JPH08167997A - Facsimile equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide facsimile equipment displaying the communication time, which is capable of reducing the communication time. CONSTITUTION: A code quantity of compression code data outputted from a compression/expansion section 4 is counted by a counter circuit 5 and fed to a compression data memory 6, in which the data are stored. The code quantity of the compressed data counted by the counter circuit 5 is given to a control section 10 and the calculated communication time is displayed by a display section 112. In the case of the transmission, the control section 10 reads the compression data memory 6 and controls the data and provides an output of the data to a line via a facsimile communication control section 8. In the case of image compression, the data are interleaved by an interleave reduction circuit 7 and the image data are compressed by the compression/expansion section 4 and the code quantity is counted by the counter circuit 5 and stored in the compression data memory 6.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a facsimile apparatus, and more particularly, to a facsimile apparatus having a function of displaying communication time.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a facsimile machine, if the communication end time is unknown, there are inconveniences such as a large wasteful waiting time and an increase in idle time until the next transmission.
2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, among various factors affecting the fluctuation of communication time, a facsimile apparatus which predicts a communication time from a code amount of an image to be transmitted, and displays the communication time or calculates a communication charge. Is known (for example, JP-A-4-372279).

That is, in this conventional facsimile apparatus, as shown in FIG. 2, a main control section 2 for controlling the entire apparatus is provided.
1. An original reading unit 22 that reads an original and binarizes it. An encoding unit 23 that compresses and encodes the binarized image data to obtain code data. A decoding that decodes the code data to obtain binary image data. Encoding unit 24, a code storage unit 25 that stores code data, a system storage unit 26 that is used as a storage area for control information and the like by the main control unit 21, a network control unit 27 that controls an interface with a public network, It comprises a print recording unit 28 for printing out image data read by the document reading unit 22, and an operation panel unit 29 for displaying information such as predicted transmission time and inputting various commands from an operator.

In the conventional facsimile apparatus having such a configuration, a coding amount when a part or all of the binary data of the document read by the document reading unit 22 is compression-coded by the coding unit 23 is obtained. The communication time (transmission time) of the document is predicted by the main control unit 21 based on the amount, and the predicted communication time is displayed on the operation panel unit 29, which is used for calculating a communication fee.

[0005]

However, in the above-mentioned conventional facsimile apparatus, the operation panel section 29
In the case where the communication time can only be displayed, and there is no means for shortening the communication time, so that the time required for communication is not long, a document having a long communication time is transmitted. In some cases, transmission has to be interrupted, or the original has to be reduced and reedited by copying or the like, and then the original has to be set again in the facsimile apparatus and transmitted.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points,
It is an object of the present invention to provide a facsimile device that can display the communication time and can shorten the communication time.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides a reading section for reading an original and outputting image data of image information of the original, and compressing and encoding the input image data to convert it into compressed data. Compression encoding means, a counting circuit for counting the code amount of the compressed data, calculating means for calculating the communication time of the compressed data based on the code amount counted by the counting circuit, a display unit for displaying the communication time, Based on the display of the part, at least the transmission operation or the image data is reduced and the communication time is displayed again, and then the input operation part which gives a selection input instruction of transmission or cancellation, and the compressed data is thinned out and compressed A thinning-out / reduction circuit for outputting to the encoding means, a memory for temporarily storing the compressed data outputted from the compression / encoding means, and a transmission selection input instruction as it is given by the input operation unit; The compressed data stored in the memory is read out and sent to the line, and when an image data reduction selection input instruction is given by the input operation unit, the image data subjected to the thinning processing by the thinning reduction circuit is compression-encoding means. And the compressed data obtained thereby are stored in the memory, and the control unit redisplays the communication time on the display unit based on the output of the counting circuit at that time.

According to the present invention, the control means temporarily saves and stores the compressed data currently stored in the memory based on the priority selection input from the input operation unit, and then stores the compressed data to be input to the memory next. It is configured to further have a function of transmitting to the line after accumulating.

[0009]

According to the present invention, based on the communication time displayed on the display unit, at least the transmission is performed as it is by the input operation unit, or the image data is reduced and the communication time is re-displayed, and then the transmission is canceled or stopped. When the image data reduction is selected, the compression-encoding means compresses the thinned-out image data, and the compressed data obtained by this is stored in the memory, while the communication time is displayed again. Since the compressed data after the thinning can be transmitted thereafter, when the communication time of the image data of the document is long, the reduced image data can be transmitted after confirming the communication time.

Further, the present invention further has a function of temporarily temporarily storing the compressed data currently stored in the memory, storing the compressed data input to the memory next, and then transmitting the compressed data to the line. It is possible to transmit the compressed data of the subsequent original document in preference to the compressed data of the original original document stored in.

[0011]

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of a facsimile apparatus according to the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, in the present embodiment, a reading unit 2 for reading a document 1, an image memory 3 for storing image data, a compression / expansion unit 4 for compressing or expanding image data,
A counting circuit 5 for counting the amount of compressed image data, a compressed data memory 6 for storing compressed data, a thinning-out reduction circuit 7 for thinning out image data, and a facsimile communication control unit connected to a line (not shown) for communicating with a destination. 8, recording unit 9 for recording image data, control unit 1 for controlling various controls of the entire apparatus
0 and an operation unit 11 for input and display. The operation unit 11 includes a key input operation unit 111 and a display unit 112, and is connected to the control unit 10.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described.
The reading unit 2 decomposes the image information of the document 1 into pixels by scanning, converts the image information into image data for each line, which is a time-series electric signal, supplies the image data to the image memory 3, and accumulates the data for one screen. The image data read from the image memory 3 is supplied to the thinning / reducing circuit 7 described later, and is also supplied to the compression / expansion unit 4.

The compression / expansion unit 4 normally transmits the image data from the image memory 3 and the image data thinned out by the thinning-out reduction circuit 7 based on the control signal from the control unit 10 during transmission. The image data is subjected to compression processing based on a known compression encoding method such as a modified Huffman (MH) method or a modified read (MR) method, and output.

The compression code data output from the compression / decompression unit 4 is counted by a counting circuit 5 and supplied to a compression data memory 6 for storage. The code amount of the compressed data counted by the counting circuit 5 is input to the control unit 10, where the communication modulation rate (for example, 9600 bp).
By dividing by s), the time required for transmitting the compressed data is calculated, and the communication time is calculated in consideration of the required processing time. The control unit 10 converts the data indicating the communication time into a signal suitable for display and supplies the signal to the display unit 112 to display the communication time.

The operator of the facsimile apparatus can use the display unit 1
Looking at the communication time displayed in 12, the user selects one of the following: transmission as it is, transmission after shortening the communication time, or giving priority to transmission of the next document to be set. For this reason, the control unit 10 waits for any one of the above-mentioned selection instructions input from the key operation unit 111.

When the above is selected, the control unit 1
0 indicates that the compressed data obtained by compressing the image data read from the image memory 3 by the compression / decompression unit 4 is stored in the compressed data memory 6, and thus the compressed data memory 6 is read and controlled. To output compressed data,
This is transmitted to the line via the facsimile communication control unit 8.

When the above is selected, the control unit 10 supplies the compression / expansion unit 4 with the image data thinned out by the thinning-out reduction circuit 7 to perform the compression process.
Here, the thinning-out reduction circuit 7 may reduce the amount of data by simply thinning out the input image data for each predetermined sample, or thinning out the information of the thinned-out pixel by reflecting the information of the thinned-out pixel to surrounding pixels by a weighting process. Perform thinning processing.

The image data subjected to the thinning-out processing by the thinning-out reduction circuit 7 is subjected to a compression processing by the compression / expansion unit 4, and the code amount thereof is counted by the counting circuit 5 and supplied to the compressed data memory 6. Stored. Thereby, the control unit 10 calculates the communication time again based on the code amount counted by the counting circuit 5 and causes the display unit 112 to display the calculated communication time.

The operator observes the communication time of the reduced image data after the thinning processing displayed on the display unit 112 and performs an operation of transmitting the reduced image data in the form of the reduced image data or canceling the transmission. When the instruction to send the reduced image data is input from the key operation unit 111, the control unit 10 receives the compressed data memory 6
Is read out, compressed data of reduced image data is output, and the compressed data is transmitted to the line via the facsimile communication control unit 8. As a result, the communication time can be shortened, which was not possible in the past. Further, when the above-mentioned instruction during transmission is input from the key operation unit 111, the control unit 10 suspends the read control of the compressed data memory 6.

When the above is selected, the control unit 10 temporarily saves the compressed data stored in the compressed data memory 6 in a free area provided in the compressed data memory 6 and then re-reads the data. To read the next original 1. As described above, the read image data of the next original 1 is stored as compressed data in the compressed data memory 6 via the image memory 3, the compression / expansion unit 4 and the counting circuit 5, and is also displayed on the display unit 112. The communication time is displayed.

The control unit 10 controls the compressed data memory 6
To read out the compressed image data of the next original and send it out to the line via the facsimile communication control unit 8, then read out the compressed data memory 6 again and save it in the free area The stored compressed image data of the previous document is output and sent to the line via the facsimile communication control unit 8. As a result, the image data of the subsequent document is transmitted prior to the image data of the previous document.

Although the above is the operation at the time of transmission, at the time of reception, the compressed data received by the facsimile communication control unit 8 is temporarily stored in the compressed data memory 6 and then compressed / compressed via the counting circuit 5. It is supplied to the decompression unit 4 and subjected to decompression processing. The decompressed received image data is stored in the image memory 3 and then supplied to the recording unit 9 to be recorded (for example, printed on paper).

It should be noted that the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment, and the priority transmission processing means may not necessarily be provided.

[0024]

As described above, according to the present invention,
The communication time of the image data of the original is displayed on the display unit, and if the communication time of the image data of the original is long, the transmission time of the reduced image data can be checked after confirming the communication time. Desired image data can be transmitted.

Further, according to the present invention, since the compressed data of the subsequent document can be transmitted prior to the compressed data of the previous document previously stored in the memory, the communication time of the image data of the previous document can be reduced. When the image data is long, the image data of the next document with a relatively short communication time can be transmitted with priority.
As described above, the facsimile machine can be used more effectively as compared with the related art.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an example of a conventional device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Original 2 Reading part 3 Image memory 4 Compression / expansion part 5 Counting circuit 6 Compressed data memory 7 Thinning-out reduction circuit 8 Facsimile communication control part 9 Recording part 10 Control part 111 Key operation part 112 Display part

Claims (2)

[Claims] A reading unit that reads an original and outputs image data of image information of the original; a compression encoding unit that compresses and encodes input image data to convert the input image data into compressed data; and counts a code amount of the compressed data. A counting circuit; calculating means for calculating the communication time of the compressed data based on the code amount counted by the counting circuit; a display unit for displaying the communication time; and at least a transmission as it is based on the display on the display unit Or an input operation unit for performing a selection input instruction of transmitting or canceling after reducing the image data and displaying the communication time again, and a thinning reduction for thinning out the compressed data and outputting it to the compression encoding means Circuit, a memory for temporarily storing the compressed data output from the compression encoding unit, and a memory for directly selecting transmission input by the input operation unit. The stored compressed data is read out and sent to the line, and when the input operation unit gives an instruction to select and reduce the image data, the image data thinned by the thinning and reducing circuit is compressed by the compression encoding means. The facsimile apparatus further comprises: a control means for storing the compressed data obtained thereby in the memory and displaying the communication time again on the display section based on the output of the counting circuit at that time. 2. The control unit according to claim 1, wherein said control unit temporarily saves and stores the compressed data currently stored in said memory based on a priority selection input from said input operation unit. 2. The facsimile apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a function of transmitting the stored data to a line.