By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Journal of Engineering -- Ricoh Company, Ltd (Tokyo, JP) has been issued patent number 8804177, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by VerticalNews editors.
The patent's inventor is Jahn, Janeen E. (Lafayette, CO).
This patent was filed on December 12, 2012 and was published online on August 12, 2014.
From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: "Print shops are typically medium or large scale facilities capable of supplying printing services to meet a variety of customer demands. For example, print shops are often used to print documents for mass-mailing (e.g., customer bills, advertisements, etc). Because print shops engage in printing on a scale that is hard to match, their customer base is usually varied. Print shop clients may therefore include both large institutional clients (e.g., credit card companies and banks), and small clients (e.g., small businesses and churches).
"Print shops are generally arranged to print incoming jobs from clients in a way that is economical, yet fast. Thus, print shops often include a number of high-volume printers capable of printing incoming jobs quickly and at high quality. These printers may be managed by operators who can remove paper jams and reload the printers with media. Print shops also typically include post-print devices that are used to process the printed documents of each job (e.g., stackers, staplers, cutters, binders, etc.). Because print shops serve a variety of clients, they are often tasked with printing jobs that have varying printing formats, delivery dates, and media requirements. Print shops therefore often use a centralized print server that coordinates the activity between printers of the print shop and clients. The print server schedules incoming jobs and forwards them to the printers they are directed to.
"Customers with printing needs generate print jobs for the print shop using a variety of tools, such as web interfaces to the print shop, client side tools operated by the customer, etc. When a customer generates a job for the print shop, options for the job are selected by the customer and integrated into the print job (e.g., a job ticket for the customer's print data indicates duplexing, media types, etc.) based on the capabilities and activities that the print shop offers to customers. A print shop operator then generates a print workflow for the print job. The print workflow includes sequences of steps that identify the print shop activities to perform for the print job. Such steps may include a variety of actions such as printing, stapling, generating billing for the customer, shipping, an email verification process for proof sheets, etc.
"In some cases, a print shop operator may generate a print workflow that is not valid. This may occur in cases where the particular rules of workflow generation are not followed. For example, if a print shop operator generates a print workflow that defines a binding operation prior to a printing operation, then this type of activity would not be possible. As the complexity of print workflows increase, so does the possibility of mistakes being made. Complex print workflows may include a number of conditional branches that render it difficult to determine if the print workflow as a whole is valid."
Supplementing the background information on this patent, VerticalNews reporters also obtained the inventor's summary information for this patent: "Embodiments described herein provide for validating branching print workflows by segmenting the workflows into a plurality of linear sequences of steps, and validating each of the linear sequences. A branching print workflow includes at least two separate paths through the workflow. The branch may be due to a conditional step in the print workflow. By decomposing branching workflows into linear segments and performing a validation process on the linear segments, complex branching print workflows can be validated. This reduces the potential for erroneous print workflows being introduced to the print shop.
"In one embodiment, a control system receives a print workflow for a print job. The print workflow comprises steps identifying the print shop activities to perform for the print job. The control system determines whether the print workflow comprises a branching print workflow. If the print workflow is a branching workflow, then the control system segments the branching workflow into a plurality of linear sequences of steps. The control system then determines if the print workflow is valid by analyzing each of the linear sequences based on workflow rules.
"In another embodiment, a method comprises receiving a print workflow for a print job, where the print workflow comprises steps identifying print shop activities to perform for the print job. The method further comprises determining whether the print workflow comprises a branching print workflow. The method further comprises segmenting the print workflow into a plurality of linear sequences of steps. The method further comprises determining if the print workflow is valid by analyzing each of the linear sequences based on workflow rules.
"In another embodiment, a non-transitory computer readable medium embodies programmed instructions which, when executed by a processor, direct the processor to receive a print workflow for a print job, where the print workflow comprises steps identifying print shop activities to perform for the print job. The instructions further direct the processor to determine whether the print workflow comprises a branching print workflow. The instructions further direct the processor to segment the print workflow into a plurality of linear sequences of steps. The instructions further direct the processor to determine if the print workflow is valid by analyzing each of the linear sequences based on workflow rules.
"Other exemplary embodiments may be described below."
For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Jahn, Janeen E.. Validation of Branching Print Workflows. U.S. Patent Number 8804177, filed December 12, 2012, and published online on August 12, 2014. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?
Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=8804177.PN.&OS=PN/8804177RS=PN/8804177
Keywords for this news article include: Ricoh Company Ltd.
Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world. Copyright 2014, NewsRx LLC