Image read-out device and image formation device

Abstract

To easily extract a necessary document.SOLUTION: An image formation device 1 includes: an image formation part 12 for forming an image on a recording medium, and performing printing; user boxes 81A to 81C for storing a document; a control part 100 for allowing the image formation part 12 to execute printing of the document stored in the user boxes 81A to 81C; a character recognition part 101 for analyzing the document stored in the user boxes 81A to 81C, and recognizing characters included in the document; and a tag creation part 102 for analyzing a character group included in the document, on the basis of the recognition result by the character recognition part 101, and creating a tag to the document.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] The present invention relates to a technique for searching for documents stored in a storage unit. [Background technology]

[0002] Some image forming devices include a storage unit that stores documents and prints the documents stored in the storage unit. The following Patent Document 1 describes generating a file name for an image file (document) based on a template that is prepared in advance or is newly generated. [Prior art documents] [Patent documents]

[0003] [Patent Document 1] U.S. Patent No. 8,208,173 Summary of the Invention [Problem to be solved by the invention]

[0004] However, it is difficult to understand the contents of a document from the file name alone. Also, as the number of documents stored in the storage unit increases, it becomes even more difficult to find a necessary document. The technology described in the above Patent Document 1 generates a file name for a document, but the contents of the document are still difficult to understand just by generating the file name, and it is not easy to extract a necessary document.

[0005] The present invention has been made in consideration of the above circumstances, and has an object to make it possible to easily extract necessary documents. [Means for solving the problem]

[0006] An image reading device according to one aspect of the present invention includes an image forming unit that forms and prints an image on a recording medium, a memory unit that stores a document, a control unit that causes the image forming unit to print the document indicated by the document stored in the memory unit, a character recognition unit that analyzes the document stored in the memory unit and recognizes characters contained in the document, and a tag generation unit that analyzes a group of characters contained in the document based on a recognition result by the character recognition unit and generates tags that indicate characteristics of the contents of the document.

[0007] An image forming apparatus according to one aspect of the present invention includes an image reading device according to one aspect of the present invention, an image forming unit that forms an image on a recording medium and prints it, and a control unit that causes the image forming unit to print the document stored in the memory unit. Effect of the Invention

[0008] According to the present invention, tags are generated that indicate characteristics of the contents of documents stored in a storage unit, making it possible to easily extract necessary documents. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0009] [Figure 1] 1 is a functional block diagram illustrating a schematic internal configuration of an image forming apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention; [Diagram 2] 5 is a flowchart illustrating an example of a process performed by a control unit of the image forming apparatus. [Diagram 3] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of an operation screen displayed on a display unit. [Figure 4] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of an operation screen displayed on a display unit. [Diagram 5] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an operation screen displayed on a display unit, illustrating an example of tag display. [Figure 6] FIG. 11 is a diagram showing another example of the operation screen displayed on the display unit and showing another example of tag display. [Figure 7]FIG. 13 is a functional block diagram illustrating a schematic main internal configuration of an image forming apparatus according to a fourth embodiment. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0010] An image reading device and an image forming device according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. Fig. 1 is a functional block diagram showing the main internal configuration of the image forming device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

[0011] The image forming apparatus 1 according to the first embodiment is a multifunction device having multiple functions such as a copy function, a printer function, a scanner function, and a facsimile function.

[0012] The image forming apparatus 1 includes a control unit 10, an original feeding section 6, an original reading section 5, an image forming section 12, a fixing section 13, a paper feeding section 14, an operation section 47, a network interface section 91, and a storage section 8.

[0013] The document feeder 6 is configured to be openable and closable by a hinge or the like (not shown) on the top surface of the document reading unit 5, and functions as a document pressing cover when reading a document placed on a platen glass (not shown). The document feeder 6 is also an ADF (Auto Document Feeder), and includes a document placement tray (not shown), and supplies documents placed on the document placement tray to the document reading unit 5.

[0014] A description will be given of a case where a document reading operation is performed by the image forming apparatus 1. The document reading unit 5 optically reads an image of a document supplied to the document reading unit 5 by the document feeding unit 6 or a document placed on the platen glass, and generates image data. The image data generated by the document reading unit 5 is stored in an image memory or the like (not shown).

[0015] The following describes an image forming operation performed by the image forming apparatus 1. Based on image data generated by a document reading operation, image data stored in an image memory or the like, image data received from a computer connected via a network, and the like, the image forming unit 12 forms a toner image on a recording paper as a recording medium fed from a paper feed unit 14.

[0016] The fixing unit 13 applies heat and pressure to the recording paper on which the toner image has been formed by the image forming unit 12, thereby fixing the toner image to the recording paper, and the recording paper that has been subjected to the fixing process is discharged to a discharge tray (not shown). The paper supply unit 14 includes a paper supply cassette.

[0017] The operation unit 47 includes a numeric keypad or hard keys. The operation unit 47 receives instructions, such as an instruction to execute an image forming operation, from an operator in response to operation of the numeric keypad or hard keys for various operations and processes that can be executed by the image forming apparatus 1. The operation unit 47 includes a display unit 473 that displays operation guides and the like for the operator. The operation unit 47 also receives input of instructions from the user based on the user's operation (touch operation) on the operation screen displayed on the display unit 473 via a touch panel included in the display unit 473.

[0018] The display unit 473 is composed of an LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) or the like. The display unit 473 is equipped with a touch panel. When the operator touches a button or key displayed on the screen, the touch panel receives an instruction associated with the touched position.

[0019] The network interface unit 91 is a communication interface for transmitting and receiving various data to and from an external device (for example, a personal computer) within a local area or on the Internet.

[0020] The storage unit 8 is a large-capacity storage device such as a hard disk drive (HDD) or a solid state drive (SSD), and stores various control programs, etc. The storage unit 8 also has a plurality of user boxes 81A to 81C (hereinafter simply referred to as "user boxes 81").

[0021] The user box 81 is a part of the storage area in the storage unit 8, and stores documents (document data) in association with attribute information of the document (for example, file name, storage date and time, data size). For example, the user box 81 stores, as documents, documents in a data format suitable for a word processor or spreadsheet software, image data obtained by scanning with the document scanning unit 5, and filed image data received via a network.

[0022] The user box 81 is further subdivided into three types of boxes: a "shared" box that can be used by all users, a "personal" box that can be used only by logged-in users, and a "group" box that can be used by groups. The "personal" box and the "group" box store authentication information for authentication for each document in association with each document. The user box 81 is an example of a storage unit in the claims.

[0023] The control unit 10 includes a processor, a RAM (Random Access Memory), a ROM (Read Only Memory), and a dedicated hardware circuit. The processor is, for example, a CPU (Central Processing Unit), an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit), or an MPU (Micro Processing Unit). The control unit 10 includes a control unit 100, a character recognition unit 101, and a tag generation unit 102.

[0024] The control unit 10 functions as a control unit 100, a character recognition unit 101, and a tag generation unit 102 by the operation of the processor in accordance with a control program stored in the storage unit 8. However, the control unit 100 and the like can also be configured by hardware circuits, without relying on the operation of the control unit 10 in accordance with a control program. The same applies to each embodiment below unless otherwise stated.

[0025] The control unit 100 is responsible for controlling the overall operation of the image forming apparatus 1. The control unit 100 is connected to the document feed unit 6, the document reading unit 5, the image forming unit 12, the fixing unit 13, the paper feed unit 14, the operation unit 47, the network interface unit 91, and the storage unit 8, and performs drive control of each of these units. For example, the control unit 100 controls the operation of the image forming unit 12, etc., to form the document image obtained by reading by the document reading unit 5 on recording paper as a recording medium.

[0026] The character recognition unit 101 uses existing OCR (Optical character recognition) technology to analyze image data documents stored in the user box 81 and recognize characters contained in the documents. Alternatively, the character recognition unit 101 recognizes characters contained in documents in a data format suitable for a word processor or spreadsheet software by using an application that decodes files in these data formats.

[0027] The tag generation unit 102 analyzes the characters contained in the document using an existing Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) method based on the recognition result by the character recognition unit 101, and generates tags for the document indicated by the document. LDA is a type of topic model for estimating latent topics of a document.

[0028] For example, the tag generation unit 102 performs preprocessing such as word splitting, word normalization (e.g., unifying half-width and full-width characters, converting uppercase to lowercase), and / or removing stop words (e.g., prepositions, conjunctions, pronouns, and articles) on the group of characters contained in the above document, and then analyzes the group of characters using LDA, sets the number of topics so as to maximize the coherence score, which is an evaluation index for the topic model, and generates a topic model.

[0029] Thereafter, the tag generation unit 102 extracts one or more topics from the generated topic model, adopts the extracted topics as tags, and stores tag information indicating the tags in the user box 81 as attribute information of the document.

[0030] Next, the process performed by the control unit 10 when the user issues an instruction to unfold the user box 81 using the operation unit 47 will be described with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG.

[0031] When the operation unit 47 receives an instruction from a user to select one user box 81 from among a plurality of user boxes 81 and expand the user box 81, the character recognition unit 101 uses OCR technology to analyze the document stored in the user box 81 selected by the user and recognizes the characters contained in the document (S1).

[0032] Next, the tag generation unit 102 analyzes the characters contained in the document based on the recognition results by the character recognition unit 101, generates tags for the document (S2), and stores tag information indicating the generated tags in the user box 81 as attribute information of the document (S3).

[0033] Based on the attribute information of the document stored in the user box 81 selected by the user, the control unit 100 displays the file name of the document on the display unit 473 in association with the tag, as shown in the example of Fig. 3 (S4). After this, the process ends.

[0034] 3 is a diagram showing an example of an operation screen displayed by control unit 100 on display unit 473. Operation screen D1, titled "box001" (the name of user box 81), displays selection buttons B11, B12 displaying the file names of each document aligned vertically, and also displays, in association with the file name of each document, storage date and time (date and time), data size (size), tags, and operation buttons B21, B22 for receiving an instruction to display details of each document.

[0035] Here, the importance of each tag to be created is set in advance, and the tag generating unit 102 stores it. The control unit 100 obtains information indicating the importance from the tag generating unit 102, and preferentially displays tags with high importance on the display unit 473. For tags for which the importance is not set, the control unit 100 treats them as the lowest rank. Here, "preferentially displaying tags with high importance" means that, in the case of the operation screen D1, tags are displayed in order of priority from the left side (or the top side) in FIG. 3. Other examples include (i) displaying tags with higher priority in larger characters (fonts), (ii) displaying tags with higher priority in a more noticeable display form, and the like. The importance of each tag may be set by the tag generating unit 102 as a default value, or may be set according to an instruction received from the user via the operation unit 47.

[0036] When operation unit 47 receives a specification of a document having a file name of "box0000001" based on a user operation on selection button B11 on operation screen D1, control unit 100 causes display unit 473 to display a preview of the document based on the document having a file name of "box0000001". This allows the user to confirm whether or not to print the document. When operation unit 47 receives a print instruction from the user, control unit 100 causes image forming unit 12 to print the document.

[0037] A search box BX in which search characters related to tags can be input is displayed on the operation screen D1. When the user operates the operation unit 47, the operation unit 47 accepts the input of search characters in the search box BX, and further accepts a search execution instruction from the user, the control unit 100 searches the user box 81 for documents having tags that match the input search characters, and displays on the display unit 473 the file names of the documents extracted by the search.

[0038] In addition, when the operation unit 47 receives an instruction to display attribute information about a specific document (in this example, the document with the file name "box0000001") based on a user operation on the operation button B21 on the operation screen D1, the control unit 100 displays only the information about the document with the file name "box0000001" on the display unit 473, as shown in the example of FIG. 4.

[0039] 4 is a diagram showing an example of an operation screen displayed by control unit 100 on display unit 473. Operation screen D2, titled "Details," displays attribute information of a document having a file name of "box0000001," and also displays an operation button B31 for instructing the display of all tags.

[0040] When the operation unit 47 accepts a user operation on the operation button B31 on the operation screen D2, if some of the tags assigned to a document with the file name "box0000001" are displayed, as shown in an example in FIG. 4, the control unit 100 displays all of the tags assigned to the file name "box0000001" on the display unit 473, as shown in an example in FIG. 5.

[0041] According to the first embodiment, the tag generation unit 102 extracts one or more topics from the generated topic model and adopts them as tags. Thus, a tag indicating characteristics of the contents of each document stored in the user box 81 is generated for each document, and the user can easily extract the required document by visually checking the tag displayed together with the document on the display unit 473.

[0042] Since tags are assigned to documents in order to facilitate document search and organization, assigning an unlimited number of tags is not preferable because it results in an excess of information, making the contents of the document even more difficult to understand. Therefore, in the second embodiment, the tag generation unit 102 generates tags for one document up to a predetermined maximum number (e.g., 5 tags). For example, when it is possible to extract topics exceeding the maximum number from the topic model, the tag generation unit 102 employs only frequently occurring topics as tags.

[0043] In another embodiment, the tag generator 102 sets the above-mentioned maximum number of topics to be generated as tags to a smaller number as the number of documents stored in the user box 81 (or a specific storage area within the user box 81) increases. When a large number of documents are stored in the user box 81, and many tags are assigned to each document, the amount of information indicating the characteristics of each document becomes excessive, making it difficult to search and organize the documents. For this reason, the above-mentioned maximum number is set to a small number and the information indicating the characteristics of each document is organized, making it easier to understand the characteristics of each document.

[0044] As yet another embodiment, the tag generation unit 102 may change and set the above-mentioned maximum number of topics to be generated as tags for a document according to the file size of the document stored in the user box 81 (or a specific storage area in the user box 81). For example, (i) the tag generation unit 102 sets the maximum number of topics to be generated as tags for one document to be smaller as the file size of the document increases, or (ii) the tag generation unit 102 sets the maximum number of topics to be generated as tags for one document to be smaller as the file size of the document decreases. In particular, in the case of (i), the number of topics inevitably increases as the file size of the document increases, but in this case, by setting the maximum number of topics to a limited number that is smaller as the size increases, even if the document contains a large amount of information, the user can easily understand the content of the document by the tags that are simply presented.

[0045] Next, a third embodiment different from the first embodiment will be described. In the third embodiment, the tag generating unit 102 generates tags of a predetermined category. The category can be a date, a level of importance, a classification, or the like. For example, if the document is a planning document for holding an event, the tag generating unit 102 generates the date and time of the event as a date tag.

[0046] An importance tag is a tag that indicates the importance of a document, and the tag generating unit 102 generates tags such as, for example, "importance: high," "importance: medium," and "importance: low." Importance is set in advance for keywords, and the tag generating unit 102 determines the importance of the document itself based on the frequency of appearance of high-importance keywords in the document, and assigns an importance tag to the document.

[0047] Examples of classification tags include "politics," "economy," "entertainment," and "sports." The tag generation unit 102 actively extracts from the topic model those that match the pre-prepared classification tags and adopts them as tags.

[0048] Next, a fourth embodiment will be described. Fig. 7 is a functional block diagram showing a schematic diagram of a main internal configuration of an image forming apparatus according to the fourth embodiment. The image forming apparatus according to the fourth embodiment differs from the image forming apparatus according to the first embodiment shown in Fig. 1 in that the control unit 10 includes a login processing unit 103 and an authentication unit 104. The control unit 10 functions as the control unit 100, the character recognition unit 101, the tag generation unit 102, and further functions as the login processing unit 103 and the authentication unit 104 by the operation of the above-mentioned processor according to the control program stored in the storage unit 8.

[0049] When operation unit 47 accepts input of login information based on a user operation, login processing unit 103 determines whether the input login information is legitimate, and when it determines that the login information is legitimate, permits the user to log in to image forming apparatus 1. At this time, login processing unit 103 identifies the user based on the input login information and determines the user's identification information. Note that login processing unit 103 is an example of an identifying unit in the claims.

[0050] The authentication unit 104 compares the authentication information for each document stored in the user box 81 with the user identification information determined by the login processing unit 103, and authenticates whether the user has the authority to use each document stored in the user box 81.

[0051] The tag generation unit 102 generates tags for documents that the user has usage rights to, based on the authentication result by the authentication unit 104, and does not generate tags for documents that the user does not have usage rights to. This prevents documents that the user does not have usage rights from being easily referenced due to tag generation.

[0052] Incidentally, a document may contain not only characters but also diagrams such as figures, photographs, and tables. In the fifth embodiment, the tag generating unit 102 analyzes the diagrams included in the document, and generates tags by including the features of the analyzed diagrams in the features of the contents of the document. For diagrams as well, the tag generating unit 102 generates topic models using an existing image analysis method. In this case, as shown in an example in FIG. 6, the control unit 100 causes the display unit 473 to display tags on the display unit 473, distinguishing between tags made of topics generated based on characters and tags made of topics generated based on diagrams, which are assigned to the file name "box0000001".

[0053] The present invention is not limited to the configuration of the above embodiment, and various modifications are possible. In the above embodiment, the configuration and processing shown in the above embodiment using Figures 1 to 7 are merely one embodiment of the present invention, and the present invention is not limited to the configuration and processing. The image forming device 1 is also an example of an image reading device in the claims. For example, among the configurations of the image forming device 1 shown above, a configuration including at least a storage unit 8 and a control unit 10, and a configuration further including a display unit 473 in addition to these configurations, is an example of an image reading device in the claims. [Explanation of symbols]

[0054] 1. Image forming device 12 Image forming section 8 Memory section 100 Control section 101 Character recognition section 102 Tag Generation Unit 103 Login processing section 104 Authentication Section 473 Display section

Claims

1. a storage unit for storing documents; a character recognition unit that analyzes the document stored in the storage unit and recognizes characters included in the document; and a tag generation unit that analyzes a group of characters contained in the document based on the recognition result by the character recognition unit and generates tags that indicate characteristics of the content of the document.

2. A display unit; a control unit that controls the operation of the display unit, The image reading device according to claim 1 , wherein the control unit further causes the display unit to display the file name of the document in association with the tag generated by the tag generation unit.

3. The image reading device according to claim 2, wherein the control unit further displays, on the display unit, a plurality of tags associated with the file name of the document, in order of priority from the tag with the highest importance, based on a predetermined importance of the tag.

4. the storage unit stores authentication information for authenticating usage rights in association with the document; an identification unit for identifying a user; an authentication unit that compares the authentication information stored in the storage unit with the identification information of the user identified by the identification unit, and authenticates whether the user has the right to use the document stored in the storage unit; 2. The image reading device according to claim 1, wherein the tag generation unit generates the tag for the document for which the user has usage authority based on the authentication result by the authentication unit, and does not generate the tag for the document for which the user does not have usage authority.

5. The image reading device according to claim 1 , wherein the tag generating unit generates the tags for one document using up to a predetermined maximum number of topics.

6. 6. The image reading device according to claim 5, wherein the tag generating unit sets the maximum number of tags to be generated for one document to be smaller as the number of documents stored in the storage unit increases.

7. The image reading device according to claim 5 , wherein the tag generating unit changes and sets the maximum number of topics to be generated for one document depending on the file size of the document stored in the storage unit.

8. The image reading device according to claim 7 , wherein the tag generating unit sets the maximum number of topics to be generated for one document to be smaller as the file size of the document stored in the storage unit increases.

9. The image reading device according to claim 1 , wherein the tag generating unit analyzes a diagram included in the document, and generates the tag by incorporating characteristics indicated by the analyzed diagram into characteristics of the content of the document.

10. An image reading device according to any one of claims 1 to 9; an image forming unit that forms and prints an image on a recording medium; a control unit that causes the image forming unit to print the document stored in the storage unit.

Images