JPH0685532B2 - Facsimile storage exchange device - Google Patents

Description

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an improvement of a facsimile storage / exchange apparatus.

[Technical background of the invention and its problems]

The facsimile storage / exchange device is a device that stores the message (image signal, character code, etc.) sent from the transmitting side facsimile device, and then transmits the message to the receiving side facsimile device. Such a facsimile storage / exchange apparatus has come to be widely used for broadcast communication and for proxy reception when the receiving side facsimile apparatus is busy.

By the way, when the facsimile storage / exchange device functions as a transmitter (a facsimile device on the side of sending a message), a failure occurs in the line between the receiver and the facsimile device on the side of receiving a message. In consideration of the fact that there is a receiver or the receiver is in a busy state, a function is provided for retrying transmission when normal communication is not performed. That is, from the facsimile storage exchange device,
When a message is to be transmitted to a certain facsimile machine and the message does not normally reach the facsimile machine, the same message is transmitted again to the facsimile machine, for example, after a predetermined time. If this message does not normally reach the facsimile machine, the transmission operation is repeated in the same manner.

However, in this case, there is a problem that the transmission operation is tried many times even if there is a line failure and the like, and the load on the facsimile storage / exchange apparatus increases.

Further, in a certain type of facsimile machine, when a message cannot be transmitted normally due to a line failure, an alarm is sounded and the message is not retransmitted and the maintenance staff waits for the intervention. It was

However, according to such a facsimile storage / exchange apparatus, a message that could not be normally transmitted cannot be transmitted unless intervention by a maintenance staff member occurs, which causes a problem when the maintenance staff member is absent at night.

[Object of the Invention]

The present invention has been made in view of the above-described drawbacks of the conventional facsimile storage / exchange apparatus. An object of the present invention is to enable efficient transmission of a message that could not be normally transmitted even if maintenance personnel are absent. Another object of the present invention is to provide a facsimile storage / exchange apparatus that does not increase the load.

[Outline of Invention]

Therefore, in the present invention, after accumulating the messages sent from the sending side facsimile device, if the transmission to the receiving side facsimile device cannot be performed normally even if the sending is attempted a predetermined number of times, the sending of the message is stopped. , The untransmitted message that has been stopped is stored, and when a new communication is normally performed with the receiving-side facsimile device that is the destination of this untransmitted message, the untransmitted message is also transmitted at the same time. Thus, the above-mentioned object is achieved by constructing the facsimile storage / exchange apparatus.

Example of Invention

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, 1 is a signal transmission / reception unit, 2 is an image signal storage unit, 3 is a transmission stop image signal storage unit, and 4 is a central processing unit.

The signal transmission / reception unit 1 transmits / receives a control signal according to a transmission control procedure to / from a partner facsimile apparatus via the line 5, transmits / receives an image signal, and performs network control. In the image signal accumulating unit 2, of the received image signals, the image signals whose number of retransmissions is less than n times are accumulated with file numbers. In the transmission stop image signal accumulating unit 3, the image signal whose number of retransmissions has become n is attached with a file number and accumulated.

The central processing unit 4 is composed of a microcomputer,
Microprocessor 6, main memory 7, I / O ports 9 to 11 connected to bus 8, management memory 12, timer 13
Consists of. The microprocessor 6 has a main memory 7
The signal transmission / reception unit 1, the image signal storage unit 2, and the transmission stop image signal storage unit 3 are controlled via the I / O ports 9 to 11 in accordance with the program therein.

As shown in FIG. 2, the management memory 12 stores the destination data and the transmission count data for each file number of the image signal storage unit 2 and the transmission stop image signal storage unit 3 in which the image signals are stored. There is.

When the microprocessor 6 receives the image signal from the transmitting side facsimile apparatus, it processes the image signal according to the program of the flowchart as shown in FIG.

First, the received image signal is stored in the image signal storage unit 2, and the destination data and the transmission count data 0 are written in the management memory 12 using the file No data as an index (10
1). Next, when a timer interrupt by timer 13 occurs (10
2) Set 0 to the transmission image signal file No pointer and add 1 (103, 104). Based on this, management memory 1
The file No. 2 is searched to detect if there is a matching file No. (105). If there is a file number, check if the transmission count data is n,
If not (n), the corresponding image signal is transmitted based on the file No data destination data (106, 107).

Next, it is detected whether or not the transmission is normally performed (108),
When it is confirmed that the image signal is normally received, the image signal and the data in the management memory 12 are cleared, and the process returns to the main flow (109).

When it is detected in (108) that the image signal is not normally received, 1 is added to the transmission count data of the corresponding file No. in the management memory 12, and it is detected whether the result is (n). Yes (110,111). If (n) is set, the image signal is stored in the empty file of the transmission-stopped image signal storage section 3 and the corresponding data in the management memory 12 is recreated (112), and (n) is not set. Sometimes it just returns to (104). By transferring the image signal to the transmission-suspended image signal storage unit 3 in this way, it is possible to prevent unnecessary transmission operation from being repeated over a long distance and an increase in the load on the central control device 4.

Furthermore, when it is detected in (105) that there is no matching file number, it is checked whether the maximum file number (N) has been reached (113). If the maximum file number (N) has not been reached (1)
Return to 04), and if the maximum file number (N) is reached, return to the main flow.

When the image signal is normally received from the facsimile machine or when the image signal is normally transmitted, the microprocessor 6 transmits the image signal according to the program of the flow chart shown in FIG. 4 stored in the main memory 7. The transmission processing of the image signal in the discontinued image signal storage unit 3 is performed.

First, the management memory 12 is searched based on the data (destination data or transmission source data) of the partner facsimile machine for which normal communication has ended to detect whether or not the same destination data exists (201, 202). If there is the same destination data, the file N
Detects whether the number of transmissions of o is (n) (2
03). When it is n, the image signal of the corresponding file No is read from the transmission stop image signal storage unit 3 and transmitted (204),
It is detected whether the normal transmission is performed (205), and if normal, the image signal and the data in the management memory 12 are cleared, and the process returns to the main flow (206).

In FIG. 5 and FIG. 6, after the transmission of another image signal is normally performed, the image signal which has been stopped is transmitted by the facsimile machine Tj.
An example of re-sending to is shown. The image signal M1 is transmitted from the facsimile apparatus Tk via the line Ik to the destination of the facsimile apparatus Tj (), but a line failure occurs on the line Lj at time T1. Then, the transmission was tried n times, but none of them could be transmitted normally (), and the image signal M1 was moved from the image signal accumulating unit 2 to the transmission stop image signal accumulating unit 3 (). After that, at time T2, the line failure of the line Lj disappeared, and the image signal M2 was transmitted from the facsimile apparatus Ti via the line Li as the destination facsimile Tj (). The facsimile storage / exchange device 100 was able to normally transmit the image signal M2 to the facsimile device Tj via the line Lj (). Therefore, the image signal M1 destined for the facsimile machine Tj stored in the transmission stopped image signal storage unit 3 could be normally transmitted via the line Lj ().

In FIG. 7 and FIG. 8, the facsimile machine Tj of the transmission source
An example is shown in which the image signal that has been suspended is retransmitted. The operation until the image signal M1 is moved to the transmission stop image signal accumulating unit 3 is the same as in the case of FIG. 5 and FIG. After that, at time T2, the line failure of the line Lj disappeared, and the image signal M4 was normally sent from the facsimile machine Tj via the line Lj. ). Therefore, the facsimile accumulator / exchange device 100 is a facsimile device that has been accumulated in the transmission stop image signal accumulating unit 3.
The image signal M1 addressed to Tj could always be transmitted via the line Lj ().

As described above, in this embodiment, initially, the predetermined number of times (n)
Until the image signal is transmitted normally, the image signal is transmitted, an appropriate number of retransmissions is ensured, and the image signal for which transmission has been stopped is the destination of this image signal. The image signal is normally transmitted by capturing the opportunity of normal communication with another image signal with and re-transmitting.

In the above embodiment, when the image signal for which transmission has been stopped is not normally transmitted, the flow returns to the main flow so that the image signal remains stored in the transmission stopped image signal storage unit 3. However, when the image signal is not normally transmitted, the image signal may be transferred to the image signal accumulating unit 2 and may be transmitted by a timer interrupt up to n times. In addition, the image signal storage unit 3 and the transmission stop image signal storage unit 4
And may be the same disk or the like.

〔The invention's effect〕

As described above, according to the present invention, since the transmission is repeated up to a predetermined number of times when the initial transmission is not normal, it is sufficient to search for the possibility of becoming normal, and the useless transmission operation is repeated forever. As a result, it is possible to prevent the load on the facsimile storage / exchange apparatus from becoming large. In addition, since the image signal is transmitted by grasping the machine that normally communicates with the destination facsimile machine of the image signal whose transmission has been stopped, there is a high possibility that the image signal will be transmitted normally. It is convenient because you can re-send by yourself regardless of

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG.
FIG. 3 is a flow chart for explaining an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 5 is a view for explaining the operation of the embodiment of the present invention. 5 is a timing chart of the operation of FIG. 5, FIG. 7 is a diagram for explaining the operation of one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 8 is a timing chart of the operation of FIG. 1 ... Signal transmission / reception unit, 2 ... Image signal storage unit 3 ... Transmission stopped image signal storage unit, 4 ... Central processing unit 5 ... Line, 6 ... Microprocessor 7 ... Main memory, 9-11 ... … I / O port 12 …… Management memory, 13 …… Timer 100 …… Facsimile store and exchange device

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁵ Identification code Office reference number FI technical display location H04L 12/58

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A facsimile centering on the transmission of a message sent from a sending facsimile machine, after accumulating the message sent to the receiving facsimile machine, if normal transmission cannot be performed even after a predetermined number of attempts. A new communication is normally performed between the unsent message accumulating unit that is an accumulator / exchange device that accumulates unsent messages whose transmission has been canceled and the receiving side facsimile device that is the destination of the unsent messages. At this time, there is provided a facsimile storing and switching apparatus, further comprising a transmitting means for transmitting the untransmitted message at the same time.