JPH07114594A - Electronic catalog device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [Purpose] More information than conventional catalog books, at low cost,
Make it available quickly and easily. [Structure] Floppy disk 3 for graphic information and character information
The information storage means 2 to be stored in the floppy disk 3, the display device 6 for displaying the information stored in the floppy disk 3, the display control means 7 for controlling the display corresponding to the display device 6, and the storage device in the floppy disk 3. Facsimile no information 1
2, a facsimile requesting means 8 for transmitting the information to the disk 2, and an information update processing means 15 for storing information not stored in the floppy disk 3 on the floppy disk 3 by communication.
An information output means 16 for outputting information stored in the floppy disk 3 to an external storage device, and a system control device 1 for controlling various means and the devices 2, 7, 8, 15, 16 described above.
7 and.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an electronic catalog device which makes it possible to easily and quickly obtain information on a desired optimum electronic component from among a vast amount of products, especially information on electronic components. is there.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, the product lineup of electronic parts has been increasing with the sophistication of product development technology, shortening of product cycles, and diversification of user needs.
Conventionally, product information of electronic parts has been provided as a paper catalog book, but the amount of information has also increased,
It takes a great deal of labor and time to find product information that meets various needs from such a huge amount of catalog books. Whether or not the product information obtained in this way is optimal for the desired needs depends on how carefully and carefully the catalog book is used. Therefore, what has been attracting attention is the electronic catalog. Normal,
The electronic catalog includes a storage device, a CD-, as a recording medium.
There are a one-way providing method of distributing with a ROM, an optical disk, etc., and a communication method of accessing a device dedicated to an electronic catalog using a network such as a telephone line.

[0003]

However, the distribution system has a problem that information cannot be updated. The communication system has the problems of high cost and communication speed due to communication with a remote place, and that the user cannot select a model of a personal computer that can be used as an electronic catalog dedicated device. Furthermore, there is a limit to the amount of information that can be displayed as an electronic catalog, information that cannot be displayed cannot be conveyed to users, the search method for obtaining product information is difficult for users to understand, and information provided as electronic catalogs There are many problems such as not being able to directly import and use. Furthermore, when the amount of information that can be displayed as an electronic catalog is expanded to not only character information but also graphic information (CAD drawings, etc.), a CD-ROM or optical disk is usually used, but it is expensive to extract information from these recording media. There is a problem that a different device is required.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to solve the above problems and to provide an electronic catalog apparatus which is inexpensive and which can easily and quickly use an information amount larger than that of a conventional catalog book.

[0005]

In order to achieve the above object, an electronic catalog device of the present invention comprises an information storage means for storing first information of at least one of a figure and a character,
A storage device in which the first information is stored by the information storage means, a display device for displaying the first information stored in the storage device, and a display for controlling display corresponding to the display device. Information stored in the storage device by control means, facsimile transmission requesting means for transmitting the second information not stored in the storage device by facsimile, and third information not stored in the storage device by communication Communication storage means and the first storage device stored in the storage device
Alternatively, information output means for outputting the third information to an external storage device, and system control means for controlling the information storage means, the display control means, the facsimile transmission request means, the information communication storage means, and the information output means. Is equipped with.

[0006]

According to the structure of the electronic catalog device of the present invention, since it is provided with the facsimile transmission requesting means and the information communication storing means, it is possible to obtain information that cannot be stored in the storage device. Can be increased to

[0007]

1 is a block diagram of an electronic catalog device according to an embodiment of the present invention. In FIG. 1, 1 is a catalog book, 2 is an information storage means for converting graphic information and character information corresponding to the contents of the catalog book 1 into electronic data and storing the electronic data, and 3 is a storage device for storing the electronic data. Floppy disk 4 is a floppy device for reading electronic data stored in the floppy disk 3,
Reference numeral 5 is a search means for extracting only the necessary information from the information stored in the floppy disk 3, 6 is a display device for displaying the electronic data obtained by the search means 5, and 7 is a display device 6.
Display control means 8 for controlling the above, a facsimile request means 8 for requesting the facsimile transmission of information not stored in the floppy disk 3, and an image input device 9 for converting the graphic information of the catalog book 1 into electronic data as an image, Reference numeral 10 is an image storage device for storing information obtained by the image input device 9, 11 is a facsimile transmission / reception device for accessing the image storage device 10 and transmitting image information by facsimile in response to an instruction from the facsimile request means 8. Is a facsimile which receives and outputs the transmitted image information, 13 is an information update requesting means for requesting to update the latest information not stored in the floppy disk 3 by communication transmission, 14 is the latest information of the catalog book 1 Latest information storage means, 15
Is an information update processing means for accessing the latest information storage means 14 through a communication line and fetching the latest information in accordance with an instruction from the information update request means 13, and 16 is a floppy disk 3
An information output unit for outputting the electronic data stored in the device as data corresponding to another electronic device, and 17 for a floppy device 4, a retrieval unit 5, a display control unit 7, a facsimile request unit 8, a facsimile transmission / reception device 11, and an information update request. It is a system control device for controlling the means 13, the information update processing means 15, and the information output means 16.

The operation of the electronic catalog device in one embodiment of the present invention will be described below. First, the information storage means 2 converts the graphic information and the character information corresponding to the contents of the catalog book 1 into electronic data, and stores the electronic data in the storage device. In this case, information may be read directly from the catalog book 1, or characters and figures may be input from a computer to create figure information and character information.

The information storage means 2 will be described in more detail with reference to the configuration diagram shown in FIG. First, various CAD
Characters and graphics are input by the devices 20 to 22 to create graphic information and character information of different formats. Since the graphic information and the character information created by the various CAD devices 20 to 22 have different formats, it is necessary to unify the formats in order to store the information on one floppy disk 3. Information conversion means 2
Reference numerals 3 to 25 respectively convert the information created by the CAD devices 20 to 22 into one uniform format information. The converted uniform format information is data-compressed by the information compression means 26, and the amount of information is reduced. The data-compressed uniform format information is stored in the floppy disk 3 by the floppy disk storage means 27.

The information compressing means 26 compresses graphic and character information as simple drawing attributes and drawing information and compares it with the information amount of the CAD devices 20 to 22, and the information amount after compression is 1
/ 4 to 1/1000. This is the information compression means 26
Then, the information is compressed up to the stage where it can be used as it is, and since it is not necessary to process the information that can be decrypted using specific hardware, it is realized by deleting the redundancy of the information of the CAD devices 20-22. To be done. As a result, it becomes possible to store the same information as that of a recording medium such as an expensive CD-ROM or an optical disk having a high recording density in the floppy disk 3. From the above, if the appearance of a normal semiconductor component is 3 Kbytes on average, about 340 pieces of drawing information can be stored in one floppy disk, which can be sufficiently used as an electronic catalog.

The information of the floppy disk 3 thus stored is read by the floppy device 4,
The necessary data is retrieved by the retrieval means 5 and controlled by the system control device 17 and the display control means 7 to obtain a desired display on the display device 6.

The display device will be described in more detail with reference to FIG. When considering an electronic catalog device that uses a personal computer (hereinafter referred to as a personal computer),
It is necessary to provide a limited number of personal computers to users. This is because the graphic display system of a personal computer varies depending on the personal computer manufacturer, and therefore it is necessary to provide an electronic catalog device corresponding to each personal computer manufacturer. However, users own PCs of various manufacturers,
It is not realistic to provide an electronic catalog corresponding to all personal computers of multiple makers. Therefore, the display control means 7
Selects the model of the personal computer into which the information data is to be read, and the computer model selection means 30 for instructing the system controller 17 to indicate the information data type, and the system controller 17 instructs the floppy disk 3 information to be changed to the computer model. The display device 6 is composed of display request means 31 for converting data according to the display data, and display processing means 32 to 34 for adjusting the display environment according to the model of the specified personal computer for the information data from the display request means 31. Display devices 35 to 37 corresponding to. Here, once the personal computer model is selected by the personal computer model selection means 30, it is valid until the next change. When this selection is made, in the electronic catalog device, the system control device 17 passes the information to be displayed to the display requesting means 31. The display requesting means 31 processes the display information and requests the display processing means 32 to 34 that have been selected to display the information. The display processing means 32-34 display the information on the display devices 35-37 of the corresponding manufacturers. With this structure, personal computers of a plurality of manufacturers can be covered with one electronic catalog device.

When the target information stored in the floppy disk 3 is all catalog books, the amount of information becomes enormous. Therefore, the electronic catalog device needs to be divided into information that can be drawn on the display device 6 and other information. Information that is not displayed on the display device 6, that is, information that is not stored on the floppy disk 3, is transferred by the facsimile requesting means 8 on paper.

The graphic information of the catalog book 1 which is not stored in the floppy disk 3 is converted into electronic data as image data by the image input device 9 and stored in the image storage device 10. When the facsimile requesting means 8 requests the facsimile transmission of this unstored information, the system control device 17 gives an instruction to access the image storage device 10 through the facsimile transmission / reception device 11 to transmit the image information by facsimile. It causes the facsimile 12 to output desired information on the paper. This makes it possible to provide the user with all necessary detailed information separately from the information directly displayed on the display device 6 in a timely manner.

The information stored in the floppy disk 3 becomes old with the passage of time, and the latest information is always required. The information update request means 13 fetches the latest information not stored in the floppy disk 3 by communication and updates the information in the floppy disk 3 to the latest information. The latest information is always stored in the latest information storage means 14. When a data update request is issued by the information update request means 13, the system controller 17 issues an instruction to access the latest information storage means 14 through the information update processing means 15 and transmit the latest information via the communication network. The desired information is output to the floppy disk 3 as electronic data. Here, the latest information storage device 14
The information passed from the information update processing means 15 is only the information to be updated, and is the information of addition / deletion / change. The latest information is created from the information to be updated and the current information stored in the floppy disk 3. This minimizes the information transferred via the communication network, shortens the transfer time, and reduces the communication cost.

The information output means 16 has a function of allowing the user to retrieve and reuse the information of the electronic catalog device. The information output means 16 has a function opposite to that of the information storage means 2 and converts the information stored in the floppy disk 3 into an information format compatible with various CAD devices and outputs it.

[0017]

According to the electronic catalog device of the present invention, it is possible to use an inexpensive floppy disk in which a wealth of information is stored by the compression technology of drawing information, and despite the distribution method with the floppy disk, Information can be updated using a communication network, and information that cannot be stored on a floppy disk can be obtained by facsimile transmission. Also,
By retrieving the information from the provided floppy disk and reusing it, the need for transcription is eliminated. Overall, it is cheap and the amount of information over conventional catalog books can be used easily and quickly with a convenient search function.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of an electronic catalog device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of an information storage unit according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of a display device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Catalog book 2 Information storage means 3 Floppy disk 4 Floppy device 5 Search means 6 Display device 7 Display control means 8 Facsimile requesting means 9 Image input device 10 Image storage device 11 Facsimile transmitting / receiving device 12 Facsimile 13 Information update requesting means 14 Latest information storage Means 15 Information update processing means 16 Information output means 17 System control device 20-22 CAD device 23-25 Information conversion means 26 Information compression means 27 Floppy disk storage means 30 Personal computer model selection means 31 Display request means 32-34 Display processing means 35 ~ 37 display device

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A first of at least one of a figure and a character
Storing means for storing the above information, a storage device in which the first information is stored by the information storing means, a display device for displaying the first information stored in the storage device, and the display device Corresponding to, the display control means for controlling the display, the facsimile transmission request means for transmitting the second information not stored in the storage device by facsimile, and the third information not stored in the storage device. Information communication storage means for storing in the storage device by communication, information output means for outputting the first or third information stored in the storage device to an external storage device, the information storage means, the display control An electronic catalog apparatus comprising: means, the facsimile transmission request means, the information communication storage means, and a system control means for controlling the information output means. 2. The electronic catalog device according to claim 1, wherein the storage device is a floppy disk. 3. A first of at least one of a figure and a character
Information storage means for storing the information of a plurality of different graphic information generating devices, a plurality of information converting means for converting the information of the graphic of different formats of the graphic information generating device into one information format, and the information converting means. The information compression means for compressing the information of the graphic converted by the above, and the storage device storage means for storing the compression information compressed by the information compression means in a storage device. Electronic catalog device. 4. A facsimile transmission means for transmitting the second information not stored in a storage device by a facsimile, and a facsimile request signal output from the facsimile request means to receive the facsimile request signal through a communication network. Request a facsimile transmission of the second information,
The electronic catalog device according to claim 1, comprising a facsimile transmitting / receiving device for transmitting. 5. The information communication storage means includes an information update request means for requesting information update of the third information not stored in the storage device through a communication network, and an information update request from the information update request means. The electronic catalog device according to claim 1, further comprising an information update processing unit that transmits the third information through the communication network and stores the third information in the storage device. 6. The display control means selects a personal computer model selecting means for selecting a model of a personal computer to be used including a display device, and a first computer according to a model of the personal computer designated by the personal computer model selecting means. 3. A display requesting means for processing so that the information of FIG. 2 can be displayed, and a display processing means for displaying the first information processed by the display requesting means on the display device. The electronic catalog device according to claim 3, claim 4, or claim 5.