Print control device and program

Abstract

To implement printing more efficiently than if printing were uniformly stopped and handled even if an inspection of a printed piece detects a rejected printed piece in the case of a series of jobs that produce a printed piece as a result of the execution.SOLUTION: A printing control unit 10 has a cause identification unit 14 for identifying the cause of a failed print if a printed piece formed by the execution of a job fails inspection when the jobs are executed consecutively and a job management unit 11 that extracts jobs that have not yet been executed from among the jobs to be executed in succession that are not affected by the cause of the failure and reschedules the extracted jobs to be executed without stopping a printing device 20.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

[Technical field]

[0001] The present invention relates to a print control device and a program. [Background technology]

[0002] In the digital printing market, the function of verifying print results is utilized to guarantee the quality of printed materials. Continuous feed digital printing machines that print on continuous paper such as roll paper record information showing the inspection results for each page by embedding it in the margin of the corresponding page.

[0003] It is a known practice for prints that fail inspection to be reprinted and replaced in post-processing with prints that pass inspection. [Prior art documents] [Patent documents]

[0004] [Patent Document 1] JP 2015-227009 A Summary of the Invention [Problem to be solved by the invention]

[0005] Incidentally, when jobs are executed consecutively, if an inspection of the printed matter resulting from the execution of one of the jobs detects that the printed matter has failed, it is common to temporarily stop the digital printing press at that point, without considering the effect on the subsequent job of the reason why the printed matter failed the inspection, and after the cause is resolved, the digital printing press is restarted and execution of the job is resumed.

[0006] To provide an apparatus for carrying out printing efficiently when jobs which produce printed matter as a result of execution are continuously executed and, even if a print that fails inspection of the print matter is detected, compared to a case where printing is uniformly stopped and a corresponding action is taken. [Means for solving the problem]

[0007] A print control device according to the present invention includes a processor, and when jobs are executed continuously, the processor acquires an inspection result for a printed matter obtained as a result of the execution of the job, and when a failed printed matter is detected in the inspection, selects a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed printed matter from among a plurality of jobs that have not yet been executed. B Run and controlling the execution of the jobs affected by the cause according to attributes related to the deadline of each job. It is characterized by:

[0011] The processor also Kihara Jobs affected by the factor Short When a deadline is required, the job is executed.

[0013] A print control device according to the present invention includes a processor, The processor, When jobs are executed continuously, an inspection result is obtained for the printout obtained as a result of the execution of the jobs, and if a failed printout is detected in the inspection, a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed printout is executed from among the multiple jobs that have not yet been executed; Depending on the expected time required to eliminate the cause , due to the execution of a job in which a print that failed inspection was detected The present invention is characterized in that it determines whether to continue or stop printing.

[0014] The processor may also stop printing if the predicted time length is less than a predetermined threshold. The processor may continue execution of the job if the predicted time length is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold value.

[0015] The program according to the present invention has a function of causing a computer to obtain an inspection result for a printout obtained as a result of execution of a job when jobs are executed continuously, and a function of selecting a job that is not affected by the cause of the failure of the printout from among a plurality of jobs that have not yet been executed when a failed printout is detected in the inspection. B The function to be performed, A function for controlling the execution of jobs affected by the cause according to attributes related to the deadline of each job; Make this a reality. The program of the present invention enables a computer to implement the following functions: when jobs are executed continuously, obtain inspection results for printed materials obtained as a result of executing a job; if a failed printed material is detected during inspection, execute a job from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed that is not affected by the cause of the failed printed material; and determine whether to continue or stop printing by executing a job for which a failed printed material was detected during inspection, depending on the predicted length of time required to resolve the cause. Effect of the Invention

[0016] Claim 1 、6According to the invention described above, when jobs which result in printed matter are executed continuously, even if an inspection of the printed matter detects that the printed matter fails, printing can be carried out more efficiently than if printing were simply stopped and the appropriate action was taken. Furthermore, for jobs for which the printout is expected to fail inspection, the execution of the jobs can be controlled according to attributes related to the delivery date.

[0020] Claim 2 According to the invention described in the above, although it is expected that the printed matter will fail the inspection, , short If the job requires a deadline, it can be executed.

[0022] Claim 3、7 According to the invention described in the above, the execution of a job can be controlled depending on the type of cause for which a rejected printed matter was obtained.

[0023] Claim 4 According to the described invention, if the cause of the rejected print can be eliminated in a short time, printing can be stopped and measures taken to eliminate the cause. According to the invention described in claim 5, the delivery date of the printed matter can be prioritized over the quality. [Brief description of the drawings]

[0025] [Figure 1] 1 is a block diagram of a printing system according to an embodiment of the present invention. [Diagram 2] 5 is a flowchart showing basic processing of a print control process in the present embodiment. [Figure 3A] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the order of execution of jobs that have not yet been executed among jobs that are executed successively in the present embodiment. [Figure 3B] FIG. 3B is a diagram showing the order after the job shown in FIG. 3A is rescheduled. [Figure 4A] FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the order of execution of jobs that have not yet been executed among jobs that are executed successively in the present embodiment. [Figure 4B] FIG. 4B is a diagram showing the order after the job shown in FIG. 4A is rescheduled. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

[0026] Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

[0027] Fig. 1 is a block diagram of a printing system according to the present embodiment, which shows a printing device 20 that executes printing, and a print control device 10 that controls the execution of printing in the printing device 20.

[0028] The printing device 20 in this embodiment is a continuous-feed digital printing machine that prints on continuous paper such as roll paper. The printing device 20 has a print execution unit 21 that performs printing, and a print inspection unit 22 that inspects the printed matter output by the print execution unit 21.

[0029] The print execution unit 21 prints on continuous paper by executing one or more jobs according to instructions from the print control device 10. The print execution unit 21 basically forms multiple pages on continuous paper by executing jobs, so the printed matter formed by the print execution unit 21 corresponds to a page. The print inspection unit 22 performs inspection on a page-by-page basis. Criteria for determining whether the quality of the printed matter passes or fails are set in advance, and the print inspection unit 22 determines whether each printed matter passes or fails depending on whether the criteria are met.

[0030] As described above, the print control device 10 in this embodiment controls the execution of printing in the printer 20. The print control device 10 can be realized by a hardware configuration of a general-purpose computer that has existed for a long time. That is, the print control device 10 is configured by connecting a CPU, a ROM, a RAM, a hard disk drive (HDD) as a storage means, a network interface (IF) provided as a communication means, and a user interface including an input means and a display means to an internal bus.

[0031] 1, the print control device 10 in this embodiment has a job management unit 11, a print execution control unit 12, a print monitoring unit 13, a cause identification unit 14, a control unit 15, and a job storage unit 16. Note that components that are not used in the description of this embodiment are omitted from the figure.

[0032] The job management unit 11 accepts jobs as print requests and registers them in the job storage unit 16. The job management unit 11 also performs job management such as registering and deleting jobs, and schedule management such as determining the order in which registered jobs are to be executed. In particular, in schedule management, the job management unit 11 obtains the inspection results of the printouts obtained as a result of job execution from the print monitoring unit 13, and if a failed printout is detected in the inspection, reschedules the job by executing only those jobs that are not affected by the cause of the failed printout from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed.

[0033] The print execution control unit 12 controls the jobs registered in the job storage unit 16 to be executed according to a schedule. The print monitoring unit 13 monitors the printing status, inspection status, etc. of the printing device 20. In this embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, the print monitoring unit 13 obtains the inspection results of each printed matter from the print inspection unit 22. The cause identification unit 14 identifies the cause of the printed matter failing the inspection. The control unit 15 controls the operation of each of the components 11-14.

[0034] The job storage unit 16 stores job information including job identification information such as a job ID, attribute information for the job such as the date and time the job was received, job size, amount of printed matter (page size and number of sheets of each size, capacity of continuous paper used, etc.), and attribute information for the printed matter generated by execution of the job. The job information also includes information regarding the delivery date and required quality of the printed matter, which will be described later. In addition, the order in which the jobs are executed, that is, the schedule information, is set according to the sorting order of the job information, etc.

[0035] Each of the components 11 to 15 in the print control device 10 is realized by the cooperative operation of a computer forming the print control device 10 and a program running on a CPU mounted on the computer. Also, the job storage unit 16 is realized by a HDD mounted on the print control device 10. Alternatively, a RAM or an external storage means may be used via a network.

[0036] Furthermore, the programs used in the present embodiment can be provided not only by communication means, but also by being stored in a computer-readable recording medium such as a CD-ROM or a USB memory. The programs provided from the communication means or recording medium are installed in a computer, and various processes are realized by the computer's CPU sequentially executing the programs.

[0037] When a job is executed by the printing system, a printout is formed on a continuous sheet as a result of the execution. The printout is printed and generated as specified by attribute information, etc., but may not be generated with the desired quality due to, for example, dirt on the nozzle that outputs the ink. The print inspection unit 22 inspects the quality of each printout generated, and judges printouts that do not meet the predetermined standard as described above as rejected. If a printout that has failed inspection is detected during the execution of multiple jobs in succession, the printing device 20 is usually stopped once at the point in time when the failed printout is detected, and the printing device 20 is restarted after taking measures to eliminate the cause of the printout being rejected. Then, execution of the subsequent job is resumed.

[0038] Incidentally, there are some reasons why a printed matter fails inspection. One example of such a reason is damage to a nozzle that outputs a specific color of ink. In this case, the printing device 20 is stopped, the nozzle is replaced, or the like, to eliminate the cause of the failure of the printed matter, and then the printing device 20 is restarted. This is believed to prevent a printed matter that uses the specific color of ink in a subsequent job from failing inspection due to the same cause. However, on the other hand, a subsequent job that generates a printed matter that does not use the specific color of ink is temporarily suspended due to the stopping of the printing device 20, even though it is executable.

[0039] Therefore, in this embodiment, when jobs are executed continuously and a printout that has failed the inspection is detected, the execution of the jobs is controlled so that only those jobs that are not affected by the cause of the failed printout are executed from among the multiple jobs that have not yet been executed. Below, the basic process of the job execution control process in this embodiment will be explained using the flowchart shown in Figure 2. Figure 2 shows the process when a printout is formed on continuous paper by executing jobs continuously.

[0040] The print execution control unit 12 retrieves the first job to be executed from the job storage unit 16 and sends it to the printing device 20 to execute the job (step 101). In this embodiment, jobs are executed continuously, but the start of execution of each job can be controlled each time. In other words, multiple jobs executed continuously are not necessarily executed unconditionally in succession according to a schedule, and even if the execution of the previous job has ended, the start timing of the next job to be executed may be controlled by the print execution control unit 12. In this embodiment, the latter is assumed.

[0041] The print execution unit 21 in the printing device 20 starts executing the sent job. In addition, the print inspection unit 22 inspects the printed matter every time the print execution unit 21 generates the printed matter. When the print monitoring unit 13 finishes executing the job, it obtains the inspection results of all the printed matters from the print inspection unit 22 (step 102). Here, if all the printed matters pass the inspection and no printed matters that have failed the inspection are detected (N in step 103), the processing related to the job ends. Then, if there is a job to be executed next (Y in step 107), the processing target is shifted to the job to be executed next (step 101).

[0042] On the other hand, if even one printed product is found to have failed the inspection (Y in step 103), the control unit 15 activates the cause identification unit 14. When activated, the cause identification unit 14 identifies the cause of the production of the printed product that failed the inspection (hereinafter also referred to as the "cause of failure") (step 104). Here, an example will be described in which a printed product fails the inspection due to an abnormality occurring in the head part that outputs Y color ink. Also, for ease of explanation, it will be assumed that only printed products that use Y color fail.

[0043] In this embodiment, since the inspection results of all printed matter produced in one job are acquired all at once in step 102, there may be cases where printed matter that has failed the inspection is detected due to multiple reasons for failure. Therefore, in order to narrow down the reasons for failure to one, the process in step 104 may be executed at the stage when a printed matter that has failed the inspection is first detected during the execution of one job.

[0044] When the cause of failure is identified, the job management unit 11 obtains the identified cause of failure from the cause identification unit 14. Then, the job management unit 11 extracts jobs that are not affected by the cause of failure, that is, jobs that do not use the color Y, from among the jobs that are executed consecutively but have not yet been executed (also called "unexecuted jobs") (step 105). Whether or not the color Y is used can be determined by referring to the job information.

[0045] Next, the job management unit 11 reschedules the unexecuted jobs so that only the extracted jobs are executed (step 106), and updates the rescheduled contents in the job storage unit 16. The print execution control unit 12 executes the unexecuted jobs in the scheduled order (Y, 101 in step 107).

[0046] As described above, in this embodiment, when a failed printout is obtained, only jobs that are not affected by the cause of the failed printout are extracted from among the multiple jobs that have not yet been executed and are executed preferentially. This allows jobs that are not affected by the cause of the failure to be executed without stopping the printing device 20, allowing printing to be carried out efficiently.

[0047] Of the multiple jobs that have not yet been executed, those jobs that are affected by the cause of the failed printout are put on hold. Basically, after finishing execution of a job that is not affected by the cause of the failure, the user stops the printing device 20, resolves the cause of the failure, and restarts the printing device 20, after which the execution of the put on hold job is resumed.

[0048] As described above, when the inspection results of all printed matter are obtained when the execution of a job is completed, multiple reasons for failure may be identified. In this embodiment, even in such a case, it is possible to handle the situation by extracting and executing a job that is not affected by any of the reasons for failure, and suspending a job that is affected by at least one of the reasons for failure.

[0049] The above-mentioned job execution control process will now be described with a concrete example.

[0050] Fig. 3A is a diagram showing the order of jobs that have not yet been executed among jobs that are executed consecutively, i.e., the execution order of unexecuted jobs. That is, in the job executed immediately before the first job A in Fig. 3A, a printout that failed inspection was detected due to an abnormality in the head part that outputs the Y color ink. Each job A to I is associated with information on whether or not to use the Y color specified from the job information. In Fig. 3A, "Use" corresponding to the Y color item indicates that it will be used, and "Not required" indicates that it will not be used.

[0051] As described above, when the cause of failure is identified (step 104), the job management unit 11 extracts jobs that are not affected by the cause of failure (step 105). That is, jobs B, E, F, and H that do not use Y color are extracted. Then, as shown in FIG. 3B, the job management unit 11 reschedules jobs B, E, F, and H to be executed without stopping the printing device 20 (step 106). Then, the job management unit 11 suspends the execution of jobs A, C, D, G, and I that are affected by the cause of failure.

[0052] Incidentally, there are jobs with relatively long and short printing man-hours, as a matter of course. In this embodiment, a long printing man-hour is equivalent to a large number of printed matters produced and a long printing time. In this embodiment, whether a printing man-hour is relatively long or short is determined based on the amount of printed matters produced by the execution of each job. That is, a job in which the predicted amount of printed matters obtained by the execution of the job is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold is determined to be a job with relatively long printing man-hours (hereinafter, "long job"). On the other hand, a job in which the predicted amount of printed matters obtained by the execution of the job is less than a predetermined threshold is determined to be a job with relatively short printing man-hours (hereinafter, "short job"). A long job requires more printing time than a short job. Therefore, a long job has a greater effect on the printing efficiency of all jobs executed in succession. Therefore, in this embodiment, it is possible to handle long jobs and short jobs differently. Hereinafter, the differences and similarities between the execution control of a long job and a short job will be described with reference to Figs. 4A and 4B.

[0053] Fig. 4A is a diagram showing each job shown in Fig. 3A in association with a job type indicating the length of the printing man-hours for the job. "Long" is set for the long job described above, and "Short" is set for the short job.

[0054] As described above, when the cause of failure is identified (step 104), the job management unit 11 extracts jobs that are not affected by the cause of failure (step 105). That is, jobs B, E, F, and H that do not use Y color are extracted, regardless of the job type. Then, the job management unit 11 reschedules jobs B, E, F, and H so that they are executed without stopping the printing device 20, as shown in FIG. 4B (step 106).

[0055] On the other hand, the job management section 11 handles jobs affected by the cause of rejection in the manner described below.

[0056] First, as shown in FIG. 4B, jobs are divided into two according to the type of job. That is, jobs C, G, and I are divided into short jobs, and jobs A and D are divided into long jobs. Then, the job management unit 11 schedules short jobs to be executed without stopping the printing device 20, even though it is expected that the printed matter generated by the execution of the short jobs will fail the inspection. The corresponding jobs C, G, and I may be executed following jobs B, E, F, and H that are not affected by the cause of failure, or may be executed mixed together, that is, in the order of jobs B, C, E, F, G, H, and I according to the execution order shown in FIG. 4A.

[0057] In this embodiment, a short job that is affected by the cause of rejection is executed for the following reasons.

[0058] Each job has attributes. Attributes include the quantity of printed matter produced as described above, i.e., long job or short job. Other attributes of a job include the quality required for the printed matter and the delivery date. In this embodiment, the execution of a job can be controlled according to the attributes of each job. Note that the attribute information of a job includes attributes for the printed matter produced by the execution of the job as described above. The attribute information is included in the job information.

[0059] In addition, since the delivery time can be set in days, it is easy to judge whether the delivery time is short or not by comparing it with a threshold value. Regarding quality, attribute values ​​such as high / low, high / medium / low, etc., that can be compared with a threshold value are set in the attribute information.

[0060] In the case of a job with a short job attribute, even if it is expected that the printed matter will fail the inspection, the printing device 20 generates the printed matter by executing the job as shown in FIG. 4B. This is because, even if the printed matter fails the pass / fail criteria in the print inspection unit 22, there are cases in which high quality is not required so that the print inspection unit 22 should actually judge it as pass. For example, the result of visual inspection by an inspector may be that the finished product does not need to be rejected. In other words, a certain level of quality may be judged to be ensured in the visual inspection by an inspector. In this case, the printed matter that failed the inspection by the print inspection unit 22 can be used as a product as it is. Even if the inspector judges it as a fail in the same way as the print inspection unit 22, in the case of a short job, the printing time is shorter than that of a long job, so it is considered that there will be little time loss even if it is reprinted. In addition, since the number of printed matter is relatively small compared to a long job, it is considered that there will be little loss in terms of cost. In this way, even if a short job that is expected to fail is executed, it is considered that the efficiency of printing will not decrease as much as that of a long job. Therefore, in the case of a short job, even if the job is affected by the cause of rejection, the job is executed while the rejection is expected.

[0061] In addition, when referring to the delivery date, which is an attribute of a job, if a short delivery date is required, such as in the case of a job with a high level of urgency, where the delivery deadline is imminent, a short job may be executed to prioritize the delivery date over quality.

[0062] In the above explanation, the execution of a job is controlled to be executed or put on hold according to the attributes of the job affected by the cause of failure, but the user may be allowed to select whether to execute or cancel the job. This is because the user can take into account attributes that cannot be expressed by the attribute information set in the job information. Specifically, the names of short jobs affected by the cause of failure among unexecuted jobs and information that can identify printed matter, etc. are displayed in a list on the user interface, and the user is allowed to select whether to execute or cancel the job.

[0063] The above describes the case where the method is applied to short jobs among jobs that are affected by the cause of failure. However, this does not mean that it is impossible to treat long jobs in the same way. In the case of a long job, if printing is executed when it is expected that the job will fail, the job will also fail, and there will be a large loss of time and cost if the job is reprinted. Therefore, in this embodiment, the method is limited to short jobs.

[0064] In the above explanation, the execution of a job is controlled according to the attributes of the job. And, when a job is put on hold, the printing by the printing device 20 is stopped, the cause of the failure is eliminated, and the printing device 20 is restarted, and then the execution of the job is started. However, it is also possible to decide whether to continue or stop printing according to the predicted time required to eliminate the cause of the failure.

[0065] That is, the time required to resolve the cause of rejection is considered to differ depending on the type of the cause of rejection. For example, if the time required to resolve the cause of rejection, such as repairing a part that fulfills some of the functions of the printing device 20 and checking its operation, is relatively long and is expected to take more than a predetermined threshold, execution of the job will have to be suspended for a long time. Therefore, printing may be continued to prioritize execution of the job. A short job that is affected by a cause of rejection is executed with priority given to delivery date and printing efficiency, even though the printed matter produced will likely be rejected by inspection.

[0066] On the other hand, if the time required to resolve the cause of rejection, such as simple part replacement, is relatively short and is predicted to be less than the predetermined threshold, printing may be stopped. While printing is stopped, the process to resolve the cause of rejection is carried out, and after restarting the printing device 20, execution of the suspended unexecuted job is resumed. By prioritizing the quality of the printed matter in this way, for example, jobs A to I shown in Fig. 4A are executed in this order, and the quality of the printed matter generated by the execution of each job is maintained.

[0067] In the above embodiments, the term "processor" refers to a processor in a broad sense, including general-purpose processors (e.g., CPU: Central Processing Unit, etc.) and dedicated processors (e.g., GPU: Graphics Processing Unit, ASIC: Application Specific Integrated Circuit, FPGA: Field Programmable Gate Array, programmable logic device, etc.).

[0068] In addition, the operations of the processor in the above embodiments may be performed not only by one processor, but also by multiple processors located at physically separate locations working together. The order of the operations of the processor is not limited to the order described in the above embodiments, and may be changed as appropriate. [Explanation of symbols]

[0069] 10 print control device, 11 job management section, 12 print execution control section, 13 print monitoring section, 14 cause identification section, 15 control section, 16 job storage section, 20 printing device, 21 print execution section, 22 print inspection section.

Claims

1. A processor is provided. The processor, When jobs are executed continuously, an inspection result is obtained for the printed matter obtained as a result of the execution of the jobs. If a failed print is detected during the inspection, a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed print is executed from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed, Controlling the execution of the jobs affected by the cause in accordance with attributes related to the deadline of each job; A print control device comprising:

2. 2. The print control device according to claim 1, wherein the processor executes a job affected by the cause if the job is required to be delivered in a short time frame.

3. A processor, The processor, When jobs are executed continuously, an inspection result is obtained for the printed matter obtained as a result of the execution of the jobs. If a failed print is detected during the inspection, a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed print is executed from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed, determining whether to continue or stop printing by executing the job in which the printout that failed the inspection was detected, depending on the estimated time required to eliminate the cause; A print control device comprising:

4. The print control device according to claim 3 , wherein the processor stops printing when the predicted time length is less than a predetermined threshold value.

5. The printing control device described in Claim 3, characterized in that the processor continues printing if the predicted time length is greater than or equal to a predetermined threshold.

6. On the computer, A function for acquiring inspection results for printed materials obtained as a result of job execution when jobs are executed continuously; A function that, when a failed printout is detected during inspection, executes a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed printout from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed; A function for controlling the execution of jobs affected by the cause according to attributes related to the deadline of each job; A program to achieve this.

7. A computer comprising: A function for acquiring inspection results for printed materials obtained as a result of job execution when jobs are executed continuously; A function that, when a failed printout is detected during inspection, executes a job that is not affected by the cause of the failed printout from among multiple jobs that have not yet been executed; a function for determining whether to continue or stop printing by executing a job in which a print that has failed the inspection is detected, depending on an estimated time length required to eliminate the cause; A program to achieve this.

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