JPH0831018B2 - Print job management method - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to a print job management system in a data processing device or the like for a laser printer or the like.

When the data processing apparatus requests the printer to print, a print control unit is provided to accept print requests (hereinafter referred to as print jobs) from each application program, and a management method is adopted in which the print data is transferred according to the processing method of the printer. ing.

In the above management method, since the conventional printer does not have a structure for holding a plurality of print jobs inside, a sequential method of receiving a print completion report from the printer and requesting the next print job is adopted.

On the other hand, in a high-speed printer such as a laser printer, in order to improve processing efficiency, so-called pipeline processing in which a plurality of print jobs are present inside the printer is performed, so that the print control unit can perform even before one print job ends. If there is a transfer request from the printer, the next print job is transferred.

However, since the print completion notification from the printer is in page units and the print job reception and the print completion report are asynchronous as described above, special management different from the conventional method is required.

Therefore, there is a demand for a simple print job management system for a printer that performs the above pipeline processing.

[Conventional technology]

 The conventional technique will be described below.

FIG. 2A is a time chart of the printing process for the conventional printer, and FIG. 2B is a time chart of the printing process for the pipeline process.

2 (a) and (b), (1), (2),
(3) indicates print jobs A, B, and C, the symbol a indicates print acceptance, and the symbol b indicates print completion.

That is, as shown in FIG. 2 (a), for the conventional printer, the print control unit accepts and executes a request for a print job from the application program, but does not accept another print job until the printing of the print job is completed. .

On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 2 (b), a printer that performs pipeline processing receives a plurality of print jobs,
The print data is sequentially transferred in the order of reception according to the data transfer request from the printer.

However, the print completion report from the printer is on a page basis, and in order to report the print completion to the requester, the print completion of a plurality of transferred print jobs must be managed for each print job.

FIG. 2 (c) is an example of a control unit of a printer that performs pipeline processing, and an outline of the operation of the printer will be described below for the above description.

In the figure, 1 is a control unit such as a microprocessor, 2 is a communication control unit that communicates print information with a data processing device that is a print request source, 3 is a pipeline processing unit, 4 is a print pattern storage unit, and 5 is a printer unit. Reference numerals 6 and 7 denote a print data storage unit and reference numeral 7 denotes an operation unit.

The print data storage unit 6 is composed of a plurality of storage areas (for example, in units of 2 Kbytes) that are individually managed, and stores the print data received by the communication control unit 2.

The pipeline processing unit 3 sends a data transfer request to the data processing device and stores the received data in the memory area when the individual area of the print data storage section 6 becomes available as the printing progresses. .

The control unit 1 notifies the printer unit 5 of the storage address of the print data for one page (for example, 16 Kbytes), the printer unit 5 reads the designated print data, and prints by referring to the print pattern storage unit 4.

After the completion of printing one page, the control unit 1 reports to the data processing device through the communication control unit 2.

As described above, in the high-speed printer, a plurality of print data storage areas are provided, and when a free area is generated, data transfer is requested and printing speed is increased. Therefore, the print control unit of the data processing device can transfer a plurality of print jobs, but as described above, it is necessary to monitor the page print completion report sent from the printer and determine the completion of the print job.

[Problems to be solved by the invention]

As described above, for a printer that performs pipeline processing, the print control unit of the data processing device smoothly manages the non-synchronization of the print job acceptance and the print completion report to assist in speeding up the printer. It is necessary to manage the consistency between the job unit and the printing unit of the printer, that is, the completion of the requested print job by the printing completion report from the printer in page units, and the present invention intends to provide a simple method of the above management. To do.

[Means for solving problems]

The above-mentioned problems include means for storing the request information and request end information of the print job, means for transferring the print data of the print job to the printer, and the number of transfer pages as a unit for each transfer of the print data. A unit for adding several minutes, subtracting a unit number from the transfer page number for each page print completion report sent from the printer, and counting the number of unprinted pages of the print data staying in the printer; And a means for reporting the print job completion when the number of unprinted pages is 0 and the print job request is completed, and transfers the print job requested to the printer from the request for the print job to the request completion. This can be solved by the print job management method of the present invention, which manages the difference between the number of pages and the number of pages completed for printing.

[Action]

That is, when receiving a print job and transferring print data, this management method counts the number of pages according to a specified print format and stores them together with the print job number, and when a print completion report for each page is received from the printer. , When the number of pages is counted down, and when the request for the print job is completed and the number of pages becomes 0,
The printing of the print job is completed.

That is, the present invention manages a plurality of print jobs by managing the number of pages sent to and received from the printer.

〔Example〕

 An embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 (a) is a block diagram showing an example of an intelligent terminal device embodying the present invention, FIG. 1 (b) is a block diagram showing a print management operation, and FIG. 1 (c) is a detailed view of a management table. 1 (d) is a detailed view of the incomplete status section, and FIG. 1 (e) is a flow chart for explaining the operation.

In FIG. 1 (a), 10 is a control unit including a microprocessor, 11 is a main control unit that stores application programs, 12 is a print data storage unit that stores print data of application programs, and 13 is an external unit. Disk device which is a storage device,
14 is a print control unit for managing print jobs, 15 is a printer 18
A transmission control unit 16 that communicates with a transmission data storage unit under the print control unit 14 that temporarily stores print data, and a display device 17 with a keyboard.

As shown in FIG. 1 (b), the print control unit 14 includes a processing unit 2
The processing unit 20 receives a print job of the application program 19 and registers it in the management table 21, and sends the print data to the printer 18 through the transmission control unit 15.

Further, the monitoring unit 22 judges the end of the print job by the page print end report of the printer 18, reports the print job completion to the application program 19 and accepts the area in the management table 21 where the print job is registered again. Set as possible area.

The print management according to the present invention is performed based on the management table 21 shown in FIGS.

As shown in FIG. 1C, the management table 21 has a common area including an error information storage area 23, a reception ID first address storage area 24, and a reception ID last address storage area 25, and a plurality of print job reception areas 26a. It consists of ~ 26n.

The print job reception area 26 further includes a reception ID NO section 27, an incomplete status section 28, a request source job NO section 29, and a request source task NO.
It is composed of parts 30.

The print job information is stored in the print job reception area 26 in the order of reception. The storage destination is the start address of the reception ID.
The print job reception area 26 specified by 24 and being executed by the printer is filled in by the reception ID final address 25 and becomes a reception area when printing is completed. The reception address starting address 24 is 26
The areas are designated by linking them in a ring like a to 26n to 26a.

In the print job reception area 26, the incomplete status section
28 is the configuration shown in FIG. 1 (d), 32 is "1" when a print job is received (OPEN macro command), and "0" is processed when the print job end (CLOSE macro command) is issued An unfinished flag, 33, entered by the section 20, is an unfinished page section representing the number of unfinished pages for printing. When the processing section 20 sends print data to the printer 18, the number of printed pages is counted and entered, and the monitoring section The page print completion report is counted down by 22.

The operation will be described below with reference to the functions of the respective parts described above and the flowchart shown in FIG.

(1) The application program 19 issues an OPEN macro command following the job NO (designation of printing, display, etc.), requester ID NO, etc.
Specify the storage location of print data and request printing.

(2) When the processing unit 20 receives the print job,
After setting the printable state to 18, the print data is stored in the transmission data storage unit 16 from the print data storage unit 12, and the print job reception area specified by the reception ID start address 24 of the management table 21 is stored in the print job reception area. Then, store the requesting job NO, etc., turn on the incomplete flag 32 (“1”), confirm that the reception ID start address 24 cannot catch up with the reception ID end address 25, and then set the reception ID start address 24. Update.

(3) The processing unit 20 follows the data transfer request from the printer 18,
The print data stored in the transmission data storage unit 16 is transmitted through the transmission control unit 15. At this time, the number of print pages is counted according to the designated print format, and the unfinished page unit 33 is counted up.

(4) The monitoring section 22 counts down the incomplete page section 33 each time it receives a page print completion report from the printer 18.

(5) When the processing unit 20 receives the CLOSE macro instruction from the application program 19, it turns off the incomplete flag 32 (“0”).

(6) The monitoring unit 22 monitors the unfinished status section 28, and when the unfinished page section 33 is “0” and the unfinished flag is “0”, it is determined that the printing of the print job is completed and the application program 19 is notified. Notify that printing is complete.

As mentioned above, multiple print job receiving areas are prepared and the print jobs are sequentially stored in a loop.
The first address 24 of the ID is the processing unit 20 and the last address 25 of the reception ID
Are managed by the monitoring unit 22, and the head or the final storage destination of the print job receiving area is updated when the print job is received or the print job is completed.

As described above, it is possible to manage a plurality of print jobs by managing the number of pages to be sent and received for the received print jobs.

〔The invention's effect〕

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to provide a simple method for managing a plurality of received print jobs according to the number of pages to be sent to and received from the printer, which assists in speeding up the printer and also in the data processing device. This has the effect of aligning the print job unit and the print unit (page) of the printer.

[Brief description of drawings]

1A is a block diagram of an intelligent terminal device, FIG. 1B is a block diagram of a print control unit, FIG. 1C is a management table diagram, and FIG. 1D is an incomplete status. Detailed drawing, FIG. 1 (e) is a flowchart showing the operation, FIG. 2 (a) is a printing sequence diagram of a conventional printer, FIG. 2 (b) is a printing sequence diagram of a high-speed printer, and FIG. 2 (c) is 3 is a block diagram of a control unit of a high speed printer. FIG. In the figure, 12 is a print data storage unit, 14 is a print control unit, 15 is a transmission control unit, 16 is a transmission data storage unit, 18 is a printer, 19 is an application program, 20 is a processing unit of the print control unit 14, and 21 is The management table 22 is the same as the monitoring unit.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A print job management system for a data processing apparatus, which requests a print job from a printer that receives print data of a plurality of pages, comprising means for storing request information and request end information of the print job, A unit for transferring print data to the printer, and adding the number of transfer pages for each transfer of the print data by the unit number, and for each page print completion report sent from the printer, the unit number from the transfer page number Means for counting the number of unfinished printing pages of the print data staying in the printer by subtracting the amount, and means for reporting the completion of the printing job when the number of unfinished printing pages is 0 and the print job request ends And manages the print job requested to the printer by the difference between the number of transfer pages and the number of print completed pages between the request of the print job and the end of the request. Print job management method, characterized in that.