JPH0863311A - Printer control device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Abstract] [Purpose] In a printer sharing system, printer control that can perform manual work such as paper replacement during print output without causing a great deal of trouble to users sharing the printer. Provide a device. In a printer controller of a system in which a plurality of information devices share the same printer, a means for sending a printer acquisition request signal for monopolizing the printer from the information device 2 to the printer 1 and this printer A means for sending a printer acquisition signal to the information device is provided when the acquisition request can be accepted. Further, in the above, when the information equipment receives the printer acquisition signal, there is provided means for transmitting a print start request signal for starting printing from the information equipment to the printer.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printer control device in a network system in which one or a plurality of printers connected via a LAN or a SCSI system network are shared by a plurality of information devices such as personal computers. In particular, the present invention relates to a printer control device that can execute paper replacement and the like without disturbing other users.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a system has been known in which a plurality of information devices such as personal computers occupied by each user share the same printer. In this system, a print request is sent from the information device to the printer. At this time, if another information device is using the printer, the print request is stored (queued) in the print queue in the printer, and after the preceding print execution is completed, the print corresponding to the queued print request is printed. Done. Also, if the subsequent print uses a different size paper than the previous print, contact multiple users who share the printer to suspend the print output, and print it in the print queue. After completing all, replace the paper cassette of a different size, exchange the paper, output the desired print, and then return the paper size to the original size after printing is completed.
The troublesome work such as notifying the user of the completion of the work is required.

[0003]

As described above, in the conventional print control apparatus, it is very inconvenient and troublesome to interrupt the printing for the users who share the printer when the paper is exchanged. It was a strong thing.

[0004]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention solves the problems of the prior art as described above, and in a system in which a printer is shared, the work which must be manually performed between print outputs, such as paper replacement, shares the printer. An object of the present invention is to provide a printer control device that can be executed without imposing a great deal of inconvenience and annoyance on a user.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, according to the present invention, as a first means, in a printer control device in which a plurality of information equipments share the same printer, the information equipments are connected to the printers by a printer. And a means for transmitting a printer acquisition request signal for monopolizing the printer, and a means for transmitting a printer acquisition signal to the information device when the printer receiving the printer acquisition request signal is ready to accept the acquisition request. I made it up. As a second means, in the printer control device of the above 1, when the information device is in the printer acquisition state in which the printer acquisition signal is received, the information device sends a print start request signal to the printer to start printing. It was configured to do. As a third means, in the printer control device, when the printer acquisition signal is sent and the printer in the standby state receives the printer acquisition request signal from another information device, the printer acquisition request signal is stored in the print queue. Then, the printer busy signal is sent to the other information device. As a fourth means, in the second means, when the printer does not receive the print start request signal from the information device within a predetermined time after the printer sends the printer acquisition signal to the information device, a print request is issued. The configuration was canceled or stored in the print queue. As a fifth means, in the fourth means, the predetermined time period can be arbitrarily designated. Sixth
In the first or second means, the information equipment includes a printer exclusive use instructing means, and when the printer is in a state where the printer exclusive use is instructed by this means, the information equipment sends a printer acquisition request signal to the printer. Is sent, and when the printer is not in the exclusive use instruction state, a normal print request signal for immediate printing is sent. As a seventh means, in the printer control device for storing the print request of the fourth means in the print queue, when the print start request signal is not received even if the print request is queued in the print queue a predetermined number of times, the print request is issued. It was configured to cancel.

[0006]

As described above, the information device sends a printer acquisition request signal for monopolizing the printer as a print request signal to the printer, and the printer receiving the printer acquisition request signal is ready to accept the acquisition request. In this case, since the printer acquisition signal is sent to the information device, it is possible to realize the printer acquisition state and the state where printing is not started. Therefore, the printer paper can be replaced in the meantime. Further, when the information device is in the printer acquisition state where it receives the printer acquisition signal, the above-mentioned information device sends a print start request signal to the printer to start printing, so that the printer acquisition signal is received. After that, printing can be started after an arbitrary time has elapsed.

In the above, when the printer in the standby state receives the print request signal from the other information device by sending the printer acquisition signal, the print request signal is stored in the print queue and the other information device is sent to the other information device. With the configuration in which the printer busy signal is transmitted, it is possible to know that a print request from an information device that does not occupy the printer is accepted and printing is not started immediately even in the printer occupancy state. When the printer does not receive the print start request signal from the information device within a predetermined time after the printer sends the printer acquisition signal to the information device, the print request is canceled or stored in the print queue. After a lapse of a predetermined time, it is possible to print even an information device that has not acquired a printer until then. In the above, in the configuration in which the predetermined time can be designated, an appropriate exclusive time can be set according to the work content.

The information device is equipped with a printer exclusive instruction means,
A printer acquisition request signal is sent as a print request signal when the printer is instructed to occupy the printer by the printer occupancy instruction unit, and a normal print request signal is printed immediately when the printer is acquired when the printer is not instructed to occupy the printer. With the configuration for sending out, the print operation is easy when there is no need to monopolize the printer. In a printer controller that stores a print request in a print queue, if the print start request signal is not received even if the print request is queued in the print queue a predetermined number of times, the print request is canceled in the configuration in which the queuing is permanently performed. You can prevent it from continuing.

[0009]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 3 is a schematic configuration diagram showing an example of a network system to which the present invention is applied. In this system, a printer 1 is shared by a plurality of information devices (for example, personal computers) 2 connected via a transmission line 3. It shows the network system to do. That is, the information device 2 can transfer a document or the like created by each device to the printer 1 via the transmission path 3 and perform facsimile transmission. As an example of applying the present invention in this system,
FIG. 1A is a block diagram showing the configuration of the information device 2, FIG.
A block diagram of the printer 1 is shown in FIG. FIG.
(A) is an embodiment of the present invention when a personal computer is used as an information device, and in the figure, reference numerals
A control unit 11 controls / manages the entire device by a program in a built-in ROM and executes an application program. Further, 12 is an R for storing various data
AM and 13 are composed of a keyboard and its interface circuit, etc., an input section for inputting various data, 14 is a display section for displaying a message to the user, and 15 is a floppy disk device for inputting an application program and the like. And its control unit, 16 is a communication control unit for connecting this information device to another information device or the printer 1 via the transmission line 3 so as to communicate with the information device.

The printer shown in FIG. 1 (b) temporarily holds the control unit 17 for controlling and managing the entire printer, the text information transferred from the information equipment and the image information obtained by expanding the bitmap information. Or an operation unit including a RAM 12a having a print queue 19 and operation keys
18 and a print unit 20 that forms characters and images on recording paper
And a clock circuit 21 for outputting the current time. Figure 2
FIG. 4 is a flow chart illustrating the operation of the above embodiment.

The operation flow of the printer control system of the present invention will be described below with reference to the block diagrams of FIGS. 1A and 1B and the flow chart of FIG. When a print request is generated from the information device 2 (S1), the control unit 11 of the information device 2
First sends a'printer acquisition request signal 'to the printer 1 via the communication control unit 16 (S2). This request signal is a signal for requesting exclusive use of the printer. The'printer acquisition request signal 'is received by the communication control unit 16a of the printer 1 via the transmission line 3, and the communication control unit 16a receives the signal.
When it is acquired by S17 (S7), the control unit 17 determines whether the printer is in use (S8). In this determination, whether the print unit 20 is in the process of forming a print or the print queue 19
The printer is considered to be in use if another print request that has not yet been printed out is set in the print request.

When the printer is in use (S8), the control unit 17 sends a "printer busy signal" to the information device 2 which has output the print request, via the communication control unit 16a (S9). When the control unit 11 of the information device 2 obtains this "printer busy signal" (S3), the printer 1 enters a standby state until the "printer obtain signal" is transferred.
On the printer side, if the printer is being used (S8), the print request from the information device 2 is stored in the print queue 19 after the transmission of the "printer busy signal" (S1).
0).

Eventually, when all other preceding prints are completed (S11), the printer control unit 17 causes the print queue.
The print request from the information device 2 on standby is fetched from 19 and a'printer acquisition signal 'is transmitted to the information device 2 (S12). If the printer is not in use in S8, the process proceeds to S12 and the "printer acquisition signal" is immediately transmitted. Further, in the control unit 17, after queuing the print request from the information device while the printer is in use (storing in queue S10), if there is a print request from another information device, it is rejected. It may be queuing.

When the control unit 11 of the information device 2 acquires the'printer acquisition signal '(S4), it requests the printer to change the maximum occupation time if necessary (S5). This maximum exclusive time is the maximum time from when the printer 1 outputs the'printer acquisition signal 'until it receives the'print start signal' returned from the information device of the other party, and within this time the print start If no signal is returned, the print request is canceled as described later, or the print request is returned to the queue. When the printer 1 receives the request to change the maximum exclusive time, the printer 1 changes the set time as requested (S13). That is, the control unit 17
Acquires the current time from the clock circuit 21, and sets the time obtained by adding the maximum exclusive time requested by the information device to the time as a deadline time in a predetermined area in the RAM 12. It should be noted that the transmission time of the printer acquisition signal is acquired prior to the change of the maximum exclusive time, and the time obtained by adding a predetermined maximum exclusive time set in advance to the time is input as the deadline time in the above predetermined area. If there is no request to change the exclusive time, S
The time set in 12 is used as the deadline time.

After that, the control unit 17 of the printer 1 monitors the maximum occupation time (S14). That is, the control unit 17 periodically acquires the time at that time from the clock circuit 21 at regular intervals, compares it with the time limit set in the RAM 12a, and determines whether the time at that time has passed the time limit. . on the other hand,
The information device 2 also goes into a standby state, and the user uses the printer 1
Replace the paper. When the work is completed and the print start instruction is input from the input unit 13 of the information device 2 within the maximum exclusive time set as described above, the control unit of the information device 2
11 gets it and sends it to printer 1 as'print start signal '
Is transmitted (S6). Then, when the control unit 17 of the printer 1 obtains this'print start signal '(S15), and if the maximum exclusive time (deadline time) has not been exceeded, transmission of print data (eg, document data) is requested. (Not shown), and printing is performed based on the print data transferred from the information device (S1
6).

On the other hand, in step 14, if the printer 1 has exceeded the maximum occupation time before receiving the "print start signal" (S14), the print request from another information device is not rejected thereafter. In this case, the print request from the information device 2 is sent to the end of the print queue 19, or the request is canceled and the print request queued from another information device is printed (S17), or the print request is issued. If is canceled, the printer acquisition request (S2) is received again and the same steps are executed. When the printer 1 is waiting for a'print start signal '(between S13 and S15) and there is a print request from another information device, it can be rejected or queued. It is also possible to do so. In the latter case, a'print in use signal 'is sent to the information device that issued the print request.

When the print request is not received within the predetermined time set as the maximum exclusive time, the print request is queued, and then the print request is taken out from the print queue 19, the print request remains unchanged. If the print start signal 'has not been received, the print request is queued again. It is also possible to cancel the print request when the'print start signal 'does not come even after repeating this a predetermined number of times. In this case, the RAM 12a is used a predetermined number of times
Each time a print request is queued, the count value provided in the other predetermined area B is sequentially incremented by 1 from 0, and the values of the predetermined areas A and B are compared each time. If they match, then the print request is taken out from the print queue 19, and if the'print start signal 'does not come, the print request is not queued.

As described above, each information device outputs a "print request signal" for immediately performing printing in addition to the print request including the "printer acquisition request signal" and the "print start signal", as in the conventional case. It is also possible to provide. That is, although not shown in FIG. 2, when the printer 1 receives the'print acquisition request signal ', it immediately requests transfer of print data if the printer is not in use, and queues if the printer is in use. , If you take it out of the print queue after the preceding print is completed,
At that point, transfer of print data is requested, and print output is performed immediately after receiving the print data. In order to properly use the two types of print requests as described above, the information device 2 is provided with a printer exclusive instruction means. For example, the input unit 13
A printer-exclusive instruction key is provided in, and when this key is pressed, the control unit 11 recognizes the signal and sets a printer-exclusive request flag in a predetermined area in the RAM 12. That is, when a print request is issued, the control unit 11 refers to the print exclusive request flag, detects the flag, that is, when in the printer exclusive instruction state, transmits a'printer acquisition request signal ', and the flag is When it is not detected, it sends a'print request signal '.

[0019]

As described above, according to the present invention,
The information device sends a printer acquisition request signal to the printer to monopolize the printer, and when the printer becomes ready to accept the acquisition request, the printer acquires a printer acquisition signal to the information device. When the device is in the printer acquisition state, by sending a print start request signal to the printer to start printing, it is possible to start printing after an arbitrary time has elapsed after monopolizing the printer, It is very easy to change the paper of a printer that is occupied by another information device. That is, a plurality of users who share a conventional printer are contacted to suspend the print output, and after all the print outputs in the print queue are completed, the paper is replaced, and then the print output is completed again. The extremely complicated work of returning the paper to the original state, calling out to the user and returning to the normal state was required, but the present invention does not require such a procedure.

Further, in the above, when the printer in the standby state transmits the printer acquisition signal and receives the print request signal from the other information device, the printer stores the signal in the print queue and sends it to the other information device. In the configuration that sends the'printer busy signal ', even if the printer is in the exclusive state, it should be notified that print requests from other information devices that do not have the exclusive use of the printer have been accepted and that printing will not start immediately. Therefore, you can wait for the printer to become available and print in the order requested.

Alternatively, when the printer does not receive the print start request signal from the information device within a predetermined time after the printer sends the'printer acquisition signal 'to the information device, the print request is canceled or Alternatively, in a printer control device configured to store in a print queue, other information devices can print after a predetermined time has passed without the printer having been occupied by one information device for a long time. With the configuration that allows you to specify, it is possible to set an appropriate exclusive time according to the work, so users who do not have exclusive use of the printer can wait unreasonably long for the printer, or printing can start before the work is completed. It is possible to avoid problems such as being confused.

Further, the information equipment is provided with a printer exclusive use instructing means, which sends out a printer acquisition request signal when the printer is in the printer exclusive use instructing state, and when the printer is not in the printer exclusive use instructing state, prints immediately when the printer is acquired. With the configuration for sending the normal print request signal, the print operation is simplified when it is not necessary to occupy the printer. Further, in the printer controller that stores the print request in the print queue, when the print start request signal is not received even if the print request is queued in the print queue a predetermined number of times, the print request is canceled in the configuration. It is possible to prevent the occurrence of the trouble of continuing the use of the printer by other information devices forever.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of an information device and a printer when a printer control device according to an embodiment of the present invention is implemented, where (a) is an information device and (b) is a main part of a printer. Diagram.

FIG. 2 is an operation flow diagram of an information device and a printer as an example of a printer control device of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a system configuration diagram of a network system as an embodiment of the printer control apparatus of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Printer, 2 ... Information equipment, 3 ... Transmission path, 11 ... Control part, 12 ... RAM, 13 ... Input part, 14 ... Display part, 16 ... Communication control part, 17 ... Control part, 18 ... Operation part, 19 ... the print queue,
20 ... Print part, 21 ... Clock circuit.

Claims (7)

[Claims] 1. In a printer control device of a system in which a plurality of information devices share the same printer, means for sending a printer acquisition request signal for monopolizing a printer from the information devices and receiving the printer acquisition request signal. And a means for transmitting a printer acquisition signal to the information device when the printer becomes ready to accept the acquisition request. 2. The printer control device according to claim 1, wherein
A printer comprising means for transmitting a print start request signal for starting printing from the information equipment to the printer when the information equipment is in a printer acquisition state receiving the printer acquisition signal. Control device. 3. The printer control device according to claim 1, wherein when the printer in the standby state that has sent the printer acquisition signal receives a printer acquisition request signal from another information device, the other information device. A printer control device comprising a means for storing a printer acquisition request signal from the printer in a print queue and a means for transmitting a printer busy signal to the other information device. 4. The printer control device according to claim 2,
When the printer does not receive a print start request signal from the information device within a predetermined time after the printer sends a printer acquisition signal to the information device, the print request is canceled or stored in a print queue. A printer control device characterized in that 5. The printer control device according to claim 4,
A printer control device characterized in that the predetermined time can be arbitrarily designated. 6. The printer control device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the information equipment includes a printer exclusive use instruction means, and when the printer is in the printer exclusive use instruction state, sends a printer acquisition request signal to the information equipment. A printer control device having a structure for transmitting a print request signal indicating that printing is to be performed immediately when the printer is not in the exclusive use instruction state. 7. The printer control device according to claim 4, wherein:
A printer control device that stores a print request in the print queue is configured to cancel the print request when the print start request signal is not received even if the print request is queued in the print queue a predetermined number of times. .