JPH01281551A - Recorder - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To prevent recording processing from being interrupted by displaying the impossibility of reception to a host when the residual of a receiving buffer is reduced, and after the passage of a prescribed time, writing data from the host. CONSTITUTION:In a receiving buffer formed in a work area of a RAM 16, data writing from the host 13 and data reading from a recording device are executed from a START position successively in the direction to an END position. When a writing speed is larger than a reading speed, the residual of the receiving buffer is reduced in proportion to residual time. When the prescribed amount (n) of residual is left prior to a complete buffer full state, the impossibility of data reception is displayed to the host 13, and from a point of the time, the host 13 displays the possibility of reception after the passage of a prescribed time included in a range generating no time-out error and data from the host 13 are entered at least in each information. Consequently, the host can be prevented from generating time-out due to the delay of the recording device and the interruption of recording processing can be removed.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a recording device connected to a host via a signal line and having a reception buffer for temporarily storing received data. ! ! This invention relates to means for preventing or postponing host timeout errors due to delays.

[Conventional technology]

Normally, a recording device such as a printer or facsimile is connected to a host such as a computer and records while sending and receiving data through various signal lines. In this case, the host writes data while checking the status of the recording device. To go.

In other words, if the recording device is in a state where data can be written, the data will be written, but if it is in a state where data cannot be written, and the data cannot be received within a certain period of time, the host treats it as a timeout error of the recording device. .

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve]

However, in general, the data read speed from the receive buffer in a recording device is lower than the data write speed from the host to the receive buffer, so when transferring a large amount of data to the recording device, there is a possibility that the receive buffer will run out and the data cannot be written. In many cases, the data becomes disabled and does not immediately return to a writable state, and the host treats it as a timeout error, so subsequent data cannot be written and recorded.

For example, when writing data for 10 pages,
The host timed out and the recording process was interrupted when the data for 8 pages had been written, and the remaining 9 and 10 pages could not be recorded.

An object of the present invention is to solve the problems of the prior art described above, and to perform i! ! It is an object of the present invention to provide a recording device that can prevent a host timeout error due to t= and eliminate recording interruption.

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention provides a recording device that has a reception buffer that temporarily stores data received from a host, and when the remaining amount of data in the reception buffer becomes low, displays reception puff full to the host, and provides a predetermined amount of data within a range that does not cause the host to time out. The above object is achieved by configuring the device to write data from the host into an area where there is little remaining in the receive buffer after a period of time has elapsed.

〔Example〕

The present invention will be specifically described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 5 is a schematic perspective view of a recording apparatus suitable for implementing the present invention.

In FIG. 5, a guide shaft 4 is placed in front of a sheet (recording medium) 3 that is fed in the direction of the arrow through sheet feed rollers 1.2 installed vertically at predetermined intervals.
．． A carriage 5 is provided which moves along the road 4, on which a head 6 is mounted.

The illustrated example shows the case of an inkjet recording apparatus, in which a fine orifice (ink ejection opening) that forms a dot is formed on the front surface of the head 6, and this orifice surface is connected to the sheet 3.
The carriage 5, which faces each other with a gap of, for example, about 0.8 mm, is driven reciprocally in the direction of the arrow by a carriage motor 8 via a belt transmission mechanism 9.

During recording, in synchronization with the scanning movement of the carriage 5,
Recording is performed using a dot pattern formed by ejecting ink dots from the orifice of the print head based on print data and depositing the dots on the sheet 3.

After the recording is completed, the head 6 is stopped at the home position HP outside the recording range. This home position fiHP has head 6
An automatic ink recovery device 10 is provided, which includes a cap that seals the orifice surface of the ink and a suction pump connected within the cap.

FIG. 6 is a control system block diagram of the recording apparatus shown in FIG. 5.

In FIG. 6, the central processing unit (CPU) of the recording device
11 is connected via an interface section 12 to a host 13 such as a computer main body or a word processor main body so as to be able to send and receive data through various signal lines.

The CPU 11 includes a display operation section 14 having a display lamp and key switches for various operations, and a ROM 15.
A storage unit 17 including a RAM 16 and a RAM 16 are connected thereto.

The ROM15 stores a control program, a CG (character generator), etc., and the RAM
16 includes a receive buffer that temporarily stores data transferred from the host 13.

The CPU II controls the head 6, the carriage motor 8, the sheet feed motor 18, etc. based on various input data and signals.

7th vlJ illustrates the structure of the reception buffer provided in the RAM 1S, (A) shows a linear structure, (B)
indicates a cyclic structure (cue structure).

In FIGS. 7A and 7B, writing of data from the host 13 and reading of data from the recording device are performed sequentially from the 5TART position toward the END position.

Here, if the write speed from the host is higher than the read speed of the recording device, the remaining capacity of the reception buffer 1 will decrease over time.

Therefore, if the processing on the recording device side is delayed after receiving a large amount of data, the remaining capacity of the reception buffer may become zero.

By the way, in conventional recording devices, when the remaining capacity of the receive buffer reaches 0, a message indicating that data cannot be received is displayed to the host, and if data cannot be received within a certain period of time from this point, the host 13 A timeout error often occurred, and subsequent data transfer was interrupted, making it impossible to record.

Therefore, according to the present invention, when the remaining amount of the receive buffer decreases and reaches a predetermined amount n, a message indicating that the receive buffer is full (data cannot be received) is displayed to the host 13, and the host receives a predetermined amount within a range that does not cause a timeout. After a period of time has elapsed, the data from the host 13 is written in a low remaining area of the reception buffer in accordance with the timing of a recording operation such as a recording bus or the timing of a change in the control state of an external device such as an automatic paper feeder. Host 13 above
Provided is a recording device that can prevent or sufficiently postpone interruption of recording processing due to a timeout error.

Each receiving buffer in FIG. 7 is a RAM of the recording device of the above invention.
This is used in the configuration of 10 when the remaining amount of the receive buffer becomes small due to a processing delay on the recording device side or a large amount of data is transferred from the host 13, and reaches a predetermined amount n, that is, when the remaining 10 It is configured to display to the host 13 that the reception buffer is full (data cannot be received) when it reaches n (1!) before END.

However, the reception buffer full indication in the present invention is not completely full because there are still remaining reception buffers (n) in terms of internal processing.

Therefore, from the point where there are remaining n buffer areas,
If the host 13 uses a timer at a predetermined time such as 1 second or 0.5 seconds so that the host 13 does not time out, and controls the timer to read (write) l information at a time when the timer times out, the host 13 can read the data from the device. There is no timeout and recording interruption can be prevented.

Furthermore, if the timer cannot be used, if the timer is controlled so that one piece of information is captured each time the recording bus ends, it is possible to similarly prevent the occurrence of a timeout error in the host 13.

Furthermore, if an external device such as an automatic paper feeder is attached to the recording device and the control state of the external device can be determined by the recording device, the timing of the change in the control state of this external device can be used to make use of the timing of the change in the control state of this external device. (II and below) It is also possible to control to execute writing (data acquisition) to the reception buffer.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart showing an outline of the recording operation of the recording apparatus.

In FIG. 4, after turning on the power in step 100, in step 101, specify online or offline, or whether the sheet feed is LF (line feed) or FF (page feed) using the key switch on the operation panel, and step 10
In Step 2, it is determined whether or not there is data taken into the reception buffer. If there is not, the data is received in Step 103. If there is, the process proceeds to Step 104 and the host 13
Determine whether there is a control command from.

If there is no control command, data processing is performed in step 105, and then the process proceeds to step 107, where it is determined whether it is OK to start printing.

If it is OK to start printing, the process advances to step 108 to perform the printing process, and then returns to step 101. If it is NO to start printing, the process directly returns to step 101, and the above-mentioned operations are repeated again.

FIG. 1 is a detailed flowchart of the operation when data reception (step 103) in FIG. 4 is executed in the recording apparatus according to the present invention.

In FIG. 1, when data reception starts in step 200, it is first determined in step 201 whether the remaining area of the reception buffer is zero, and if it is zero, step 202 is performed.
Proceed to , just set a flag to say that the data will not be accepted, and end the operation without doing anything.

If the remaining amount is not 0 in step 201, the process proceeds to step 203, where it is determined whether the remaining amount of the reception buffer is larger than the set amount n.

If the remaining amount is smaller than n, the process advances to step 204 and sets a flag indicating that no data will be received, the next step 205 reads the data in the receive buffer, and in step 206 it displays to the host 13 that data cannot be received. I do.

Thereafter, in step 207, the data received from the host 13 is stored in the work and the data is written.

In step 203, if the remaining amount of the reception buffer is n or more, the process proceeds to step 208 and sets a flag indicating that it is OK to receive data, reads the received data in step 209, and outputs an indication that data reception from the host 13 is OK in step 210. , and then proceeds to step 207 to perform a series of normal reception processing in which the received data is stored in the work.

FIG. 2 shows an example in which the process of displaying to the host 13 that data cannot be received at step 206 in FIG. 1 and then changing the status to that of data reception is performed by interrupt processing.

That is, a timer is set at the time when the display that data cannot be received is made in step 206.

After a predetermined period of time has elapsed, interrupt processing is activated and the process moves to step 206 in FIG.

In step 301, steps 204 and 20 in FIG.
Check the value set in step 8, and if it is 0, proceed to the next interrupt processing; if it is not 0, proceed to step 302 and clear the flag indicating that no data will be received).
In step 303, a message indicating that data reception is OK is displayed to the host 13.

Through such interrupt processing, the display indicating that data cannot be received changes to the display indicating that data can be received every second, for example, thereby preventing timeout error processing by the host 13 and making it possible to write the next data.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart of the operation in the case where, after the number of data remaining in the reception buffer reaches n and a message indicating that data cannot be received is displayed, one piece of information is taken in and controlled for each recording pass.

In FIG. 3, it is determined whether or not the printing pass (recording bus) in step 108 in FIG. Then, the process further advances to step 403 to display to the host 13 that it is possible to receive data.

If the printing pass has ended in step 401, the process advances to step 101 in FIG. 4, and the aforementioned steps are executed.

According to the recording device described above, when the remaining amount of the reception buffer provided in the work area of the RAM 16 becomes small and the buffer is not completely full and a predetermined amount of 51n remains, a message is displayed to the host 13 indicating that data cannot be received. From this point on, the host 13 is controlled to take in at least l information of data from the host 13 after a predetermined period of time within a range that does not cause a timeout error.
This makes it possible to prevent timeout errors and eliminate interruptions in the recording process.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As is clear from the above description, according to the present invention, in a recording device having a reception buffer that temporarily stores data received from a host, it is possible to display a message indicating that data cannot be received to the host, and to display data within a range where the host does not time out. Since the data from the host is written in an area with little remaining in the reception buffer after a predetermined time has elapsed, a timeout of the host due to a processing delay of the recording device can be prevented, thereby providing a recording device capable of eliminating interruptions in recording processing.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a flowchart showing the detailed operation of the recording apparatus according to the present invention when receiving data during a recording operation, and FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the procedure for receiving data during the printing process in FIG. 4, FIG. FIG. 6 is a block diagram of the control system of the recording device shown in FIG. 5, and FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram showing the structure of the receiving buffer of the RAM of the recording device according to the present invention. It is a diagram. 5・・・・・−・−・・−Carriage, 6−−−−−・
・Hera)', 11-...CPU, 13-
......Host, 16-------RA
M.

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) In a recording device that has a reception buffer that temporarily stores data received from the host, when the remaining capacity of the reception buffer becomes low, a predetermined amount of data is displayed to the host that indicates that the data cannot be received, and the host does not time out. A recording device configured to write data from a host to an area with little remaining space in a receive buffer after a period of time has elapsed. (2) The recording apparatus according to claim 1, characterized in that writing to an area with a small amount of remaining space in the reception buffer is performed at timing with the recording bus.