JP2007295169A - Image forming apparatus, control method thereof and image forming system - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image forming apparatus capable of managing FAX transmission documents by its own apparatus without using a dedicated PC, and to provide an image forming system, and a control method of the image forming apparatus. <P>SOLUTION: An application for managing transmission documents transmitted using PC-FAX is incorporated into the image forming apparatus, and the image forming apparatus manages the transmission documents by itself without using the PC for transmission document management. In FAX transmission, FAX document data are stored in an HDD 511 before delivering the data to a facsimile control unit (FCU) 600, thereby monitoring the memory of the image forming apparatus so that the memory may not be in a full state. If the FAX document cannot be delivered, the incorporated application monitors the transmission result and notifies the user of the result. Thus, the user can choose re-transmission of the undelivered document, change of setting, or deletion of the transmission. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus, an image forming system, and a control method for the image forming apparatus, and more particularly to an image forming apparatus that performs management of a document transmitted by a facsimile function provided in the image forming apparatus without using a dedicated PC. The present invention relates to a forming system and a method for controlling an image forming apparatus.

  In the system configuration of an image forming apparatus such as a digital multifunction machine in recent years, in addition to a conventional printer I / F and facsimile function, a local storage (Local Storage; LS) by installing a large capacity memory (HDD) as standard. Various image processing functions can be provided by built-in applications incorporated in the system of the apparatus, such as (local storage device) function and data transfer with a host PC via a network. As the number of applications implemented in this way increases, the system configuration becomes complicated, and more data needs to be managed.

  On the other hand, when a large amount of FAX transmission is performed via PC-FAX from a PC to an image forming apparatus (MFP) having both a printer function and a FAX function, the image forming apparatus may become full even if the HDD is installed. Therefore, a document transmitted by an application dedicated to FAX document management of the host PC is managed.

  Here, since data is transmitted from the host PC to the printer, and the image generated by the printer is faxed as it is, the printer fax transmission designation and the fax destination setting can be performed only on the printer drive of the host PC. . Therefore, in recent years, it has become possible to change settings such as printer FAX transmission designation and FAX destination designation on the image forming apparatus, and in addition, a multi-function machine that can be printed by a single multi-function machine with unique settings. A printing system for a multifunction peripheral has been proposed (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

  Also, jobs are received from multiple users, the MFP performs job queuing to the RAM or hard disk drive according to the received time order, and the jobs stored in the queue are processed according to the prescribed order. It was. When a problem occurred on the MFP and there was a job that could not be processed, an error was notified to the owner of the job. A method of notifying all owners of queued jobs has also been proposed.

However, if the job owner is not in the place where the error notification is confirmed, there is no effect, and if other owners are notified, there is a problem that the user is confused. Therefore, among the multiple jobs queued in the image forming device, if the intended result for one job cannot be obtained, the owner who sent this job and the job that cannot be continued due to this An image forming apparatus that notifies an owner of an error is proposed (see, for example, Patent Document 2). Thus, unnecessary notification is not given to the owner of a job that can be continued, and user confusion can be prevented.
JP 2005-329620 A JP 2000-188657 A

  However, when a large amount of faxes are transmitted, it takes a very long time for transmission. Therefore, in operation, transmission work is mainly performed at night. For this reason, a dedicated PC having an application for managing transmission FAX documents (retransmission of non-delivery documents, management of transmission jobs, etc.) has to be continuously activated even at night. There is a problem that important personal information is contained in the PC, and it is dangerous for security to keep the PC running at night when there is no person.

  In addition, in any of the above techniques, there is a problem that the user who has received the error notification does not consider the case where the user wants to retransmit the non-delivery document or cancel the transmission.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above-described problems. An image forming apparatus, an image forming system, and an image forming apparatus capable of managing a transmission FAX document transferred from a PC by the image forming apparatus itself without using a dedicated PC. It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for controlling an image forming apparatus.

  The invention according to claim 1 is an image forming apparatus including a transmission unit that performs printer FAX transmission, and includes a storage unit that stores a transmission document and a management unit that manages the transmission document. The image forming apparatus.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the apparatus according to the first aspect, the management unit monitors a storage capacity state of the storage unit, and adjusts transmission by the transmission unit when the memory is full. Features.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the apparatus according to the first or second aspect, the adjustment temporarily suspends transmission and waits until it can be stored by the storage means.

  According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, in the apparatus according to any one of the first to third aspects of the present invention, the apparatus includes a display unit that displays information such as a transmission status, and the management unit determines that the transmission document is a non-delivery document. The display means displays an unsent result when it is confirmed by the management means that a non-delivery document has occurred.

  According to a fifth aspect of the present invention, in the apparatus according to the fourth aspect, the non-transmission result includes setting information such as a name of the non-delivery document, a FAX number, the number of documents, time information, and information on the cause of non-delivery. It is characterized by being.

  The invention according to claim 6 is the apparatus according to claim 4 or 5, further comprising post-processing selection means for selecting post-processing of the non-delivery document.

  According to a seventh aspect of the present invention, in the apparatus according to the sixth aspect, the post-processing selection unit retransmits the non-delivery document again, changes the destination of the non-delivery document, cancels the transmission, and cancels the non-delivery document. In this case, the holding time and the deletion time are set, and the time when the non-delivery document is retransmitted is specified.

  The invention according to claim 8 is the apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 7, comprising: a log storage unit that stores a log of a transmission result by the transmission unit; and a transfer unit that transfers the log. It is characterized by providing.

  The invention according to claim 9 is an image forming system in which the image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 8, a PC, and a public line are connected via a network, The PC includes a document generation unit that generates a FAX transmission document, and a transmission unit that transmits the generated transmission document to the image forming apparatus. The transfer unit of the image forming apparatus stores the log in the PC And an image forming system.

  A tenth aspect of the present invention is a method for controlling an image forming apparatus including a transmission step of performing printer FAX transmission, and includes a storage step of storing a transmission document and a management step of managing the transmission document. And a control method for the image forming apparatus.

  According to an eleventh aspect of the present invention, in the method according to the tenth aspect, the management step monitors a storage capacity state of the storage step, and adjusts transmission by the transmission step when the memory becomes full. Features.

  According to a twelfth aspect of the present invention, in the method according to the tenth or eleventh aspect, the adjustment temporarily suspends transmission and waits until it can be stored by the storing step.

  A thirteenth aspect of the present invention is the method according to any one of the tenth to twelfth aspects of the present invention, further comprising a display step of displaying information such as a transmission status, wherein the management step includes: The display step displays an untransmitted result when it is confirmed that a non-delivery document has been generated by the management step.

  According to a fourteenth aspect of the present invention, in the method according to the thirteenth aspect, the untransmitted result includes setting information such as an address name, a FAX number, the number of documents, time information of the non-delivery document, and non-delivery cause information. It is characterized by being.

  A fifteenth aspect of the invention is the method according to the thirteenth or fourteenth aspect, further comprising a post-processing selection step of selecting post-processing of the non-delivery document.

  According to a sixteenth aspect of the present invention, in the method according to the fifteenth aspect, the post-processing selection step includes: re-transmission for retransmitting the non-delivery document; redirection of the non-delivery document; cancellation of transmission; In this case, the holding time and the deletion time are set, and the time when the non-delivery document is retransmitted is specified.

  The invention according to claim 17 is the method according to any one of claims 10 to 16, comprising: a log storage step for storing a log of a transmission result by the transmission step; and a transfer step for transferring the log. It is characterized by providing.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to provide an image forming apparatus, an image forming system, and an image forming apparatus control method capable of managing a FAX transmission document transferred from a PC without using a dedicated PC.

  Hereinafter, an image forming apparatus, an image forming system, and an image forming apparatus control method according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. The embodiments described below are preferred embodiments of the present invention, and thus various technically preferable limitations are given. However, the scope of the present invention is particularly limited in the following description. As long as there is no description which limits, it is not restricted to these aspects.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention.
An operation unit 400, an operation unit controller 500, a main controller 501, an image processing controller 502, an ADF controller 503, a sorter controller 504, a paper feed tray controller 505, an FCU 600 (facsimile control unit), a LAN I / F board 510, and an HDD 511 are included. Yes. The operation unit 400 includes a large LCD (liquid crystal display), various LEDs (light emitting diode) 401, and various key inputs 402. The FCU 600 includes a FAX controller 506, a G3 controller 507, a G4 controller (ISDN control unit) 508, and an expansion G3 controller 509. Note that the FCU 600 may be configured to be optionally mountable.

  The operation unit controller 500 controls the operation unit 400 (large LCD display, various LED controls, various key inputs). The main controller 501 performs paper feeding, conveyance, fixing, duplexing, process control, and the like. The image processing controller 502 performs image control / scanner reading control. The ADF controller 503 performs ADF control, the sorter controller 504 controls the sorter, the paper feed tray controller 505 controls the paper feed unit, and the fax controller 506 performs fax transmission / reception control and file management. The G3 controller 507 performs G3 protocol control, and the G4 controller (ISDN control unit) 508 performs G4 protocol control. The LAN I / F board 510 connects a network (LAN) and an image forming apparatus, and the large-capacity memory HDD 511 is used for a local storage function or the like. As shown in FIG. 1, the image forming apparatus according to the present embodiment includes a copy function and a facsimile function.

  FIG. 2 shows a flow of FAX document data at the time of PC-FAX transmission in the image forming apparatus according to the present embodiment. The FAX document data is generated by the PC 1 and sent to the image forming apparatus 2. FIG. 2 shows a PC 1, an image forming apparatus 2, and a public line 3. The image forming apparatus 2 acquires the transmission destination information (telephone number etc) input from the PC 1 (step S101). The FAX transmission data is stored in the HDD 511 (step S102).

  The FAX transmission data stored in the HDD 511 is managed by the embedded application (step S103), and is monitored by the FCU 600 to check whether the memory of the FCU 600 is full. The data is transferred to a certain buffer memory (step S104). The FAX document data is recompressed by the compression / decompression unit according to the mode of the receiver, and then transferred to the NCU (Network Control Unit) 700 (step S105), and transmitted from the NCU to the public line via the modem. (Step S106).

  When the document does not reach the destination and becomes a non-delivery document, the embedded application 300 senses the state of the transmission document from the FCU 600 and displays that it has not been transmitted to the large LCD and various LEDs 401 (see FIG. 1) of the operation unit 400. (Step S107). The user can select “retransmission” or “transmission cancellation” on the operation unit 400. It is also conceivable that the embedded application 300 stores the transmission result in a log in the HDD 511 and notifies the FAX transmission result by transferring the log to a PC designated from the operation unit 400.

  The flow of operation processing according to this embodiment will be described below with reference to FIG. FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing an operation process at the time of FAX transmission according to the present embodiment. First, FAX transmission data is created by operating the PC (step S1), a destination is set (step S2), and PC-FAX transmission is executed (step S3). Conventionally, in order to manage FAX transmission data, data is transferred to the FCU after being stored in a limited HDD area in a unique file format. In this embodiment, the embedded application 300 manages the data. The FAX transmission data is stored in the HDD 511 area (step S4), and the embedded application 300 spools the transmission data and the memory (HDD) of the image forming apparatus while managing the transmission data (step S5), and passes the transmission data to the FCU (step S5). S6).

  The FCU to which the transmission data is passed checks whether or not the memory is full (step S7). If the memory is not full (step S7 / No), the transmission is executed (step S9). On the other hand, when the memory of the image forming apparatus is full (step S7 / Yes), the embedded application 300 that has received the memory full notification from the FCU temporarily waits for FAX transmission and waits for the memory to recover (step S8). ).

  FAX transmission is executed (step S9), and if a transmission job remains (step S10 / No), the process returns to step S9 to repeat the FAX transmission. On the other hand, if no transmission job remains (step S10 / Yes), it is then determined whether there is a non-delivery document (step S11). If there is no undelivered document (step S11 / Yes), the FAX transmission ends (step S12).

  On the other hand, if there is a non-delivery document (step S11 / No), the embedded application 300 is notified, and the embedded application sends the non-delivery document destination name, FAX number, number of documents, time information to the operation unit of the image forming apparatus. The setting information such as the error reason and the like are displayed (step S13). The operation unit prompts for post-processing selection such as “retransmission”, “setting change”, “cancel” (steps S14 and S15). When the user selects “re-transmission” or “setting change” (step S14 / Yes), the non-delivery document is transmitted again. When the cancellation is performed (step S15 / Yes), the non-delivery document transmission process is terminated, the transmission data is discarded, and the process is terminated.

  According to the above-described embodiment, a dedicated PC for managing transmission documents is not required for FAX transmission, so that a security risk such as personal information being leaked because the PC has been started up at night is avoided. be able to.

  Further, it is possible to prevent a FAX transmission failure at the time of mass transmission in order to monitor and adjust whether or not the memory is full.

  In addition, since re-transmission can be performed when the FAX is a non-delivery document, the user is not required to resend the FAX again. Furthermore, since the log can be acquired, the state of the device, the transmission result, etc. can be known in detail.

  Although the present invention has been specifically described above based on the preferred embodiments, it is needless to say that the present invention is not limited to the above-described ones and can be variously modified without departing from the gist thereof.

1 is a block configuration diagram of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is a figure which shows the flow of the FAX document data which concerns on embodiment of this invention. 6 is a flowchart showing an operation process of the image forming apparatus according to the embodiment of the present invention.

Explanation of symbols

1 PC
2 Image forming apparatus 3 Public line 300 Embedded application 400 Operation unit 401 Large LCD, various LEDs
402 Various key inputs 500 Operation unit controller 501 Main controller 502 Image processing controller 503 ADF controller 504 Sorter controller 505 Paper feed tray controller 506 FAX controller 507 G3 controller 508 G4 controller 509 Additional G3 controller 510 LAN I / F board 511 HDD
600 FCU
700 NCU

Claims (17)

An image forming apparatus including a transmission unit that performs printer FAX transmission,
Storage means for storing transmission documents;
An image forming apparatus comprising: management means for managing the transmission document.   The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the management unit monitors a storage capacity state of the storage unit and adjusts transmission by the transmission unit when the memory becomes full.   The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the adjustment temporarily stops transmission and waits until the storage unit can store the image. A display means for displaying information such as the transmission status is provided.
The management means monitors whether the transmission document is a non-delivery document,
4. The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the display unit displays an unsent result when it is confirmed by the management unit that a non-delivery document has occurred. 5. .   5. The image forming apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the non-transmission result is setting information such as an address name, a FAX number, the number of documents, and time information of the non-delivery document, and non-delivery cause information.   6. The image forming apparatus according to claim 4, further comprising post-processing selection means for selecting post-processing of the undelivered document.   The post-processing selection means re-transmits the non-delivery document again, changes the destination of the non-delivery document, cancels transmission, sets various retention time and deletion time of the non-delivery document, re-delivery of the non-delivery document 7. The image forming apparatus according to claim 6, wherein when transmitting, the time is designated. Log storage means for storing a log of transmission results by the transmission means;
The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a transfer unit that transfers the log. An image forming system in which the image forming apparatus according to any one of claims 1 to 8, a PC, and a public line are connected via a network,
The PC
Document generation means for generating a FAX transmission document;
Transmission means for transmitting the generated transmission document to the image forming apparatus,
The image forming system, wherein the transfer unit of the image forming apparatus transfers the log to the PC. A method for controlling an image forming apparatus including a transmission step of performing printer FAX transmission,
A storing step for storing a transmission document;
And a management process for managing the transmission document.   11. The method of controlling an image forming apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the management step monitors a storage capacity state of the storage step, and adjusts transmission by the transmission step when the memory becomes full.   12. The method of controlling an image forming apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the adjustment temporarily stops transmission and waits until it can be stored by the storing step. It has a display process that displays information such as the transmission status,
The management step monitors whether the transmission document is a non-delivery document,
13. The image forming apparatus according to claim 10, wherein when the non-delivery document is confirmed to be generated by the management process, the display process displays an unsent result. Control method.   14. The control of an image forming apparatus according to claim 13, wherein the unsent result is setting information such as an address name, a FAX number, the number of documents, and time information of the non-delivery document, and information on a cause of non-delivery. Method.   15. The method of controlling an image forming apparatus according to claim 13, further comprising a post-processing selection step of selecting post-processing of the undelivered document.   The post-processing selection step includes re-sending the non-delivery document again, changing the destination of the non-delivery document, canceling the transmission, various settings for the retention time and deletion time of the non-delivery document, and re-sending the non-delivery document. 16. The method of controlling an image forming apparatus according to claim 15, wherein when transmitting, the time is designated. A log storage step for storing a log of a transmission result by the transmission step;
The image forming apparatus control method according to claim 10, further comprising: a transfer step of transferring the log.

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