JPH04362772A - Document processing method and device - 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]

0001

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a document processing method and apparatus, and more particularly, to a document processing method and apparatus capable of connecting a plurality of printers with different fonts and selecting arbitrary fonts to edit and output documents. Regarding.

0002

[Prior Art] Conventionally, in a document processing device, the printer has font information installed in the main body of the device, and when editing or printing a document, the font to be used is selected based on that information. It had been taken.

0003

[Problem to be Solved by the Invention] However, in the above conventional example, in the case of a system configuration in which multiple printers equipped with different fonts are connected to one document processing device, the printer is installed on the device main body side. Because the device has font information, the printers that can be used by the device are limited, and it is not possible to edit and print document data by selecting a desired font from any printer.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned conventional example, and provides a document processing method and device that can dynamically select fonts installed in a plurality of printers and use them for document editing and printing. The purpose is to

[0005]

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the document processing method of the present invention includes the following steps. That is, in a document processing method capable of communicating with a plurality of printers having different fonts, a step of instructing font selection when outputting a document, and triggered by the instruction of the step,
a step of collecting font information possessed by the plurality of printers; a step of generating and displaying a font information display window based on the collected font information; and a step of generating a desired font information from the font information displayed in the window. The document processing method includes the steps of: selecting a font; and instructing one of the plurality of printers having the font selected in the step to print the document.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a document processing apparatus for connecting a plurality of printing means having different fonts, comprising: a display means for displaying a document and information related to the document; and a display means for displaying a document and information related to the document; font selection instruction means for instructing font selection when outputting the document; and font selection instruction means for transmitting font information held by the plurality of printing means in response to an instruction from the font selection instruction means. window generating means for generating a font information display window and displaying the font information on the display means based on the font information; and selecting and instructing a desired font from the font information displayed on the window. font selection means for selecting a font; and print instruction means for instructing one of the plurality of printing means having the font selected by the font selection means to print the document. Equipped with

[0007]

[Operation] With the above configuration, the present invention collects font information possessed by each of a plurality of printing means when selecting a font, generates and displays the font information in a window, and selects a desired font from the window. and instructs the printing means having the selected font to print the document.

[0008]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

[0009] In addition, the term "document" referred to in this embodiment is used as a general term including texts (including tables), figures, images, and the like.

[Schematic Description of the System (FIGS. 1 and 2)] FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a document processing system that is a typical embodiment of the present invention. In Figure 1, 1 is a system bus, and each component described below is this system bus.
Connected to bus 1. 2 is a CPU. 3 is a program memory (hereinafter referred to as PMEM), in which a program for editing processing is appropriately selected from the hard disk 15, read therein, and executed by the CPU 2;

Furthermore, data input from the keyboard 9 is stored as code information in the PMEM 3, which is also a text memory. 8 is an input control unit to which input devices such as a keyboard 9 and a mouse 10 are connected. By operating this keyboard 9, the operator issues system operation commands and the like. 10 is a pointing device (hereinafter referred to as P) for instructing processing of image information on CRT 13;
In this embodiment, a mouse is used. This allows you to arbitrarily move the cursor on the CRT 13 in the X (horizontal) and Y (vertical) directions and select a command icon on the command menu to issue processing instructions, editing targets, drawing positions, etc. I do.

11 is a video image memory (hereinafter referred to as VR
12 is a display output control section, and 13 is a CRT. The data displayed on the CRT13 is stored in the VRAM11.
It is developed as bit map data above. For example, in the case of character data, a character pattern corresponding to the code is developed in the VRAM. It is also possible to generate and display a cursor directly in the display area of the VRAM by software control. 14 is an external storage device control unit, 15
, 16 are external storage media (disks, etc.) for data files, for example, 15 is a hard disk (hereinafter referred to as HD), and 16 is a floppy disk (hereinafter referred to as FD).

The document processing system of this embodiment also receives font/character size instruction information, print position, character code string, etc. sent from the communication control unit 4 via the communication port 5 and the communication line 6. A plurality of printers 7 are connected to each other for developing and printing out a printing bitmap image using character fonts and the like held within the printer.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the printer 7. As shown in FIG. In FIG. 2, 21 is a system bus;
Each component described below is connected to the system bus 21. 22 is a CPU, and 23 is a PMEM, which selects and reads a program for printing bitmap image development and output processing from the hard disk 28 or ROM 30 and executes it in the CPU 22.

Now, data received and input via the communication line 33, the communication port 32, and the communication control unit 31 is stored as code information in the PMEM 23, which is also a text memory. 24 is an image memory (hereinafter referred to as IM)
EM), 25 is a print output control section, 26 is a print output section, and the print image is input as bitmap data.
After being developed in the MEM 24, it is output to the print output section 26 under the control of the print output control section 25. 29 is an external storage device control unit, 28 and 27 are disks for data files, 27 is an FD, and 28 is an HD. A ROM 30 stores character font control information, bitmap data, outline information, etc., and a control program for the printer 7.

[Structure of Font Management Data (FIG. 3)] FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the structure of font management data installed in the printer 7. As shown in FIG. The printer 7 has management data having a structure as shown in FIG. 3 for each typeface, and this data can be imported into the main body of the apparatus upon request from the main body of the apparatus. In FIG. 3, 41 is a font ID code for internally recognizing font data, 42 is a font name character code for displaying the font name in the font selection window, and 43 is for dot data, compressed data, vector data, etc. The data type ID 44 for identifying the data type of the pattern is a group of other font management data such as version and pattern box size.

[Description of the font selection window (FIG. 4)] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of the font selection window created based on the font management data installed in each printer 7 described using FIG. 3. be. In Figure 4, printer A has font data for medium Mincho, textbook, and block fonts, printer B has font data for medium Mincho, block, and cursive, and printer C has Gossik and block type font data. It shows how the body font data is registered. In FIG. 4, font data is selected by inputting a selection instruction from either the mouse 10 or the keyboard 9 shown in FIG. For example, if you are using the mouse 10 to make a selection, you can click on the area of the desired font in Figure 4, or if you are using the keyboard 9, you can enter the numerical value corresponding to the desired font displayed in the window. .

[Typeface selection window generation process and document output by font selection (FIGS. 5 to 7)] Here, the font selection window generation process and document output by font selection executed by the document processing system having the above configuration will be explained. This will be explained using the document example shown in FIG. 5 and the print data shown in FIG. 6 with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG.

First, in step S1, the system operator issues a font change instruction while editing an existing document, or a font selection instruction while creating a new document. Next, in step S2,
The CPU 2 of the system of this embodiment inquires of each printer 7 via the communication control unit 4 about the fonts installed in each printer, and obtains font management data having the structure shown in FIG.

In step S3, the font ID in the font management data obtained in step S2 is associated with the font name code, and a printer i is specified that identifies each printer.
A font selection window is created from the information in d, and the font selection window is displayed on the CRT 13. FIG. 5(a) is
5 is a diagram showing a state in which a font change is instructed on a document editing screen 51 displayed on a CRT 13, and a font selection window 52 is displayed. FIG. Next, in step S4, the displayed window waits for an instruction input from the mouse 10 or the keyboard 9. Here, if an instruction is input to the font selection window 52, the process proceeds to step S5. Here, it is assumed that the gothic font of printer C is selected from this window and the font of the document data being edited is changed to the gothic font, as shown in FIG. 5(a).

[0021] In step S5, the instruction inputted in step S4 is analyzed and the corresponding font ID and printer ID are set in the character data in the print data.

When the data is printed, the result is shown in Figure 5 (
It is output in Gothic font, such as 53 shown in b). At this time, the print data sent from the system main body side to the target printer, that is, the printer equipped with the desired font, is as shown in FIG.

As shown in FIG. 6, this print data is composed of character data 61, graphic data 62, and image data 63, but both the graphic data and the image data are stored on the main body side or on the printer side. It doesn't matter which way the data is rasterized. On the other hand, character data is sent as code data from the main body, and specified font data is rasterized into a desired format on the printer side according to the code data. 71 is a printer ID, and print data is sent to the printer corresponding to this ID.

Character data 61 includes a character code to be printed,
Or a font ID 65 (same as the font ID 41 shown in FIG. 3) for identifying which font data the character string data 64 and character code 64 are obtained from.
, information on how to transform and rasterize the font pattern 66 , font pattern middle fill information 6
7. It consists of font pattern vertical and horizontal size (dot size or print character size) 68, font pattern rotation size 69, and font pattern development reference point data 70.

On the printer 7 side, when such print data is sent, it rasterizes a font pattern uniquely obtained according to the font ID and character code data according to the expansion parameters of the character data, and prints it. Output.

Therefore, according to this embodiment, when selecting a font, the system can collect font information from the printers connected to the system and display that information as a list in a window, so the system operator can select the displayed printer. A desired font can be selected from various font information possessed by the printer, and a document can be output from a printer having the selected font.

In this embodiment, the print results output by changing the font have been explained, but for example, by using the data communication function between the printer and the system main body, the font pattern data raster developed on the printer side can be used in the same way as printing. By transferring the data to the VRAM of the system itself,
It is also possible to select a plurality of fonts from different printers for one document data and display the results on a CRT.

Furthermore, in this embodiment, the size of the font selection window was described as being such that it would fit within the document editing screen 51 displayed on the CRT 13, as shown in FIG. 5(a). It is not limited to. For example, when the number of connected printers or the number of installed fonts increases and the size of the font selection window becomes large,
It is possible to provide a window with a scrolling or page turning function as shown in FIG. In this case, for example,
In FIG. 8, when the lower scroll bar is clicked with the mouse 10 in the window display state 72, the window display state is changed to 77, and when the lower page turning bar 76 is clicked with the mouse 10, the window display state is changed to 78. On the other hand, to scroll or turn the page in the direction opposite to that shown in FIG. 8, the user may click on the upper page turning bar 73 or the upper scroll bar 74.

Note that the present invention may be applied to a system consisting of a plurality of devices, or to a device consisting of one device, or may be applied to a system or a device that is supplied with a program. Needless to say, the present invention can be applied to systems where processing is performed via a network such as a LAN.

[0030]

As explained above, according to the present invention, font information is collected from each connected printing means, a desired font is selected, and a document is output to the printing means having the selected font. For example, in a system where a plurality of printers are connected, it is possible to dynamically use any printer to perform more flexible document processing.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a document processing system that is a typical embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a printer connected to a document processing system.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the structure of font management data installed in the printer.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of a font selection window.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of font selection and printing of the result.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing the structure of print data.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing font selection window creation processing.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a display example of a font selection window with scrolling and page turning functions.

[Explanation of symbols]

1, 21 System bus 2, 22 CPU 3, 23 Program memory (PMEM) 4, 31
Communication control section 5, 32 Communication port 6, 33 Communication line 7 Printer 8 Input control section 9 Keyboard 10 Mouse 11 VRAM 12 Display output control section 13 CRT 14, 29 External storage device control section 15, 28 Hard disk (HD) 16, 27
Floppy disk (FD) 24 Image memory (
IMEM) 25 Print output control section 26 Print output section 30 ROM

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A document processing method capable of communicating with a plurality of printers having different fonts, including the step of instructing font selection when outputting a document, and, triggered by the instruction of the step, font information possessed by the plurality of printers. a step of generating a font information display window based on the collected font information and displaying the window; and a step of selecting a desired font from the font information displayed in the window. A document processing method comprising the step of instructing one of the plurality of printers having the font selected in the step to print the document. 2. A document processing device that connects a plurality of printing means having different fonts, the apparatus comprising: a display means for displaying a document and information related to the document; and a display means for exchanging print information with each of the plurality of printing means. a communication means; a font selection instruction means for instructing font selection when outputting the document; and font information possessed by the plurality of printing means is collected via the communication means in response to an instruction by the font selection instruction means; window generating means for generating a font information display window based on the font information and displaying it on the display means; font selection means for selecting and instructing a desired font from the font information displayed on the window; A document processing apparatus comprising: print instruction means for instructing one of the plurality of printing means having the font selected by the font selection means to print the document.