Image forming apparatus, image forming system and computer program of the same

Abstract

There is described an image forming apparatus, which makes it possible to form a lining cover sheet image at an appropriate position of the lining cover sheet, irrespective of change of the lining cover sheet width. The apparatus includes a lining cover-sheet width acquiring section to acquire a lining cover-sheet width; a cover-sheet image data acquiring section to acquire various cover-sheet image data sets; a cover-sheet image data arranging section to arrange the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data in such a manner that they are arranged at an interval of the lining cover-sheet width, and to arrange the lining cover-sheet image data in such a manner that a lining image center line coincides with a cover sheet center line, in its width direction; and an image forming section to form the total cover sheet image, based on the arranged image data.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Embodiments will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to the accompanying drawings which are meant to be exemplary, not limiting, and wherein like elements are numbered alike in several Figures, in which:

FIG. 1 shows a block diagram of an image forming system embodied in the present invention;

FIG. 2 shows an explanatory drawing for explaining a booklet formed through a case binding process;

FIG. 3 shows an example of an image forming operation when forming images onto one side surface of a cover sheet;

FIG. 4 shows an example of another image forming operation when forming images onto one side surface of a cover sheet;

FIG. 5 shows a flowchart of a cover sheet image formation processing embodied in the present invention; and

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of a total cover-sheet image data synthetic processing to be conducted in Step S3 shown in FIG. 5.

Claims

1. An image forming apparatus, comprising: a lining cover-sheet width acquiring section to acquire information with respect to a lining cover-sheet width;a cover-sheet image data acquiring section to acquire front cover-sheet image data, rear cover-sheet image data and lining cover-sheet image data;a cover-sheet image data arranging section to arrange the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data, acquired by the cover-sheet image data acquiring section, in such a manner that a front cover sheet image and a rear cover sheet image are arranged at an interval of the lining cover-sheet width, acquired by the lining cover-sheet width acquiring section, and to arrange the lining cover-sheet image data, acquired by the cover-sheet image data acquiring section, in such a manner that a lining image center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a lining cover sheet image in its width direction, coincides with a cover sheet center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, in its width direction; andan image forming section to form the total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, onto a recording medium, based on the front cover-sheet image data, the rear cover-sheet image data and the lining cover-sheet image data, which are arranged by the cover-sheet image data arranging section.

2. The image forming apparatus of claim 1, further comprising; a lining image data processing section to apply a predetermined processing to the lining cover-sheet image data;wherein the cover-sheet image data arranging section arranges the lining cover-sheet image data processed by the lining image data processing section.

3. The image forming apparatus of claim 2, further comprising; an overlapping area extracting section to extract overlapping areas on which the lining cover-sheet image data overlaps with the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data, arranged by the cover-sheet image data arranging section;wherein the lining image data processing section applies the predetermined processing to a part of the lining cover-sheet image data corresponding to the overlapping areas.

4. The image forming apparatus of claim 3, wherein the predetermined processing is to make the part of the lining cover-sheet image data corresponding to the overlapping areas invalid.

5. The image forming apparatus of claim 3, wherein the predetermined processing is to conduct a OR-logical calculation between the part of the lining cover-sheet image data and both a part of the front cover-sheet image data and a part of the rear cover-sheet image data, which correspond to the overlapping areas.

6. The image forming apparatus of claim 2, wherein the predetermined processing is to extract specific lining image data, corresponding to the lining cover-sheet width, from the lining cover-sheet image data.

7. The image forming apparatus of claim 1, wherein a data size of the lining cover-sheet image data are same as those of the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data.

8. An image forming system, comprising: an image forming apparatus that includes: a lining cover-sheet width acquiring section to acquire information with respect to a lining cover-sheet width; a cover-sheet image data acquiring section to acquire front cover-sheet image data, rear cover-sheet image data and lining cover-sheet image data; a cover-sheet image data arranging section to arrange the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data, acquired by the cover-sheet image data acquiring section, in such a manner that a front cover sheet image and a rear cover sheet image are arranged at an interval of the lining cover-sheet width, acquired by the lining cover-sheet width acquiring section, and to arrange the lining cover-sheet image data, acquired by the cover-sheet image data acquiring section, in such a manner that a lining image center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a lining cover sheet image in its width direction, coincides with a cover sheet center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, in its width direction; and an image forming section to form the total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, onto a recording medium, based on the front cover-sheet image data, the rear cover-sheet image data and the lining cover-sheet image data, which are arranged by the cover-sheet image data arranging section; anda book binding apparatus that joins the recording medium, on which the total cover sheet image is formed by the image forming apparatus, to a bunch of paper sheets, in such a manner that the bunch of paper sheets is enveloped by the recording medium while one side, upper and lower sides of the bunch of paper sheets are made to be open.

9. The image forming system of claim 8, wherein the book binding apparatus joins the recording medium to the bunch of paper sheets by adhering them to each other with adhesive material.

10. A product for storing a computer program, the computer program comprising: a lining cover-sheet width acquiring step for acquiring information with respect to a lining cover-sheet width;a cover-sheet image data acquiring step for acquiring front cover-sheet image data, rear cover-sheet image data and lining cover-sheet image data;a cover-sheet image data arranging step for arranging the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data, acquired in the cover-sheet image data acquiring step, in such a manner that a front cover sheet image and a rear cover sheet image are arranged at an interval of the lining cover-sheet width, acquired in the lining cover-sheet width acquiring step, and for arranging the lining cover-sheet image data, acquired in the cover-sheet image data acquiring step, in such a manner that a lining image center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a lining cover sheet image in its width direction, coincides with a cover sheet center line, indicating a center position of an image area of a total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, in its width direction; andan image forming step for forming the total cover sheet image, including the front cover sheet image, the rear cover sheet image and the lining cover sheet image, onto a recording medium, based on the front cover-sheet image data, the rear cover-sheet image data and the lining cover-sheet image data, which are arranged in the cover-sheet image data arranging step.

11. The product of claim 10, the computer program further comprising; a lining image data processing step for applying a predetermined processing to the lining cover-sheet image data;wherein the lining cover-sheet image data, processed in the lining image data processing step, are arranged in the cover-sheet image data arranging step.

12. The product of claim 11, the computer program further comprising; an overlapping area extracting step for extracting overlapping areas on which the lining cover-sheet image data overlaps with the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data, arranged in the cover-sheet image data arranging step;wherein the predetermined processing is applied to a part of the lining cover-sheet image data corresponding to the overlapping areas in the lining image data processing step.

13. The product of claim 12, wherein the predetermined processing is to make the part of the lining cover-sheet image data corresponding to the overlapping areas invalid.

14. The product of claim 12, wherein the predetermined processing is to conduct a OR-logical calculation between the part of the lining cover-sheet image data and both a part of the front cover-sheet image data and a part of the rear cover-sheet image data, which correspond to the overlapping areas.

15. The product of claim 11, wherein the predetermined processing is to extract specific lining image data, corresponding to the lining cover-sheet width, from the lining cover-sheet image data.

16. The product of claim 10, wherein a data size of the lining cover-sheet image data are same as those of the front cover-sheet image data and the rear cover-sheet image data.