JPS6043530B2 - printer device - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a printer device, and more particularly to a printer device that can clearly identify pages with defective prints.

Conventionally, most of the output data of computer systems has been converted into hard copies using impact line printers, but it has become impossible to keep up with the variety of data that is processed in large quantities at high speed using central processing units.

Therefore, non-impact types such as discharge type, thermal type, inkjet type, electrostatic type, and electrophotographic type have emerged.
2. Description of the Related Art Printers, especially laser beam printers, have become advantageous in terms of visibility of output, printing speed, print quality, output on plain paper, etc. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a controller section and a printer section of a conventional laser beam printer.

When codes and information such as characters, figures, forms, etc. are transferred from the host computer HC to the printer device, the printer device temporarily stores them in the reception buffer 101 and uses internal codes (address information in the character pattern memory 105). After converting to
In step 106, one page's worth of dot image patterns are developed.

An external memory (floppy disk, not shown) stores a plurality of types of formats in addition to control programs, etc., and it is possible to change formats using programs and print forms and data simultaneously. Note that the paper image/dot development buffer 106
does not have to have the capacity for one page, and the buffer 106 may be used redundantly for the remaining portion of one page while outputting to the printer unit. The printer section is composed of an optical system, an electrophotographic section, and a conveyance system.

In the optical system, a laser beam from a He-Ne laser 111 is transmitted to an AIO modulator (acousto-optic optical modulator) 112.
The laser beam is modulated according to the serial video signal transferred from the controller section, and the modulated laser beam enters the scanner 113. Further, the laser beam is scanned in the axial direction of the rotating photosensitive drum 118 by a polygon mirror attached to the scanner 113. In this manner, characters and patterns are formed as dot electrostatic latent images on the photosensitive drum 118 by the latent image forming charger 114. As the photosensitive drum 118 rotates, in the developing device 115, charged toner adheres only to the portion of the photosensitive drum 118 that is irradiated with the laser beam, and does not adhere to the portion that is not irradiated. When the paper is fed one by one from the paper feed stacker 120, it is transferred by the transfer charger 116 on the way, and after being thermally fixed by the fixing device 119, it is transferred to the output stacker 2.
12, and printing ends.

By the way, with impact line printers and the like, if a failure occurs in the device during the printing process, the printing drum etc. can be immediately stopped, the failure can be recovered, and then the printer can be started up again. You can continue printing from the interrupted point, or if a printing error occurs during a failure, you can print again from the beginning of the page.

However, in the conventional laser beam printer shown in Figure 1, a failure occurs in the storage device, etc. during the period from when the dot pattern begins to be sent out until all the dot patterns on that page have been sent to the printer. However, it is impossible to stop the printer at that point.

Therefore, if a failure occurs during printing, the printed dot pattern may be defective. However, all the pages are printed, and in the meantime, the failure is reported to the host computer C, and a request is made again to send the character code, graphic information, etc.

Then, once again, the printer is activated to generate a dot pattern based on the character code and graphic information for one page. The page is retried in the event of a failure, and then printed. Therefore, if the retry is successful, printing can be performed continuously and a series of printed pages can be output without stopping the operation of the printer section.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of an output page resulting from a retry operation in the event of a failure in FIG. 1.

In FIG. 2, 201 is the n-1th output page, 202 is the n-th output page, and 203 is the output page on which the n-th retry was performed.

On the n-th page 202, a defective print occurs at the failure location 20A, but it is generally difficult for the operator to determine which part of which page is defective.

Pages 201, 202, 203, etc. are output continuously, but pages 202 and 203 have overlapping contents, so page 202, which was printed when a failure occurred, is extracted and discarded. There is a need.

However, it is extremely difficult for an operator of a printer to find defective pages mixed in a series of printed output pages. The purpose of the present invention is to
In order to solve such conventional problems, it is an object of the present invention to provide a printer device that allows an operator to easily find a defective page output when a failure occurs from among a series of printed output pages.

When a failure occurs during a printing operation, the printer device of the present invention outputs the page in a way that allows it to be identified as a defective page, in order to indicate that the printed content of the page being printed cannot be guaranteed. It is characterized by outputting separator pages (pages for separation) so that defective pages can be easily searched among output pages.

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of an output sheet showing an example of a printing result according to the present invention.

301 indicates the n-1th normal page, 302 indicates the n-th defective page, 303 indicates a failure separator page, and 304 indicates the n-th retry page.

After successfully outputting the (n-1)th page 301, while processing the nth page 302 and outputting it to the printer section,
If a failure is detected at the failure location 30A, the print result of the n-th page 302 will be a defective page.

In the present invention, the failure location 30 of this defective page 302 is
The pages after A are printed out with a flat color to identify them as defective pages. However, if a problem occurs while printing the bottom row of the page, even if you fill it out completely, there will be a black line 1.
Only the book is output, and the defective page 302 is difficult to identify.

Further, even if the page is not the bottom page, if only the lower part is filled with a small amount, the operator may not be able to identify the defective page 302. Therefore, in the present invention, the page next to the defective page 302 is further transferred to the defect separator page 3.
By printing out the defective page 302 as 03, the operator can completely recognize the defective page 302. That is, after the defective page 302 is output, the defect separator 3
Process the text for 03 and print out the fault separator 303. At the same time as the failure occurs, the failure is reported to the host computer HC, and the same text information as the n-th page 302 when the failure occurred is received from the host computer HC and printed out to obtain a retry page 304. After that, normal print pages will be output continuously. The operator finds the separator page 303 and the defective page 302 from among the series of output pages and discards these two pages, leaving only normal continuous printed pages. FIG. 4 shows a laser beam illustrating an embodiment of the present invention.
It is a block diagram of the controller section of the beam printer. In FIG. 4, the difference from the conventional configuration shown in FIG. Fault separator for printing ◆Text buffer 10
2. An input switch 103 is provided.

The configuration of the printer section 110 is the same as that shown in FIG.

First, when character codes and graphic information for one page to be printed, dot patterns, and compressed data of dot patterns are sent from the host computer C, the receive buffer 101 receives them.

The received data is input to the dot expander 104 via the input switch 103, and in the case of a character code, the character pattern corresponding to the character code is read from the character pattern●Memo 1J105 and the paper image Dots are allocated to the page image in the dot expansion buffer 106. Furthermore, in the case of a dot pattern, it is sent as is from the dot expander 104 to the paper image dot expansion buffer 106 and allocated to a page image. Graphic information or data obtained by compressing dot patterns is converted into dot patterns, restored, and then allocated to the image/dot expansion buffer 106.

In this way, the paper image dot development buffer 1
The dot pattern data assigned to 06 is sent to the printer unit 110 via the OR gate 107 and becomes print data.

That is, first, the dot data on the top row of one page is sent serially, then the dot data on the next row, and the dot data on the next row are sequentially sent out. If a fault is detected in the fault detector 109 while one page of dot data is being printed, a fault flip is triggered by a signal from the fault detector 109 or a signal from a fault controller circuit (not shown). ●Flop 108
At the same time as is set, the input switch 103 is switched to inhibit input from the reception buffer 101 and permit input from the fault separator ●text● buffer 102.

For example, if a failure occurs in a storage device such as a memory that stores the character pattern/memo 05 or the type of format, a signal indicating a defective state is sent to the printer unit 110, and as a result, defective printing occurs. It will be done.

When the flip-flop 108 is set, the output signal of the flip-flop 108 is always kept on and input to the OR gate 107.

Therefore, an on signal is sent to printer section 110 at the same time that faulty flip-flop 108 is set, and as a result, as shown on page 302 of FIG.
The area after the failure location 30A on that page is filled with a flat color. And dots to print page 302.
Once the butternon data has been sent to printer section 110, failure flip-flop 108 is reset by a signal from paper image dot development buffer 106 or other controller circuitry. On the other hand, by switching the input switch 103, input from the reception buffer 101 is suppressed, and data from the fault separator ◆text● buffer 102 is input to the dot expander 104.

In the fault separator text buffer 102, an image code of a pattern indicating a fault separator (for example, X″F
FFF'') is stored, and after the page at the time of the failure is output to the printer, the failure separator text is decoded by the dot expander 104.The dot expander 104 stores the pattern corresponding to the decoded code. is read from the character pattern memory 105 and allocated to the page image in the paper image dot development buffer 106, and then sent to the printer unit 11 via the OR gate 107.
Send to 0. Note that the fault separator text pattern is not limited to the pattern shown on page 303 in FIG. A combination pattern of O or a combination pattern of Δ may be used.

When the fault separator text is transferred to the dot expander 104 via the switch 103, the input switch 103 is switched by a signal from the dot expander 104 or another controller circuit, and the input is input from the receive buffer 101. controlled as follows. In this way, after the fault separator text is dot-developed, it is sent to the printer section 110 and printed.

On the other hand, when a failure occurs, the boss is sent from the printer device. The occurrence of the failure is reported to the computer, Tsukizuki C, and the host computer HC issues a retry command for page 302 at the time of the failure.
Since the same information is sent again, it is received by the reception buffer 101 and printed after dot expansion.

In this way, the fault separator page 30 of FIG.
3, a page 304 of the same text information as the page 302 at the time of the failure is output. When an operator searches for a defective page 302 at the time of a failure among a series of output pages printed by the printer unit 110, it is better to search for the defective separator pattern on the entire page than to search for only the defective page 302 where a part of the page is filled with solid paper. It is easier to search for the displayed separator page 303, and the operator can obtain consecutive normal pages by extracting the previous defective page 302 along with the defective separator page 303. As explained above, according to the present invention, a defective page when a failure occurs is output in a flat color, and the next page is output in a pattern that is easy to recognize as a failure separator page, so that a series of printed output An operator can easily search among pages for a defective page that was printed when a failure occurred.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block configuration diagram of a conventional laser beam printer, FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of a retry operation in the event of a failure in FIG. 1, and FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of the retry operation in the event of a failure according to the present invention. FIG. 4 shows a laser beam illustrating an embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a controller section of a beam printer. 101...Reception buffer, 102...Fault separator text, 103...Input switch, 104...
Dot expander, 105...Character pattern memory, 1
06...Paper image dot development buffer, 107
...OR◆gate, 108...flip-flop, 109...fault detector, 110...printer section,
111... He-Ne laser, 112... Modulator, 113... Scanner, 114... Latent image forming charger, 115... Developer, 116... Transfer charger, 117... Cleaner, 118... Photosensitive drum, 119... Fixing device, 120... Paper feed stacker,
121...Output stacker, 202,302...Bad page when a failure occurs, 203,304...Retry/
Page, 303...fault separator page, 20A
, 30A... Location of failure occurrence.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a printer device that outputs and prints dot patterns such as characters, figures, images, etc. on a page-by-page basis, it has a control means for printing in solid color the area after the failure point on the page, and the control means prevents the occurrence of the failure from occurring. 1. A printer device that outputs a code or a dot pattern in order to print a failure recognition pattern on the next page after printing of a page is completed.