JPH082664B2 - Character pattern recording method - Google Patents

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD The present invention relates to a method of recording various character patterns on a recording member by a dot matrix.

"Prior Art" As a character recording device connected to a computer or a facsimile device, a wire dot printer, a thermal head printer, or the like that employs various dot matrices to obtain a character pattern is very often adopted. ing.

With these devices, for example, 5x for letters and numbers
A 7-dot matrix structure is used, and for kanji and hiragana, a character pattern is created with a 12x12 dot matrix structure and recorded.

On the other hand, the character pattern thus created is also enlarged or reduced, or processed into a character pattern with a certain deformation.

Usually, basic character patterns are stored in a storage element called a font memory. Here, for example, when a so-called thick character is recorded, a character pattern of a specific character is read from this font memory, and this is subjected to arithmetic processing according to a certain rule.

Similarly, a so-called outline character pattern, which represents only the outline of a character, can be created by arithmetic processing. This technique is described in JP-A-59-2171 or JP-A-59-5388.

"Problems to be solved by the invention" However, if a certain arithmetic processing is added to the character pattern read from the font memory in this way,
The time required for the arithmetic processing is relatively long, and the recording speed must be sacrificed to some extent.

Moreover, if all the character patterns are obtained by uniform arithmetic processing, the desired character pattern of the optimum design may not always be obtained.

On the other hand, in addition to the font memory that stores the basic character patterns, if you prepare a font memory that stores the character patterns of various typeface characters such as bold characters and outline characters, the processing speed will be improved. , It is possible to record a preset character pattern of an appropriate design.

However, this requires a large amount of font memory, which results in a large circuit and an increase in cost.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and an object thereof is to provide a character pattern recording method capable of recording various types of bold characters, outline characters, etc. with a relatively small amount of font memory. To do.

"Means for Solving Problems" In the present invention, in the case of recording a character pattern on a recording member by a dot matrix, (a) a basic pattern and the contour of the basic pattern are arranged at predetermined intervals for each character. Providing at least one kind of shell pattern consisting of contour lines which are surrounded in order, (b) a predetermined character pattern representing the character is synthesized from the logical combination of the basic pattern and the corresponding shell pattern, and the recording thereof. It is characterized by performing.

[Operation] In this method, for example, as shown in FIG. 1, a basic pattern 1 and a contour character pattern 2 output from two sets of font memories are used, and if necessary, they are created by a microprocessor or the like not shown. The so-called shaded pattern 3 is used at the same time.

 Then, these are input to one logic circuit 4.

In this logic circuit 4, three types of input patterns 1
About 3 to 3, the logical product or logical sum is taken in various combinations. The combination to be processed depends on the instruction content of the control signal 5 input to this logic circuit.

As a result, as shown in the figure, for example, a character pattern 6 including a shaded pattern 3 in the outline character pattern 2
("Mountain") is synthesized. This is sent to a recording unit such as a printer (not shown).

In the case of this embodiment, two sets of font memories can be used to obtain, for example, about 7 types of character patterns.
This is shown in FIG. 6, the details of which will be described later.

[Example] The relationship among the basic pattern 1, the shell pattern, and the outline character pattern 2 will be described with reference to FIG.

In the present invention, as shown in the figure, the basic pattern 1 is always surrounded by the other shell patterns 8 and 9, and when there are two or more kinds of shell patterns 8 and 9, one should always surround the other. It is designed.

In this figure, the shell pattern 8 surrounds the basic pattern 1,
Further, a shell pattern 9 surrounds the outside thereof.

Then, first, the basic pattern 1 is stored in the first font memory. On the other hand, the second font memory stores the outline character pattern 2 corresponding to the area sandwiched between the inner shell pattern 8 and the outer shell pattern 9.

A specific operation example of the logic circuit (FIG. 1) for processing such a signal will be described with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5.

FIG. 4 shows a dot matrix processed by the logic circuit 4 (FIG. 1) and identified by adding 2-bit information to each dot. This is a character pattern for recording a hyphen "-", for example.

Here, the part to which "00" is added corresponds to a so-called background color (white dot) part where no character exists. All parts of the outer periphery (not shown) have the same ground color. Further, the part with "01" indicates a dot that should be turned on (black dot) when the basic pattern is recorded.

Further, the part to which "11" is attached indicates the dot which should be turned on when the contour character pattern is recorded. this is,
This corresponds to the portion sandwiched between the shell pattern 8 and the shell pattern 9 in FIG. Further, the part marked with "10" corresponds to the part excluding the basic pattern inside the shell pattern 8 in FIG.

In this way, for example, if the basic pattern and the outline character pattern are input to the logic circuit 4 (FIG. 1) from two sets of font memories (not shown), and processing is performed based on the instruction "01" in this logic circuit, A basic pattern 1 as shown in FIG. 5a is output from this logic circuit.

Further, when the processing based on the instruction "11" is performed, it is shown in FIG.
The contour character pattern 2 is output as shown in FIG.

Furthermore, (not 00) AND (not 11) or "10" OR
When processed by the logic "01", a character pattern 11 corresponding to the inner portion of the shell pattern 2 (FIG. 5d) is synthesized as shown in FIG. 5b. When controlled by the logic of (not 00), a character pattern 12 corresponding to a thick hyphen is synthesized as shown in FIG. 5c.

In this way, four types of character patterns can be obtained by combining the outputs of the two sets of font memories.

Similarly, if identification is performed using N-bit information for each dot, (2 ⁿ -1) shell patterns can be designed in addition to the basic pattern.

That is, the dot matrix is the part without dots,
The basic pattern portion, the first shell pattern, the second shell pattern ... The ( ^2n- 1) th shell pattern may be identified by information having weights from "0" to " ^2n- 1". Then, a signal corresponding to a dot to be turned on may be extracted from the dot matrix based on a predetermined instruction.

When the synthesizing process is performed on the character pattern "mountain" shown in FIG. 3 in exactly the same manner as described with reference to FIGS.
By turning on the "01" portion, a basic pattern A is obtained, and by turning on the "01" and "10" portions, a thick Gothic character pattern (shell pattern B in FIG. 3 and all of the inside) is synthesized. , Turn on parts other than "00", and synthesize thick Gothic (contour character pattern C in Fig. 3 and its inner part), turn on part "11" to obtain contour character pattern C be able to.

Here, when the shell pattern does not completely surround the basic pattern and a part of the shell pattern intersects with each other, unnecessary dots are recorded. Therefore, in the present invention, the shell pattern is set and designed so that the shell pattern surrounds the basic pattern in order. The first
As shown in the figure, by combining this with a shaded pattern, more various character patterns can be synthesized. This processing merely obtains a logical sum or a logical product, and can be sufficiently speeded up.

6A to 6G, the basic pattern A, the first shell pattern B (including the basic pattern) and the outline character pattern C of FIG. 3 are combined and processed as follows to be synthesized. The letter pattern is shown. However, the shaded pattern of FIG. 6a is shown for reference in relation to the other patterns of FIG.

Fig. 3 a …… Shading pattern b …… A + B c …… A + C d …… C + (A × not B) e …… C + (A × B) f …… A × not C g …… (A × not C) + B Of course, other than this, various combinations are possible.

"Modification" The character pattern recording method of the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments.

It goes without saying that various character patterns can be synthesized by more intricately combining the basic pattern, the shell pattern, and the other patterns.

"Effects of the Invention" The character pattern recording method of the present invention described above uses a relatively small amount of font memory and a simple logic circuit.
Various character patterns can be synthesized at high speed.

Therefore, a printer capable of recording the title of a document and various decorative characters can be provided at a lower cost.
Therefore, a printer capable of recording the title of a document and various decorative characters can be provided at a lower cost. In particular, in the present invention, a shell pattern made up of the outlines of the basic patterns of the characters is prepared, so the thickening process of the characters suitable for each character and the pattern in which the inside surrounded by the outlines is drawn out surely, Moreover, there is an effect that it can be created extremely easily.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory view of a signal processing part showing an embodiment of a character pattern recording method of the present invention, FIGS. 2 and 3 are explanatory views showing a relationship between a basic pattern and a shell pattern, and FIG. 5 and 5 are explanatory views showing an example of simple signal processing, and FIG. 6 is an explanatory view showing an example of a character pattern synthesized by the method of the present invention. 1 ... Basic pattern, 2, 3 ... Shell pattern.

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Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. When a character pattern is recorded on a recording member by a dot matrix, one or more shells consisting of a basic pattern for each character and a contour line that sequentially surrounds the contour of the basic pattern at a predetermined interval. A character pattern recording method, comprising: providing a pattern, synthesizing a predetermined character pattern representing the character from a logical combination of the basic pattern and a shell pattern corresponding to the basic pattern, and recording the synthesized character pattern.