Printer Group Management System for Cross-Office Printing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Users face difficulties in determining which printers are part of the same group for sharing print instructions and settings, leading to inconvenience when trying to print across different offices or locations.
Innovation Solution
A computer program that collects and accumulates group and feature information from multiple printers, allowing a mobile terminal to connect to a specific printer to share this information and display it to the user, enabling easy identification of compatible printers for print tasks.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If printers are classified into groups for sharing print instructions, then printing versatility is improved, but user convenience deteriorates when users cannot grasp which printers belong to which group
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a management apparatus as an intermediary that collects group information from multiple printers and provides this information to terminal apparatuses. This mediator enables users to understand printer groupings without requiring direct interaction with each printer, thus maintaining printing versatility while improving user convenience through centralized information management.
2Loss of information
If group information is collected from all printers, then information completeness is improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The management apparatus performs multiple functions: collecting group information from printers, storing this information, and providing it to terminal apparatuses. By consolidating these functions into a single multi-functional system, the patent achieves information completeness without proportionally increasing system complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The system automatically collects and accumulates group information from printers without requiring manual intervention. Printers autonomously provide their group information to the management apparatus, which then makes this information available to users, reducing operational complexity while maintaining information completeness.
Data Source
AI summary
A non-transitory computer readable medium stores a program causing a computer to execute a process including: collecting group information of each of plural printers classified into plural groups from each of the plural printers by connecting to each of the plural printers; and accumulating group information of each of the plural printers in a specific printer among the plural printers as group information of the plural printers together with group information of the specific printer by connecting to the specific printer.