, P
,.

P engineering, P□as PL@P2Qe paspts are detected.

Next, the processor 2 finds a pair of two lines from among the horizontal lines detected and stored in the RAM 5 based on the following three conditions (step 502).

Condition 1: The distance between the two lines (difference in coordinate values) is within ±5 of the thickness shown in the thickness table.

Here, the reason why the tolerance value of 5 dots is provided is that in this embodiment, even if there is an error of several meshes in the design of the character pattern, the line width can be processed correctly.

Note that the thickness shown in the thickness table is the line width (original data) of 31, 42.53 in FIG. 4.

Condition 2: There is a common part in the X coordinate values of the two lines. In other words, the minimum value of the X coordinate of one line is smaller than the maximum value of the other X coordinate.

Condition 3: The storage order in the character pattern memory 6 of the coordinates of the two lines with the larger X coordinate value is from right to left, that is, the one with the larger X coordinate is first and the one with the smaller X coordinate is later. is stored in. Conversely, lines with smaller X coordinate values are stored in the character pattern memory 6 in the order from left to right.

According to this condition 3, in this embodiment, the outer outline of the part to be filled in in the character pattern is stored in the half-hour mark, and the inner outline is stored in the clockwise direction, so that the vertical relationship between the two lines can be correctly recognized.

The processor 2 stores in the RAM 5 the pair of two lines forming the horizontal line determined in this manner.

In the case of the characters in Figure 2, P, P, and plp,, p□P
4 and P IP x −P 2 @ P x. and P. Eng., P.
Engineering st PisPze and P17P1. are detected as a pair of two lines, each forming a horizontal line.

Note that if information indicating that the line is a pair is stored in advance along with the contour line coordinate data, the process of detecting the line pair described above can be omitted and the processing speed can be increased. can.

Next, the processor 2 again performs the reduction process while reading the outline coordinate data from the beginning of the character to be printed in the character pattern memory 6.

That is, read the coordinate value of one point, determine whether it is a previously determined horizontal line, and if it is below the horizontal line, add the value of 1 / n pixels to the coordinate value, and calculate the added value. is reduced (steps 503, 504, and 505).

Here, when the value of n is 2, it means that the theoretical dot size and the dot size printed by the printer are the same. For printers whose dot size is larger than the theoretical dot size, by setting the value of n to a value smaller than 2, such as 1.5, the line width can be brought closer to the original designed thickness. In this example,
The following explanation assumes that the value of n is 2.

In this embodiment, the reason why the value of 1/2 pixel is added to the coordinate value is to prevent 1/2 pixel from being filled in more than 1/2 pixel in the raster conversion process performed after the full reduction process is completed.

In addition, if it is above the horizontal line, add the value of 1/2 pixel to the coordinates below the paired line, and reduce the added value to the value shown in Figure 4. 6th from the table
The value obtained by the process shown in the flowchart is added and the process ends (steps 506 and 507).

Regarding the coordinates of lines other than horizontal lines and vertical lines,
For example, as shown in step 711, processing to move inward by 1/2 pixel, processing to smooth the curve, or simply reduction processing may be performed (step 508).
).

By performing processing for moving the coordinates of lines other than the horizontal line inward by 1/2 pixel or smoothing the curves as described above, higher quality characters can be generated. Furthermore, since variations in line width for lines other than horizontal lines are less noticeable than for horizontal lines and vertical lines, it is sufficient to simply perform reduction processing, and in this case, priority can be given to speeding up the processing.

After storing these processed values (step 509) and repeating the above process up to the character end code, raster conversion processing is performed (step 510).

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of the process of obtaining the line thickness from the thickness table.

First, step 611 sets the counter i to an initial value of 1.
), then the line width (original data) corresponding to counter i is compared with the detected line width (step 602), and the difference is ±5.
If it is not within the range, 1 is added to the counter i and the comparison process is performed again (steps 603 and 604).

In the case shown in FIG. 4, the line width (original data) is 31°42.
The comparison will be made in the order of 53.

If the difference is within ±5, counter j is set to an initial value of 1 (step 6o5). Next, the size of the character to be printed is compared with the character size in the thickness table corresponding to counter j (step 606). If the character size in the thickness table is smaller, 1 is added to counter j. Then, the comparison process is performed again (steps 607 and 608).

In the case of FIG. 4, for example, i=2, that is, for the thickness shown in line width (original data) 42, the character size is 43,
Comparisons are made in the order of 45, 47, and 49.

If the font size in the thickness table is larger than the font size to be printed, use the thickness table.

The line width corresponding to the character size in the thickness table is obtained (step 609).

A thickness table that corresponds to all line widths up to the maximum font size to be printed is required, but for font sizes of approximately 100 dots or more, the difference of 1 dot due to rounding errors becomes less noticeable. , there is no need for line width correction, and the table only needs to store information regarding line widths up to about 100 dots.

In FIG. 4, for example, the line IN (after conversion) 52 has
If a negative number is stored and a negative number is obtained as the value of the line width, the line width is determined by calculation instead of the table value (steps 610 and 611).

Further, when a plurality of printers with different printing characteristics are connected to one character generating device, optimal printing quality can be obtained by rewriting the table according to the characteristics of the printer.

For example, in a printer that prints dots that tend to become thinner, the table is rewritten so that the line width becomes thicker.

Furthermore, a control code is provided that allows the user to select table rewriting data from among several types, and by rewriting the table according to the control code transferred from the host computer 4, the host computer 4 can be adjusted to suit the user's preference. You can print text of different thickness.

(The following is a blank space.) FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a character generator according to another embodiment of the present invention.

In the first embodiment, an example in which the present invention is applied to a printing device such as a printer has been described, but in this embodiment, an example in which the present invention is applied to a display device such as a CRT will be described.

In FIG. 8, 81 is a character generator, 82 is a processor, 83 is a keyboard interface, 84 is a keyboard, 85 is a RAM, 86 is a character pattern memory, 87 is a bus, 88 is a program ROM, 89 is a CRT controller, and 9o is a CRT display 91 is a bitmap memory.

The keyboard 84 transfers the character code of the character to be displayed and the control code necessary for displaying the size of the displayed character, etc. to the character generator 81. The character code and control code are transferred to the bus 87 via the keyboard interface 83, and the processor 82 executes the program RQM
According to the algorithm of the program stored in 88,
The character code and control code transferred from the keyboard 84 are interpreted and processed.

The RAM 85 is a memory used to temporarily store data necessary for the processor 82 to perform processing. The zero character pattern memory 86 stores outline coordinates indicating the shape of the outline of the character to be displayed. A memory in which data is stored.

The bitmap memory 91 is a memory for storing dot data corresponding to the position on the CRT display to be displayed. It is used to store the dot data converted by processor 82 according to the following.

The CRT controller 89 controls reading out the dot data stored in the bitmap memory 91 at a fixed cycle timing in order to display it on the CRT display 9o.
Control to send a synchronization signal to the CRT display 90, control to write data to the address of the bitmap memory 91 specified by the processor 82, and control to control when reading for display on the CRT display 9o overlaps with reading or writing by the processor. Perform arbitration control.

The process of reading data from the character pattern memory 86 and creating character dot data is the same as in the first embodiment.

As explained above, in this embodiment, the thickness of horizontal lines and vertical lines is defined according to the character size.

Store this in the thickness table. When performing affine transformation on horizontal or vertical lines detected from contour line coordinate data, the line thickness corresponding to the character size to be printed or displayed is extracted from this thickness table, and the line thickness is adjusted to this thickness. Because of the conversion, the quality is optimal, unlike calculation.

In addition, horizontal lines and vertical lines are not only detected by two adjacent coordinate values, but also by checking their thickness, length, overlap, and side to be filled. Since the bare line of the line is detected and processing is performed for each pair, there will be no false detection.

Furthermore, when obtaining the thicknesses of horizontal and vertical lines, errors are taken into consideration and the widths are given before being matched with the thickness table, so that incorrect thicknesses are not obtained.

In the above embodiment, the line width data stored in the thickness table is used to determine the line thickness corresponding to the character size to be printed or displayed. However, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, the line width can be determined by calculation without using a thickness table.

An example of calculating by calculation is when converting the coordinates of data representing the shape of the outline of a character to a specified size, detecting horizontal lines and/or vertical lines from the data representing the outline of the character. Of the two lines that make up the horizontal and/or vertical lines, the coordinates of one line are converted into coordinates, and the coordinates of the other line are relative coordinates from the coordinates of the above one line. There is a character generating device that performs coordinate transformation and adds the other shelf value to the coordinate transformed value.

In this case as well, it is preferable that the coordinates of lines that are not detected as horizontal lines or vertical lines move in a direction that becomes thinner by the coordinates corresponding to 1/n pixels.

Note that in each of the above embodiments, the thickness of the horizontal line and the vertical line is adjusted, but only one of them may be adjusted.

Moreover, although the character generating device of each of the above embodiments can be used as an independent device, the present invention is not limited to this, and may be configured to be used by being incorporated into an output section of an information processing device.

Furthermore, the present invention applies the above embodiments to the case where characters are reduced from the original data, and when enlarging the characters,
A configuration may be adopted in which a conventional calculation method is applied. Further, the present invention may be configured such that the embodiment in which the thickness is determined using a thickness table is applied to character reduction, and the embodiment in which thickness is determined by calculation is applied to character enlargement from original data.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, according to the present invention, even when the logical line width in the character size to be generated is close to the boundary of quantization in arithmetic processing, quality that matches the characteristics of the printer can be achieved. It is possible to achieve a line width with a good number of dots.

Further, even if there are variations in the outline coordinate data of the original characters, the line widths after conversion can be made uniform.

In this way, the present invention has the advantage that it is possible to adjust the line width to the optimum line width according to the character size to be generated and to improve quality.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a character generator according to an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of a character pattern stored as outline coordinate data in a character pattern memory, and FIG. FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing the data contents in the character pattern memory of the character pattern shown in FIG. 2, FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing a part of the thickness table, FIG. 5 is a flow chart of line width correction processing and reduction processing, FIG. 6 is a flowchart of the process of obtaining line width from the thickness table, FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of curve correction processing, and FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a character generator according to another embodiment of the present invention. It is a diagram. 1.81...Character generator, 2,82...Processor, 3...Host interface, 4...Host computer, 5,85...RAM, 6,86...Character pattern memory, 7.88...Program ROM,
8... Engine interface, 9.91... Bitmap memory, 10... DMA controller, 11
... Printer engine, 12.87 ... Bus, 83
...keyboard interface, 84...keyboard, 89...CRT controller, 90...CRT
Display.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a character generation device that generates characters by converting data indicating the shape of the outline of a character into character data expressed in raster format after coordinate conversion, the size of the character is determined by: A table is provided that indicates the thickness of the horizontal line and/or vertical line corresponding to Detects horizontal lines and/or vertical lines from the data shown and displays the detected horizontal lines and/or vertical lines.
Or, among the two lines that make up the vertical line, the coordinates of one line are obtained by converting the coordinate values, and the coordinates of the other line are the thickness from the coordinate values of the above one line after the coordinate conversion. A character generating device characterized in that the character has a thickness corresponding to the specified size in the table indicating the thickness. 2. When checking the thickness corresponding to the size specified above in the table showing the thickness, check the size specified above and the size of the character whose thickness is shown in the table showing the thickness above. 2. The character generating device according to claim 1, wherein a predetermined error is allowed between the characters. 3. Regarding the two lines, the coordinates of the line with the smaller coordinate value are moved to the larger one by a coordinate amount corresponding to 1/n pixels of the size before coordinate conversion. character generator. 4. The coordinates of the line with the larger coordinate value of the two lines are moved to the smaller one by a coordinate amount corresponding to 1/n pixels of the size before coordinate conversion. character generator. 5. The character generating device according to claim 1, wherein the data indicating the shape of the outline of the character includes data indicating that the character is a horizontal line or a vertical line. 6. The character generating device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the table indicating the thickness is variable depending on the characteristics of the output device or can be changed by the user. 7. If the specified size is larger than the predetermined size, the absolute value of the coordinates of one of the two lines is transformed, and the coordinates of the other line are converted to the coordinates of the other line. 2. The character generating device according to claim 1, wherein the relative coordinates from the coordinates of the line are coordinate-converted, and the other coordinate value is added to the coordinate-converted value. 8. By converting the data indicating the shape of the outline of the character into character data expressed in raster format after coordinate conversion, the data representing the shape of the outline of the character can be converted into character data in the character generator that generates the character. When converting the coordinates to the specified size, a horizontal line and/or vertical line is detected from the data indicating the outline of the character, and one of the two lines that make up the detected horizontal line and/or vertical line is , the coordinates of one line are obtained by converting the coordinate values, and the coordinates of the other line are the values obtained by converting the relative coordinates from the coordinates of the one line above, and converting the other coordinate value. A character generator characterized by adding. 9. The character generating device according to claim 1, wherein the coordinates of lines that are not detected as horizontal lines or vertical lines move in a direction that becomes thinner by a coordinate corresponding to 1/n pixels. 10.Claim 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9
An information processing device incorporating the character generator described above in an output section.