JP3151960B2 - Network print control system - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a data transfer system in which a plurality of data processing devices such as a host computer having different communication protocols (hereinafter simply referred to as protocols) and at least one printer have the same transmission. The present invention relates to a network print control system connected to a medium. The invention is connected to a transmission medium,
The present invention relates to a network print control system capable of recovering a file between a plurality of host computers having different protocols and a plurality of printers. The present invention relates to a network print control system capable of obtaining a print job history between a plurality of host computers and printers connected to a transmission medium and having different protocols.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional network system in which a plurality of data processing devices and a printer are connected on a transmission medium will be described with reference to FIGS.
FIG. 14 is an explanatory diagram of a network print control system connected to a network in a conventional example. FIG.
FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining a relationship between a transmission / reception process, a print queue, and a printer in a conventional example. FIG.
FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of queuing in a conventional example. In FIG. 14, a gateway 90 connected to a network (not shown) transmits and receives data, and performs a process of converting the data into a predetermined protocol when the protocol of the data is different. A command analyzing unit 92 for analyzing a command included in the data received by the unit 91; and a file transfer for queuing management information of data received from a workstation described later and performing processing for storing the data as a print file. Processing unit 93
And the queued management information and print file via the data transmitting / receiving unit 91 to the printer 95.
(Printing / XNS). On a network (not shown), for example, a plurality of workstations 96 (GAP / XNS) and workstations 97 (FTP / TCP / IP, Telnet /
TCP / IP), and at least one printer 95
(Printing / XNS).

For example, a print request is made from a workstation 97 to a printer 95 having a different protocol. The data transmission / reception unit 91 converts the data into the same protocol as the printer 95 and transmits the data to the command analysis unit 92 in order to transmit the data to the printer 95. The command analysis unit 92 analyzes the command from the received data, recognizes the content thereof, for example, a print request and the printer, and activates the file transfer processing unit 93.
The file transfer processing unit 93 receives the data for which a print request has been issued from the workstation 97, queues management information included in the data in a print queue (not shown), and a spool (not shown). To store the print file. The print processing unit 94 takes out the management information queued in the print queue and the print file stored in the spool, and sends them out to the printer 95 that has sequentially requested through the data transmission / reception unit 91.

[0004] In the above conventional example, the relationship between the transmission / reception process, the print queue, and the printer is shown in FIG.
It becomes as shown in. That is, each workstation 9
Data for which a print request has been made from 6 and 97 is received by the data transmission / reception unit 91. The management information included in the data includes the reception processes 101 to 1 including the command analysis unit 92 or the file transfer processing unit 93.
03, the print job is sequentially queued in the print queue 104. Thereafter, the transmission process 105 extracts management information from the head of the print queue 104 and extracts a print file from a spool (not shown) based on the management information. Then, the transmission process 105 performs a process for transmitting the management information and the print file to, for example, the requested printer A. The network print control system described above is disclosed in, for example, JP-A-3-75921 and JP-A-3-759.
No. 49 discloses this in detail.

Japanese Patent Publication No. Sho 63-219091 discloses a printer capable of obtaining a history indicating a state of a paper jam or the like in a printer. In addition, Tokuhei 3
Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 26561 discloses an apparatus for recovering loss of print data when a paper jam occurs.

[0006]

However, in the above-described conventional network print control system, if the power is turned off or the system goes down, the recovery function is not supported. Management information is lost. Therefore, when the gateway is started, the host computer must confirm whether the requested print has actually been output. If the requested print is not output, the user has to make another print request from the host computer.

In the network print control system described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 63-219091, even if a history indicating the state of a paper jam or the like in a printer can be obtained, data such as who printed the data and when was printed. No history was taken. In addition,
The network print control system described in Japanese Patent No. 26561 cannot recover the print state when the power is turned off, even though the history indicating the state of a paper jam or the like can be known.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made to solve the above-described problems. When the gateway is started after the power is cut off or the system is shut down, the power is not cut off or retransmitted from the host computer to the gateway. An object of the present invention is to provide a network print control system that can be restarted before a system down. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a network print control system that can easily obtain printer history information by holding the history information in one file. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide a network print control system capable of correctly restoring a power-off / system-down queue state and restarting even when a plurality of printers are connected when the gateway is started.

[0009]

[Means for Solving the Problems]

(First Invention) To achieve the above object, a network print control system according to the present invention comprises a plurality of data processing devices (2, 3,... In FIG. 1) and at least one printer (5 in FIG. 1). , 6,... Are connected on a transmission medium (1 in FIG. 1), and are connected to the transmission medium (1) via an interface to transmit / receive data. 1), a command received by the data transmitting / receiving means (10) is analyzed, and print queues (1 in FIG. 1) respectively corresponding to the printers (5) recognized in accordance with the analyzed command.
5) queuing the management information of the data and storing the print file of the data in a reception processing means (12 in FIG. 1); and a queue in a print queue (15) corresponding to the printer (5). Transmission processing means (14 in FIG. 1) for transmitting the received management information and print file to the corresponding printer (5), and additionally writes the management information of the print queue (15) to a file (73 in FIG. 7). At the same time, there is provided a gateway comprising recovery operation means (18 in FIG. 1) for reading out the management information additionally written when the system is started up and restoring the queuing state in a predetermined print queue (15). .

(Second Invention) A print queue (15 in FIG. 10B) of the network print control system of the present invention.
0) is a first queue (152 in FIG. 10B) for spooling the management information of the print queue (150), and a second queue (153 in FIG. 10B) for queuing the pending state of the print. ) And the normal end of printing,
A third queue (154 'in FIG. 10B) comprising abnormal print termination and print cancellation information, and management information in the print queue (FIG. 1).
Reference numerals 1101 to 1118 denote operation units (FIG. 10) for changing the queue when the print state is corrected.
The sorting means (see FIG.
According to (b) 151a), the sorting is performed on the basis of the modification time when the queue is replaced.

(Third invention) The management information (1101 to 1118) in the print queue (150) of the network print control system of the present invention is provided with print end status information.

[0012]

[Operation]

(First invention) For example, a request is made from a data processing device such as a host computer to print a file to a printer having a different protocol via a network. Print data from the data processing device is received by the transmission / reception means from the network via the interface. Then, the print data received by the transmission / reception means by a predetermined protocol is analyzed by a reception processing means, and a command included in the print data is analyzed. If the command is a print request, the print data is received and sent to the spool. The print data management information is stored and queued in a print queue corresponding to the printer.

The recovery operation means writes the management information of the newly queued print queue in, for example, a spool queue recovery file. The transmission processing unit sequentially retrieves the management information from the print queue corresponding to the printer, and transmits the management information and a print file corresponding to the management information to the requested printer.
After the gateway is turned off or the system is shut down, when the gateway is started up, the recovery operation means extracts management information from, for example, a spool queue recovery file, queues it in a print queue, and restores it. Therefore, after the gateway power is cut off or the system goes down, when the gateway is started up, the gateway is restarted in the same state as before the system down without retransmitting the print request from the host computer, for example. .

(Second Invention) The print queue includes a first queue for spooling print queue management information,
A second queue for queuing the pending state of the print, normal end of print, abnormal end of print,
And a third queue of print cancel information. Then, in the management information of the print queue, the time of transfer of the file, for example, to the gateway, the time of transfer to the printer, the print completion time, and the like are written each time. The sorting means provided in the operation unit, based on the corrected modification time of the queue described in the management information attached to the third queue,
Files can be sorted in order of modification time, or in any desired order. Therefore, the network print control system of the present invention sorts the file in which the management information is described in chronological order, and reads the management information to reconstruct the print queue at the time of startup after power-off or system down, for example. enable.

(Third invention) In the print queue management information, information such as, for example, the end of normal printing, the end of printing due to an abnormality, or the cancellation of printing, is stored in one file as the printing end status. be written. Therefore, the network print control system of the present invention can know the history of printing by looking at the management information of the print queue. The print end status is convenient for recovery of the print queue after a power failure or the like.

[0016]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram for explaining an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 1, a network 1 includes a plurality of data processing devices, for example, host computers 2, 3,.
.. Are connected via the gateway 7. Then, the host computers 2 and 3 are, for example, TCP /
It has an IP / FTP protocol. Printers 5 and 6
For example, it has the XNS protocol. The gateway 7 connected to the network 1 includes a console 8 for controlling the gateway 7 or performing operations such as displaying and changing an operation state, and a file 71 such as a print file and a recovery file described later. Is provided.

The gateway 7 transmits and receives data from the host computers 2, 3,... And the printers 5, 6,. ,..., Etc., and a reception process 12 that analyzes commands included in data received by the data transmission / reception unit 10 and receives management information and files thereof. , 12 ', 12 ",
A process for transmitting management information and a print file to the requested printer, and a function for inquiring about a print status and a printer status, and a transmission process provided in correspondence with a print queue described later 1
, 14, 14 ″,..., And print queues 15 provided for the respective printers 5, 6,. 15 ′, 15 ″,..., A console command processing unit 16 that performs processing according to commands from the console 8 such as displaying and changing the control and operation state of the gateway 7, and for starting up the gateway 7. It comprises an initializing means 17 for performing processing, and a recovery operation section 18 for performing recovery processing due to power interruption or system down. Note that the gateway 7 does not include devices that are not directly related to the description of the invention, such as a CPU, a main storage device and an auxiliary storage device, and peripheral devices.

The data transmitting / receiving unit 10 includes a receiving unit 11 that can process data according to the type of protocol, and a transmitting unit 13 that can transmit data according to the protocol of the printer.
It is composed of Receiving process 12, 12 ', 1
2 ″,... Indicate a plurality of host computers 2, 3,.
, A command analyzing unit 121 for analyzing a command included in the received data, and a command analyzing unit 121 for receiving the data and transferring the print file to the spool 9. And a file receiving unit 122 for performing the above processing.

The transmission processes 14, 14 ', 14 ",...
, Is the printer 5 connected to the network 1,
, Print queue 1
, 15 ', 15 ",..., And the print file 71 from the spool 9 and, for example, a file transmitting unit 141 for transmitting to the requested printer 5, and a status of the transmitted print file. It comprises a print status inquiry unit 142 for inquiring and a printer status inquiry unit 143 for inquiring about the status of the printer.
2 inquires whether the transmitted print file is in a waiting state, during printing, when printing has been completed normally, or when printing has been abnormally completed. Also, the printer status inquiry unit 143 determines whether there is room for a print file in the spool 9 of the printers 5, 6,..., Whether the printers 5, 6,. , 6,..., And whether or not the formatter (print process) is normal.

The print queues 15, 15 ', 15 ",.
.., A spool queue 152 for queuing management information from when the print file is received until the print file is transmitted to the printers 5, 6,..., And print after the print file is transmitted to the printer. Queue 153 for queuing management information until the process is completed
And a terminated queue 154 for queuing the management information after the printing is completed, and an aborted queue for queuing the management information if a print error occurs before the print file is transmitted to the printer after the print file is received. And a queue 155. The print queues 15, 15 ', 15 ", ... correspond to the transmission processes 14, 14', 14", ..., respectively. Receiving processes 12, 12 ', 12 ",...
Is provided with a cancel queue 156 for queuing management information of the print file to be canceled if the print is canceled after the print file is received and transmitted to the printer.
And the cancel queue 156 are made to correspond to each other.

FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining the relationship between the transmission process and the printer according to the embodiment of the present invention. FIG.
In, for example, a print request from the host computer 1 is analyzed by the reception process 12 for the command. By analyzing this command, the receiving process 12 recognizes, for example, the printer 5 to be output,
It requests the operation unit 151 to queue the management information in the print queue 15 corresponding to the printer 5. The queued management information is also stored in the printer 5.
And is transmitted to the printer 5 together with the print file.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining a print queue according to the embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 3, the print queue shown is the same as that shown in FIG. The thick solid line indicates normal queuing, the thin solid line indicates queuing when an error occurs in printing, and the dotted line indicates queuing when canceling.

FIGS. 4 to 6 are diagrams for explaining a state in which management information is queued in the present invention. FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of extracting the free management information from the free queue and writing the management information to the spool queue. FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram when the management information is changed from the spool queue to the pending queue. FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram when the management information is changed from the pending queue to the terminated queue. 4 to 6, a print queue 15 corresponding to, for example, the printer 5 will be described. Free queue 157 in print queue 15
Are a predetermined number of empty management information 157-1, empty management information 157-2, empty management information 157-3,.
・, Are connected.

The printer 5 is recognized, for example, by the command analyzer 121 in the receiving process 12. Then, after receiving the data and storing it as a file in the spool 9, the receiving process 12 makes a request for queuing the management information to the operation unit 151 of the print queue 15 corresponding to the printer 5. Then, the operation unit 151 sets the file name received by removing the first free management information 157-1 of the free queue-157 into this management information, and sets the file name at the end of the spool queue 152 (the management information 152-in FIG. 4). Queue after 2).
The head of the free queue 157 has the empty management information 1
57-2.

If a request is made, for example, the printer 5
Is transmitted to the spool queue 152.
Of the operation unit 15 so as to retrieve the head management information (for example, the management information 152-1 already queued).
After the request to the printer 1, the file name in the spool is extracted from the extracted management information, and the file is transmitted to the printer 5. Further, the operation unit 151
A sending flag is set in the management information 152-1 being transmitted.

As shown in FIG. 5, after the transmission process 14 completes transmitting the print file to the printer 5, the operation unit 151 transmits the management information at the top of the spool queue 152,
That is, the management information 152-already queued
1 is put at the end of the pending queue 153. At this time, the request ID returned from the printer 5 is set in the management information. Therefore, the head of the spool queue 152 is the management information 152-2. The file whose transmission has been completed is deleted from the spool 9. At this time, as shown in FIG. 1 or FIG. 3, the management information for which the operation unit 151 of the print queue 15 has been requested to cancel via the console 8 is replaced with the cancel queue 156. Further, the transmission process 14 extracts the head management information of the pending queue 153 from the printer 5 that has issued the print request, inquires the status of the transmitted file using the request ID as an argument, and the print file is being printed. If so, a request is made to the operation unit 151 to cause a printing flag to be set in the print waiting management information (a) attached to the head of the pending queue 153.

As shown in FIG. 6, when the result of the file status inquiry is a normal end at the request of the transmission process 14, the operation unit 151 terminates the management information (a) waiting for printing or printing. Change to the end of the queue 154. Therefore, the head of the pending queue 153 contains the print waiting management information (b).
Becomes If the result of the file status inquiry ends abnormally, a request from the transmission process 14
The operation unit 151 transmits the management information to the aborted queue 1
Replace with 55. And terminated queue 1
When a predetermined number or more of management information is accumulated in the aborted queue 155 and the aborted queue 155, the operation unit 151
Moves the top management information (a) for which printing has been completed to the top of the free queue 157.

FIG. 7 is a diagram for explaining a print file and a recovery file stored in a spool according to an embodiment of the present invention. 7, a print file 72 and a recovery file 73 are files 71 in the spool 9 shown in FIG. The print file 72 includes, for example, a file name A in the gateway 7.
15, A16, A17, and A18 are stored. The recovery file 73 stores a spool queue recovery file 731, a pending queue recovery file 732, a terminated / aborted recovery file 733, and an ignition recovery file 734. The spool queue recovery file 731 includes, for example, a file name “file 2” for which a print request has been made, a file name “A10” in the gateway, and their management information, a file name “file 3” for which a print request has been made, and a gateway. File name "A11" and the management information thereof,
.., The file name “file 10” for which a print request was made, the file name “A18” in the gateway, and their management information are stored.

Pending queue recovery file 73
2, a file name "file 3" for which a print request has been made, a file name "A11" in the gateway,
..,...,...,...,...
The file name "file 6" for which a print request has been made, the file name "A14" in the gateway, and management information thereof are stored. The terminated / aborted recovery file 733 includes, for example, a file name “file 4” and a file name “A1” in the gateway.
2 "and their management information. The Ignore recovery file 734 stores a file that describes whether or not to perform recovery processing at the time of starting the gateway.

Next, the queuing of the requested print file will be described. Usually, the operation unit 1 shown in FIG.
Reference numeral 51 denotes the spool queue 1 which stores the management information of the received data.
52, and requests the recovery operation unit 18 to additionally write to the spool queue recovery file 731. The transmission process 14 fetches the management information 152-1 at the head of the spool queue 152, transmits the print file to the requested printer, queues the recovery operation unit 18 in the pending queue 153, A request is made to write the management information 152-1 in addition to the recovery file 732.

The transmission process 14 inquires of the printer which has transmitted the print file whether or not the printing has been completed. Then, after confirming that the printer has output the requested print, the transmission process 14 transmits the file name to the recovery operation unit 18 using the terminated / aborted recovery file 73.
Requests that 3 be overwritten. Initializing means 17 is used when starting up the system.
The process goes to see if the file 34 has been created. If the ignition recovery file 734 has been created, the recovery process is not performed. For example, in the case of initial startup of the gateway instead of the system down, the ignor recovery file 734 has been created, and the recovery process is unnecessary.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram when a recovery process is performed when the gateway is started. First, the initialization unit 17 checks whether or not the ignition recovery file 734 in the recovery file 73 has been created. If the Ignor recovery file 734 has been created, the recovery process is not performed. When performing recovery processing, the recovery operation unit 18 searches the spool queue recovery file 731 and advances the pointer to the position of the youngest file name of the spool queue recovery file 731. That is, the recovery operation unit 18 determines that the file 6
As shown in FIG. 7, since the file has been written to the pending queue recovery file 732, a pointer that stops at the position of the file name A15 shown in FIG. Then, the recovery operation unit 18 stores the management information in the file 7 after the position indicated by the pointer in FIG.
As shown in (1), it is connected to the spool queue recovery file 731 as a recovery target.

Next, the case where the pending queue recovery process is performed will be described. The recovery operation unit 18 searches the pending queue recovery file 732 and advances the pointer to the position next to the file name in the terminated / aborted recovery file 733. That is, the recovery operation unit 18 stops at the position of the file name A13 shown in FIG. 8C because the file 4 has been written to the terminated / aborted recovery file 733 as shown in FIG. Search for the pointer that is Then, the recovery operation unit 18 stores the management information in the file 5 after the position indicated by the pointer in FIG.
As shown in (d), it is linked to the pending queue recovery file 732 as a recovery target. As described above, the print file management information is stored in the recovery operation unit 1.
8, because it is stored in the spool file,
It does not go out even if the power is turned off.

The switching of the recovery file will be described with reference to FIGS. Fig. 9 (a)
(F) is a diagram for explaining switching of a recovery file in one embodiment of the present invention. Fig. 9 (a)
In (1) to (5), the recovery file “0” and the recovery file “1” are provided in the recovery file 73 shown in FIG. The capacity of the recovery files “0” and “1” is set in advance. For example, as shown in FIG.
As a result, the management information is written from the recovery file “0”. As shown in FIG. 9B, when the capacity of the management information written in the recovery file “0” exceeds a preset capacity, as shown in FIG. Is written in the management information. Further, the writing of the management information by the recovery operation unit 18 proceeds, and as shown in FIG.
When the capacity of the recovery file "0" is exceeded, the contents of the older recovery file "0" are deleted as shown in FIG. And
As shown in FIG. 9 (F), new management information is written in the recovery file “0” whose contents have been deleted. As described above, by providing two recovery files, the size of the recovery file can be specified, and the spool can be prevented from overflowing. The setting size of the recovery file can be set arbitrarily according to the usage status of the user.

Next, another embodiment of the present invention will be described. FIG. 10A is a diagram for explaining a print queue in the first embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 10B is a diagram for explaining a print queue according to the second embodiment of the present invention. FIGS. 10A and 10B show the print queue 15 shown in FIG.
The difference between FIGS. 10A and 10B lies in the terminated cue and the operation unit. The print queue 15 in the embodiment shown in FIG. 10A includes a spool queue 152, a pending queue 153, a terminated queue 154, an aborted queue 155,
And a cancel queue 156. However, the first embodiment has no recovery function of changing the queue order. In contrast, FIG.
The print queue 150 shown in (b) includes a spool queue 152, a pending queue 153, a terminated queue 154 ', and a cancel queue 156. And the terminated queue 15
Reference numeral 4 'indicates a normal end of printing, an abnormal end of printing, or an end due to cancellation of printing. The operation unit 151 'is provided with a sorting unit 151a for sorting the management information of the print queue on the basis of the correction time when the queue is replaced, as described later.

In the first embodiment, since the history is taken for each of the internal queues, three files of the terminated queue 154, the aborted queue 155, and the cancel queue 156 are managed as the queues which have been completed. There is a need. Further, the user's print data relating to the management information such as the print start and end times does not enter any of the queues shown in FIG. Therefore, it is difficult to sort the prints in order of end time because there are three files, the terminated queue 154, the aborted queue 155, and the cancel queue 156, to see the entire history of such prints.

The second embodiment of the present invention eliminates the disadvantage of not having the recovery function of the first embodiment shown in FIG. 10A, and as shown in FIG. The termination queue 154 'indicates the end of the print job, the normal end of the print, the abnormal end of the print, or the end by canceling the print.
To be stored. And the terminated queue 154 '
The management information such as the end time of the print status is added to the management information stored in. FIG. 11 is a diagram for explaining an example of management information according to the second embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 11, the management information includes, for example,
file name 1101, host computers 2, 3,... connected to the network 1, the name and spool 9 of the gateway 7, the user ID 1102, the printer ID 1103 to which the file should be transmitted, the printer ID 1104 before the change when the transmission printer is changed, Printer ID 1105 to be transmitted in the gateway 7,
During processing of each processing inside the gateway 7, a flag 1106 indicating the end of the processing, etc., a queue ID 1107 indicating to which queue the print status is connected, a pointer 1108 to the next queue, a pointer 1109 to the previous queue, a gateway 7, a file name 1110, a file size 1111, a time 1112 when the file was transferred to the gateway 7, a time 1113 when the file was transferred to the printer, a time 1114 when the file was printed, a print processing result 1115 of the file, and printing. Ending result information 1116, the source 1117 of the file indicating which protocol has been used to enter the file, and the file deletion counter 1118 for deleting the number of prints described in the reference at the time of broadcast printing. It has been mounting. In particular, the print end result information 1116 includes, as the print status,
For example, it describes whether printing has been completed normally, has been abnormally terminated, or has been canceled in the spool queue and has been completed, and the time period. The entry of the management information shown in FIG. 11 is performed by the operation unit 151 in the gateway 7.

As described above, the terminated queue 1
In the management information in 54 ', all the times concerning the printer are described, so that they can be shared as a recovery file. For example, at the time of startup when the power is turned off, the sorting unit 151a of the operation unit 151 'in the print queue 150
By sorting the times related to the printer in the management information in 4 ', the state before the power is turned off can be reproduced. The sorting means 151a is composed of, for example, an algorithm for sorting the magnitude relation of time. Also, the management information is stored as a binary file instead of a text, and the operation unit 151 'can add the file to the file as it is when adding it to the queue. Therefore, the management information is efficiently stored on the disk, and the item to be displayed can be easily selected even when displayed by the printer.

In the second embodiment, one directory is prepared for each printer in order to support multiple printers. For example, "/ usr / gw / recovery / printer
1 "" / usr / gw / recovery / printer
2 "When changing the output printer, for example, when changing the output destination of a certain print job from the printer 1 to the printer 2," / usr / gw / recover "
y / printer1 ”, the print job is deleted, and“ / usr / gw / recovery / pri ”is deleted.
The time stamp is newly added under “inter2”.

A recovery method when the print order is changed will be described. FIG. 12 is a diagram for explaining a case where the modification time of a file is reset according to the second embodiment of the present invention. When the user changes the print order for the same printer, the operation unit 151 changes the time described in the management information in the order queued in the spool file and sets the correction time in the file of the recovery faryl. Reattach. For example, as shown in FIG. 12A, files 1 to 5 are managed in the order in which they were corrected. For example, if you want to insert the fifth file 5 between the second file 2 and the third file 3 and change the order, the creation time of the fifth file 5 is changed to the second file 2 and the third file 3 Instead of changing the time between the file creation times, a new time is assigned to the order of the actually queued files.
That is, as shown in FIG. 12B, after the files are changed in the order in which the files are to be changed, new times are allocated in order from the first file. Therefore, even if the print order is changed, when the printing is restarted, the print order is performed according to the changed order stored in the recovery file.

FIG. 13 shows a file holding connection states corresponding to respective protocols according to the second embodiment of the present invention. The data transmitting / receiving unit 10 creates a file holding connection states corresponding to each protocol as shown in FIG. Then, this file is held as a recovery file. For example, if the system goes down during file transfer, files that have been retrieved halfway will be deleted. An error is returned to the client indicating that the transfer failed.
If the system goes down after the files have been transferred, it will be restored to the queue state by the recovery file at the time of restart. Therefore, by having the status of the connection corresponding to each protocol as shown in FIG. 13, recovery relating to the connection can be easily performed.

As described in detail above, the gateway according to the present embodiment has been described in the case where a host computer or a printer having a different protocol is connected to the network. If it is provided, the print state and the state of the printer can be known, and when the system is started after the system is down, the operation is resumed in the same manner as before the system was down.

[0043]

According to the present invention, the print queue corresponds to the requested printer and is separated into a spool queue and a pending queue. It is possible to restore the queue state before power-off or system down. Therefore, the loss of the print file and the double output of the print file are eliminated, and the state before the system down can be resumed without retransmitting from the host computer to the gateway.

According to the present invention, since the management information in the print queue is sorted based on the correction time, it can be used as a recovery file and the print order can be easily changed. According to the present invention, since the end status information of the printer is added to the management information in the print queue, the print end state of each printer can be accurately reproduced even when used as a recovery file in the case of a multi-printer. According to the present invention, the history regarding printing is corrected and described each time in the management information in the print queue, so that the print information can be easily managed.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram for explaining an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating a relationship between a transmission process and a printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating a print queue according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of extracting empty management information from a free queue and writing the management information to a spool queue.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram when the management information is changed from a spool queue to a pending queue.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram at the time of changing management information from a pending queue to a terminated queue.

FIG. 7 is a diagram illustrating a print file and a recovery file stored in a spool according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram when performing a recovery process when starting up a gateway.

FIGS. 9A to 9F are diagrams for explaining switching of recovery files according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 10A is a diagram for explaining a print queue according to the first embodiment of the present invention. (B) is a diagram for explaining a print queue in the second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 11 is a diagram illustrating an example of management information according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 12 is a diagram for explaining a case where a file modification time is added according to the second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 13 shows a file that holds a connection state corresponding to each protocol according to the second embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 14 is an explanatory diagram of a gateway connected to a network in a conventional example.

FIG. 15 is a diagram illustrating a relationship between a transmission / reception process, a print queue, and a printer in a conventional example.

FIG. 16 is a diagram showing an example of queuing in a conventional example.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Network 8 ... Console 2, 3 ... Host computer 9 ... Spool 5, 6 ... Printer 10 ... Data transmission / reception part 7 ... Gateway 11 ... TCP / IP / FTP protocol 12, 12 ', 12 ", receiving process 13 ... XNS protocol 14, 14', 14", transmitting process 15 ... print queue 150 ... print queue 151, 151 ' ... Operation unit 151a ... Sort means 152 ... Spool queue 153 ... Pending queue 154,154 '... Terminated queue 155 ... Aborted queue 156 ... Cancel queue 16 ..Console command processing section 17 ... Initialization means 18 ... Recovery operation section 71 ... Prince File 73 ... recovery files 731 ... spool queue recovery file 732 ... pending queue recovery file 733 ... termination Ney Ted / Abou over recoveries file 734 ... IG Noah recovery file

Claims (3)

(57) [Claims] 1. A network print control system in which a plurality of data processing apparatuses and at least one printer are connected on a transmission medium, wherein the data transmission and reception are performed by connecting the transmission medium to the transmission medium via an interface. Means for analyzing a command received by the data transmitting / receiving means, queuing the data management information in a print queue corresponding to each of the printers recognized in accordance with the analyzed command, and storing a print file of the data. Reception processing means for performing a storing process; transmission processing means for transmitting management information queued in a print queue corresponding to a printer and a print file to a corresponding printer; and adding and writing the management information of the print queue to a file Along with Reads the management information written in the added during start-up systems out, the network print control system comprising: the recovery operation means for recovering the queuing state at a predetermined print queue, the gateway comprising a. 2. The print queue according to claim 1, wherein the print queue includes a first queue for spooling print queue management information, a second queue for queuing a print pending state,
A third queue composed of information on a normal end of printing, an abnormal end of printing, and print cancel information.
The management information in the print queue is sorted based on the correction time when the queue is replaced by a sorting unit provided in an operation unit for replacing the queue when the print state is corrected. 1
The network print control system according to the above. 3. The network print control system according to claim 1, wherein the management information in the print queue is provided with print end status information.