Method and apparatus for inserting tabs in a print job

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention pertains in general to electrophotographic printing systems and, more particularly, to a system for automatically printing tabs on selected sheets in a document.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In order to generate and print a document on an electrophotographic marking engine, it is first required to create a print job with an application program that generates and assembles defined pages into a single print job. This print job is then converted into a printer control language to provide file script that can be interpreted by a destination printer in order to generate rasterized data in a RIP engine. This rasterized data is then transferred to the marking engine associated with the printer and the subsequent transfer to paper stock.

In general, most documents are assembled in the print job such that they can be printed on a common paper stock. Whenever different paper stock is involved, a problem is presented. This is the case with respect to tab sheets wherein the sheet is designed to be the same length and width as a conventional page of the document with the exception of a portion thereof protruding from the side as a tab. The feed mechanism can usually handle the feeding of these tab sheets and even insertion of the tab in the appropriate place along the edge of the document. However, if the printing engine is also to print information on the tab, then there must be an accommodation made for this, due to the fact that the tab is outside of the normal image space for the document. As an example, consider an 8.5×11 sheet of paper that is typically edge fed in the marking engine. The dimension of the image along the feed path is typically equal to the width of the widest document accommodated in the marking engine—8.5 inches. When accommodating a tab sheet, a wider sheet, and thus a longer feed path, must be accommodated. This has been facilitated in the past with the use of a “shift” of the image, such that the original document actually places the tab information within the boundaries of a conventional size document and this is then shifted when the image for that page is actually printed.

When the document is printed, there will typically be provided two paper bins to source paper, one for the conventional paper and one for the tab stock. The tab stock will typically be conventional tab stock that is sequenced in such a manner that each subsequent tab is vertically offset along the right edge of the page. This requires information that is to be placed on a tab be correctly positioned along the edge and also that the correct tab sheet be selected from a tab sheet containing bin. Once this operation is synchronized, then the tab information will be placed on the correct position on the appropriate tab stock.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention disclosed and claimed herein, in one aspect thereof, comprises a method for inserting tab sheets in a print job. First, a position is selected within a document to insert a tab sheet, which document is comprised of a plurality of sheets each with a document defined image space associated therewith. A tab sheet is then created as a rasterized tab sheet image that has a rasterized tab specific image disposed in a predetermined location on the rasterized image. The created tab image is then inserted in the document after rasterizing thereof in the selected position.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

For a more complete understanding of the present invention and the advantages thereof, reference is now made to the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying Drawings in which:

FIG. 1 illustrates a marking engine and the associated network for effecting the generation and output of a print job;

FIG. 2 illustrates a diagrammatic view of insertion of tab sheets into a document;

FIG. 3 illustrates a conventional tab;

FIG. 4 illustrates the operation of printing information on the various sheets with one tab sheet the sequence;

FIG. 5 illustrates the shifting operation;

FIG. 6A and FIG. 6B illustrate a side view of a stack of tab paper stock;

FIG. 7 illustrates a diagrammatic view of the overall process;

FIG. 8 illustrates a diagrammatic view of inserting tabs into a document after RIPing;

FIG. 9 illustrates a diagrammatic view of a RIP job that contains RIPed pages that occupy the conventional space of a sheet;

FIG. 10 illustrates an operation of the auto detect feature for detecting the tab information;

FIG. 11 illustrates a diagrammatic view for positioning the tab information in the sheet for the auto detect operation;

FIG. 12 illustrates a screen shot for the initiation of the tab operation;

FIG. 13 illustrates a flowchart depicting the operation of inserting tab pages;

FIG. 14 illustrates a flowchart for converting to tab pages;

FIG. 15 illustrates a flowchart for the insert tab dialog;

FIG. 16 illustrates a screen shot for the tab insert dialog box;

FIG. 17 illustrates a screen shot for the advanced tab label settings;

FIG. 18 illustrates a screen shot for the insert tab dialog box for the bank position page;

FIG. 19 illustrates a chart showing the difference between locked and lock/reset tabs;

FIG. 20 illustrates a flowchart for the operation of generating the pages and extracting the appropriate tab stock for the appropriate tab position;

FIG. 21 illustrates a screen shot for the job tab properties; and

FIG. 22 illustrates a configuration panel for the template configuration.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

Referring now to FIG. 1, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of an overall printing system for printing tabs. At least one printer 102 is provided which includes a marking engine. The marking engine is an electrophotographic marking engine that is operable to receive a bit-map image, create a latent image of toner particles and transfer that latent image to a substrate such as paper. Once transferred to the paper, the paper is passed through a fuser to fix the toner onto the paper and then output it to a plurality of output bins 104. The paper to which the toner is transferred is provided in a plurality of paper bins 106. In the disclosed embodiment, the printer 102 is a network printer that is operable to receive the print image information via a network mesh 108. The network mesh 108 is interfaced with the plurality of workstations 110, each of which can access the printer 102 for the purpose of forwarding a print job thereto. The information that is transferred to the printer 102 can be in the form of a bit-mapped image or the information could be assembled into a script in printer control language. If the job is forwarded in a printer control language, then the printer 102 must process this information to generate the bit-mapped image with the use of a rasterized image processor (RIP) which then is utilized by the marking engine internal to the printer 102 for the purpose of generating the image. In the disclosed embodiment, the workstations 110 are operable to transfer bit-mapped images, although it should be understood that any type of information regarding a print job could be transferred to the marking engine with the processing either distributed to the workstations 110 or contained within the printer 102 or any combination thereof.

In the present embodiment, a job is typically comprised of a plurality of pages which are designed to have tab pages inserted at predetermined locations therein. When printing the job, the individual non-tab pages and tab pages are printed, such that the document is printed in the original sequence of the pages in the document. However, it is difficult to assemble the paper into a single paper bin with the tabs disposed at the appropriate locations such that all of the source substrate material could be extracted from a single bin. Therefore, tab stock is disposed in separate bins and the printer 102 controlled to pull a tab page when it appears in the document sequence. When the tab page is extracted, the tab information can then be printed onto the body of the tab page or onto the tab itself, as will be disclosed hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 2, there is illustrated one embodiment for extracting pages out of the paper bins 106. In this embodiment, there is provided a regular paper bin 202 that contains regular paper stock. This is conventional stock that would be 8½×11, 8½×14 (referred to as legal paper) or A4 paper (the type utilized by European and Japanese countries). For the regular pages in the job, paper will be pulled from this paper bin 202. Whenever a tab is required, one of the other bins 106 must be utilized to extract and insert tab stock.

Typically, tab stock is comprised of a plurality of sheets that are arranged such that the tabs are equally offset along the vertical edge. For example, if the stock were a 3-tab stock, this would mean that the first sheet of the tab stock would have the tab in the upper right corner, the second sheet therein would have the tab in the center and the third would have the tab in the lower right corner, all of the tabs being disposed on the right vertical edge. In one form, tab stock can be purchased such that it is stacked in an order from top right to bottom right for the first three pages, top right to bottom right for the pages 4-6, and so on. However, the tab stock could be arranged such that one bin 106 could have just the upper right corner tab stock, the second bin having all stock associated with the middle tab and the third bin having tab stock associated with the lower right corner tab. This is the embodiment illustrated in FIG. 2.

With further reference to FIG. 2, there are provided three tab bins 204, 206 and 208, tab bin 204 containing all the same tab stock for the upper right tab stock, bin 206 containing all of the same tab stock for the middle tab and bin 208 containing all of the tab stock for the lower right tab. This is an embodiment associated with a 3-tab stock, it being understood that other print jobs could require, for example, 5-tab stock.

During processing of the job, tabs must be inserted at particular locations. In the job illustrated in FIG. 2, the first sheet is a tab sheet 210 which utilizes the first sheet of the tab stock extracted from bin 204. This is followed by N sheets of regular paper from the paper bin 202 for pages P1 through PN, this being a section 212 of N sheets of regular paper. At the end of the N sheets of regular paper, there is inserted a second tab sheet 214 extracted from bin 206. This is followed by M pages of regular paper stock, extracted from bin 202, indicated by reference numeral 216. At the end of the M sheets of paper, a third tab 218 is inserted from tab bin 208. This is then followed by regular sheets of paper from paper bin 202, and then more tabs inserted, if necessary. In the configuration illustrated in FIG. 2, the tabs are inserted sequentially from tab bin 204 through 208 and then it cycles back again to tab bin 204. This is a conventional organization. However, it should be understood that the tabs could be extracted from the tab bins 204-208 in any order, depending upon the definition of the print job.

As an alternate embodiment illustrated in FIG. 2, there is provided a common tab bin 220 that replaces the tab bins 204-208. In some printing systems, it is impractical to provide enough bins all configurations of tab stock, it being understood that some stock can require upwards of 10 or 20 tabs along a vertical edge, thus requiring 10 or 20 tab bins. Therefore, a single common tab bin 220 is provided wherein the stock is pre-organized, i.e., the first sheet will be the uppermost right tab, the next sheet the next right lowermost tab, the third tab sheet the next sequential lowermost tab, and so on. In this embodiment, a first tab sheet 222 corresponding to the upper rightmost tab in the 3-tab stock will be extracted for tab sheet 210, a second tab sheet 224 extracted from tab bin 220 for the middle tab as tab sheet 214 and a third tab sheet 226 will be next extracted from tab bin 220 corresponding to the lower rightmost tab in the 3-tab stock as a tab sheet 218. It is noted that the tabs are organized such that the tab is always pulled off of the top of the stack and, thus, the tabs must be organized in that manner.

It is noted that in some situations a reverse order exists wherein the tabs are pulled off of the bottom due to the operation of the marking engine and, they must be so organized or the software must accommodate such, as will be described in more detail hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 3, there is illustrated a diagram of a conventional sheet of tab stock 302. The tab stock has an upper edge 304, a left edge 306, a lowermost edge 308 along a vertical right edge 310. The length of the tab stock is defined by the dimension of the left edge 306 and right edge 310 and the width is the dimension of the lower edge 308, not including the dimension of a tab section 312 that protrudes from the right edge 310. This tab can be disposed at any position along the right edge 310 and has a predetermined dimension and shape. This shape can either be beveled or rectangular and it can be any dimension. Typically, the width will be defined by the number of tabs. However, it is noted that the length of the left edge and the width associated with the lower edge 308 or the upper edge 304 absent the tab dimension 312 will be the dimension of conventional stock. The tab 312 increases the width of the stock for the purpose of printing the image, for the reason that most marking engines will not accommodate a wider stock for the purpose of forming an image on the tab 312.

Referring now to FIG. 4, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of the image-forming mechanism wherein a latent image is transferred to paper stock. In this embodiment, the paper is passed through a transfer roller 402 that is operable to transfer an image onto the substrate or paper stock. The paper is fed in this embodiment such that a tab sheet 404 is passed through the transfer roller with a conventional image area 406 associated therewith. A second sheet 408 is passed through the transfer roller with an image area 410 formed thereon. A third sheet 414 in the sequence is illustrated as being partially passed through the transfer roller such that only a partial image 416 is disposed thereon. Behind the third sheet 414 is a fourth sheet 418 that has no image transferred thereon. It can be seen that the image is, in the conventional printing system, synchronized such that the leading edge of the document, that being the leftmost edge 306 of the tab stock, will be passed through the transfer roller initially. Since the synchronization typically requires the image to be initiated at the leading edge (the left vertical edge), and then terminated at the right vertical edge, such that printing of an image on a tab sheet will be terminated prior to actually printing information on the tab. However, as illustrated in an expanded view of a tab 422, it is desired that a tab image 424 be disposed on the tab 422 which is outside of the boundaries of a conventional image for the stock.

Referring now to FIG. 5, there is illustrated an embodiment of shifting the image to dispose a portion of the normal image area over the tab. The conventional operation would result in a tab 502 on a tab sheet 504 having an image area 506 disposed thereon such that it did not overlap the tab area 502. A delay is disposed in the transfer process such that the leading edge of the image area is delayed from the leading edge of the tab stock by a distance equal to the width of the tab 502. This results in a delayed image area 508 being formed on the tab sheet 504. This allows the image area to be disposed over the tab 502 and information then printed thereon.

Referring now to FIGS. 6A and 6B, there is illustrated a perspective view and side view of a stack of tab stock that will be disposed in the tab bin 220, by way of example. This is a 5-tab stock. It can be seen that tabs are oriented such that, from the side view of FIG. 6B, the edges of the tabs are disposed with the upper rightmost tab on the top, this being a tab sheet 602 with a tab 604, the second and next lower tab sheet being disposed thereunder with a tab 606, the next sheet with a next lower tab 608 being disposed thereunder, the next tab sheet disposed thereunder with a next lower tab 610 and the last sheet in the set having a tab 612 which is the lowermost right tab. The next set is arranged in the same manner with the upper rightmost tab down through the lower rightmost tab. FIG. 16 illustrates three sets of these tabs. Of course, there could be more than 5 tabs in a set. Each set is referred to as a “bank.”

Referring now to FIG. 7, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of a printer control and distribution system for receiving a print job, converting it to a RIP job and then distributing the RIPed pages to one or more marking engines. The embodiment of FIG. 7 is generally illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 5,859,711, issued Jan. 12, 1999 and assigned to the present assignee, which U.S. Patent is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. A personal computer 702 is provided that is operable to generate one or more jobs in a conventional printer control language. This is transferred to a rasterized image processor referred to as a RIP engine 704 that is operable to convert the printer control language into a bit-mapped image and store each of the pages in the bit-mapped format in a memory 706. During the RIP operation, the job is parsed into pages. Thereafter, the system is operable to operate on post-RIPed pages. These RIPed pages, which include tab pages, are extracted from the memory 706 in the order they exist within the job and distributed to one or more marking engines 710 with a page distributor 712. The page distributor 712 interfaces with the marking engine through a print adapter 714, such that the distributor 712 can pass RIPed pages to the various marking engines 710, it being understood that only one marking engine is required for a given print job, but multiple marking engines could be utilized, depending upon the configuration. The job distributor 712 is under control of a print station manager 718 which is operable to define how the pages are distributed. Further, the print station manager 718 is operable to actually generate tab pages and insert them into the document that is stored in the memory 706, as will be described hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 8, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view for inserting tabs into a job. Although most jobs will typically have tabs defined therein at specific locations, it may be that an additional tab is required. In this embodiment, there are no existing tabs and the new tab is to be inserted within the RIPed job.

A first RIPed job is defined having a plurality of RIPed pages R1 through R8 and so on. These can be defined as RIPed pages. The user can view these RIPed pages as a navigation tree of page numbers or as thumbnails of the pages. A decision can then be made to insert various tabs at desired locations within the RIPed job itself. For example, a first tab 802 is desired to be disposed before page R1 in the original RIPed job. A second tab 804 is desired to be disposed between RIPed pages R4 and R5 in the original job and a third tab page 806 is desired to be disposed between the pages R7 and R8 in the original RIPed job. These tab pages 802, 804 and 806 can be selected such that the tabs are positionally sequential, i.e., upper rightmost, middle and lower rightmost in a 3-tab set, or each of the tab sheets 802, 804, and 806 could be selected at any position, as will be described hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 9, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of a RIPed job that contains RIPed pages that occupy the conventional space of a sheet. It should be understood that a “sheet” is defined as a sheet with conventional boundaries, i.e., an 8½×11 sheet would have the image disposed within the boundaries of an 8½×11 sheet, an 8½×14 sheet would have the image disposed within the boundaries thereof, etc. It should also be understood that any job could have different size sheets disposed therein with the image defined within the boundaries of that sheet. With respect to the RIPed job illustrated in FIG. 9, there are provided a plurality of RIPed pages wherein some of the RIPed pages have a subscript “T” that defines that RIPed page as a tab page. However, upon generation of the RIPed page, all of the image space is disposed within the boundaries of the source sheet that will be the tab sheet, i.e., it will not take into account the extra width of the tab. Therefore, there must be some type of conversion to place the image that is originally disposed in the image area of a conventional sheet within the tab area. In the disclosed embodiment, the system will recognize this RIPed page as a tab sheet and then will take the appropriate actions.

In the RIPed job of FIG. 9, there are illustrated nine RIPed pages in a sequence that continues past that number of sheets with three sheets designated as tab sheets, R1_T, R5_Tand R9_T, it being noted that additional pages and additional tab sheets could be contained within the job. Each of these tab sheets indicates information contained within the conventional image area that should be placed onto the tab. This could be placed in such a manner that all that is required is an image shift, i.e., the information is placed at the right location in the RIPed page. Therefore, the RIPed page R1_Twill be converted to provide for an image on the tab area on a tab sheet 902 labeled R1′_T, the originally RIPed sheet R5_Tconverted to a tab sheet R5′_Tto provide for an image on the tab area associated therewith on a sheet 904 and the tab sheet R9_Tconverted to a tab sheet 906 labeled R9′_Tto provide for an image on the tab area associated therewith. The tab sheets 902-906 are illustrated with sequential tabs in a 3-tab set. Again, this can be a simple shift or information within the original area of the tab sheets R1_T, R5_Tand R9_Tcould be utilized to effectuate the generation of tab information to be placed on the tab of appropriate sheet.

Referring now to FIG. 10, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of the detect operation for detecting if tab related information is disposed on the RIPed page that defines both the location of the tab and the information that is to be disposed on the tab. To facilitate this, a predetermined area of the sheet is defined as being associated with tab information. In this disclosed embodiment, this area is a portion of the right side margin of the RIPed page, within the normal image area. This is illustrated as a RIPed sheet 1002 that has associated therewith a region 1004. In this region, data can be disposed in such a manner that it contains a RIPed image that is to be disposed on a tab. In a first disclosed embodiment, it can be disposed in an area that is associated with the tab stock and correlates to the intended tab position along the right edge. For example, if 3-tab stock is accommodated, this is known to the user. When detecting image data for a tab, the region 1004 is divided into three regions 1006, 1008 and 1010 associated with the three tab positions. The image can then be predefined by the user at the job creation step to be in a predetermined position such that the image will then be converted from the region 1006 to the actual tab region on an output tab sheet 1012 at a tab 1014, associated with the region 1006, for example. In this mode, the auto detect merely detects the presence of a RIPed or bit-mapped image in the region 1006 and then utilizes a shift operation to cause it to be shifted to the tab, this operation always forcing the tab to be in the same associated position. Of course, as will be described hereinbelow, once the image is defined, this image can actually be shifted to different positions, depending upon the software or the application. This will be the case in the event that a tab were inserted or a particular tab that was auto detected were to be inserted in a different position, as will be described hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 11, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view illustrating an alternate embodiment wherein the sheet 1002 with the region 1004 has information associated therewith for only the tab image. The region 1004 could have the tab image disposed anywhere in the region and this tab image is then disposed in a location defined by the automatic tab insertion operation, such that the image can be placed in the appropriate location for the sequence of tabs defined in a creation step. In this example, the image is disposed in the upper right hand corner of the region 1004 defined by an image “XX” that can be disposed on a tab sheet 1104 in an upper rightmost position tab 1106 or it could be disposed on a tab sheet 1108 in a center most position tab 1110.

The detect operation can be effected with a number of procedures. In a first embodiment, the detect region has disposed therein bit-mapped information that is extracted. This bit-mapped pattern comprises exactly what information is to be disposed on the tab. It is an image that is extracted from the RIPed image and placed onto an area associated with the tab. It is noted that this image can then be shifted to a different tab position or otherwise manipulated. Further, in this embodiment, the simplest operation is to merely copy the bit-mapped image to the tab area. However, the image could be manipulated by rotating the image and even resizing the image.

In a second embodiment, information is placed in the region 1004 that is extracted from the bit-mapped image and this information provides either content, instructions or both. For example, the information may be a hyperlink to other information such as an image or a predefined configuration that opens a dialog box to view the image and the associated content.

Referring now to FIG. 12, there is illustrated a diagrammatic view of a dialog box 1202 that can be opened for the purposes of applying tabs to an already RIPed job. The dialog window 1202 contains a number of regions. The first is a page display region that is operable to either display the first page of the RIPed document or is operable to display thumbnails of each page of the job. A second region 1206 is operable to display a navigation tree which illustrates the various page numbers. This can either be displayed in a sequential order or even in a hierarchical tree structure if desired. A toolbar area 1208 is provided for displaying to the user various icons that allow for control of the operation.

As will be described hereinbelow, the system will allow tab pages to be added to any RIPed job output, wherein the marking engine supports tabs. No preprocessing is required, due to the fact that the tab will actually be generated during the printing process. The operator is allowed to select the tab position for each tab in the job wherein the default operation allows the system to step through a bank of tabs or the default operation can be bypassed and the operator can choose a specific tab position for an individual tab. This latter operation is useful in creating a multi-chapter job with tabs in each chapter wherein the tab location for the chapter is at a specified location. Text is automatically placed on a tab position in a pre-defined position or it can be repositioned. Further, images or text can be placed within the 8½×11 image area (or other image area of a conventional page) of the page associated with the tab.

Referring now to FIG. 13, there is illustrated a flowchart depicting how a tab page is inserted into a RIPed job. The program is initiated at a block 1302 and then proceeds to a function block 1304 wherein the view is selected in the region 1204, this being the thumbnail view or a view of the first sheet. This first sheet is selected upon selection of the Insert Tab Pages function. The program proceeds to a function block 1306 to select the page on the navigation tree in region 1206 proximate to the region that a tab is to be inserted, this operation requiring that a tab be inserted before or after the selected page. The page on the navigation tree is “right-clicked” with a mouse to pop up a window that provides two choices, “before” and “after.” This is selected by the user, as indicated by function block 1308. This allows the tab page to be inserted before the selected page or after the selected page. This will then display a tab page, as indicated in FIG. 12 in area 1204. In this embodiment, the tab is inserted between page 2 and page 4 of the original document. Initially, there is no information disposed in the textual portion of the tab. In order to create this information, the user is forwarded to an Insert Tab routine as indicated by a sub-routine block 1310. This will be described hereinbelow.

Referring now to FIG. 14, there is illustrated a flowchart depicting the operation of converting a page to a tab page. This is the operation wherein an already RIPed page has information disposed therein that is to be disposed on a tab or, alternatively, the page itself is to be printed onto tab stock and a tab label must be created. The program is initiated at a function block 1402 and then proceeds to a function block 1404 to select the page that is to be converted. The program then proceeds to a decision block 1406 to perform a tab data detection operation to determine if tab data exists within the detect region of the page which then can be utilized to determine if information is in the tab region 1004. If so, the program flows to a function block 1408 to convert this image to a tab image as a tab label. The program will then proceed to a decision block 1410 after either conversion or indication that tab data was not detected. At this decision block 1410, a determination can be made as to whether to create an entirely new label by flowing along a “Y” path or to accept the already existing label that was detected. Of course, if no label exists, then the program must flow along the “Y” path. If it flows along the “Y” path, it flows to a subroutine block 1412 to go to the Insert Tab subroutine. If the tab has been automatically detected and converted in function block 1408 and it is not desired to change that tab, the program will flow along the “N” path to a block 1418 to perform the automatic operation and utilize that tab and determine the position for that tab. Although not illustrated, there is an automatic operation wherein the system performs an auto detect on each RIPed page to determine if, first, it is a tab page and, second, if it has tab data associated therewith. In this operation, the program will automatically go from block 1402 to bock 1406 and then it will automatically flow from decision block 1410 along the “N” path to the block 1418. This will then auto detect all pages in the document and create the appropriate tabs.

Referring now to FIG. 15, there is illustrated a flowchart for the Insert Tab dialog operation. This is initiated at a block 1502 and then proceeds to a function block 1506 wherein the user is allowed the option to create the label that is disposed on the tab. This will provide to the user the ability to access the settings for the tab label, such as the label type (text, picture, file, none), font specifications (typeface, style, and size), single or multi-line layout, etc. After the label is created, the user can select an advanced option, as indicated by a decision block 1508. If the advanced settings are selected, the program will flow to a function block 1510 to basically set up advanced label settings. If the advanced option is not selected or after the advanced label settings have been accessed, the program will flow to a function block 1512 to select the Bank Position option which allows the user access to settings for the bank of tabs, such as the bank size (number of tabs in the bank), sequencing (e.g., lock a tab position so that all tabs in the session will print at a particular tab position), etc. After all the options in the Tab Insert dialog have been accessed, the program will flow to a Return block 1516.

Referring now to FIG. 16, there is illustrated a screen shot 1602 for the Insert Tab dialog operation. The screen shot illustrates the portion thereof associated with the label, which is accessed by selecting an upper tab 1604 in the screen shot designated as “label.” This has associated therewith two fields 1606 and 1608 for line one and line two of the label, each having font select buttons 1610 and 1612. Therefore, two lines of text can be placed on the label in this embodiment, although it should be understand that any amount of information or type of information could be placed on the label.

A check box 1614 is provided if the user desires the text that is in the field 1606 and 1608 to be displayed on the tab. An optional field 1618 is provided for inserting a picture or image on the tab. There are two check boxes 1620 and 1622 for allowing the white areas of the picture to be transparent and also to allow for removal of the picture, respectively. An area 1624 illustrates the tab and the appearance thereof. An advanced button 1626 allows access to the advance features. Table 1 illustrates the functions of each of the above noted fields.

TABLE 1Field/ControlDescriptionTab LabelLine 1: Type text for line one of the label.Line 2: Type text for line two of the label (optional).FontClick font . . . button to change the typeface, style,and size.Show Text on TabCheck this box if you want the label text toappear on the tab.Picture FileClick . . . button to browse and select a bitmap(Optional)in one of the following supported formats:tif, gif, png, jpg, bmp.TransparentCheck this box to set the white areas of thepicture file to transparent.Remove PictureCheck this box to remove a picture file you nolonger want to use.Advanced . . .Click this button to access advanced labelsettings (covered in the following section).

Referring now to FIG. 17, there is illustrated a screen shot for the advance function which is selected via the button 1626, this display being designated with a reference terminal 1702. This display provides three fields 1704 which provide information relating to the text, the text orientation, the text vertical alignment and the text horizontal alignment. Radial buttons are provided for each of these to provide various choices. For the text orientation, the choices are normal, i.e., text bottom is adjacent to the page, flipped, i.e., text top is adjacent to the page, and portrait, i.e., text is perpendicular to the page. The vertical alignment of the text provides for left, center, right and absolute positions. For text horizontal alignment, the horizontal position of the text of the tab is provided as left, center, right or absolute position. A second region provides three field selections 1706 for the picture. This provides for picture rotation, picture vertical alignment and picture horizontal alignment. Radial buttons are provided in each of these fields for choices therein. For picture rotation, there is provided a selection for “none” wherein no rotation is selected, “90” for rotating the image 90°, “180” for rotating the image 180° and “270” for rotating the image 270°. The picture vertical alignment field allows for vertical positioning of the picture on the tab between left, center, right and absolute position. For the picture horizontal field, the horizontal position of the picture is set to left, center, right or absolute position. A third region provides a single field 1708 for the tab style. A radial selection button provides for beveled or not beveled, depending on the type of tab stock that is being utilized. This is illustrated in a picture region 1710 on the screen shot 1702. The functions in the advance display screen shot 1702 are illustrated in Table 2.

TABLE 2Field/ControlDescriptionText OrientationNormal - text bottom is adjacent to the pageFlipped - text top is adjacent to the pagePortrait - text is perpendicular to the pageNote: The preview graphic on the dialog updatesdynamically based on user choices.Text VerticalVertical position of the text on the tab (left, center,Alignmentright, absolute position). See note in Text Horizontaldescription.Text HorizontalHorizontal position of the text on the tab (left, center,Alignmentright, absolute position).Note: The exactly at (absolute position) will use theunit of measurement specified on the Job TabProperties dialog accessible via Tab→Settings . . .Picture RotationNone - no rotation 90 - rotates image 90°180 - rotates image 180°270 - rotates image 270°Picture VerticalVertical position of the picture on the tab (left, center,Alignmentright, absolute position). See note in Text Horizontaldescription.Picture HorizontalHorizontal position of the picture on the tab (left,Alignmentcenter, right, absolute position). See note in TextHorizontal description.Tab StyleSelect either Beveled or Not Beveled depending onthe type of tab stock being used.

Referring now to FIG. 18, there is illustrated a screen shot 1802 for the bank position which is selected by selecting an upper tab 1804 on the Insert Tab dialog. This provides three selection fields 1808 for automatic, locked and locked & reset. In automatic, the system can determine the tab position based upon the bank size, the tab number and the reverse order setting. For the locked position, the system locks the current tab page at the specified position. Tabs that follow will assume their position as though the locked tab had been in order, i.e., tab order 1, 2, 4 (locked), 5, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. For the locked & reset function, the system locks the current tab page at the specified position and resets the order of the tabs that follow beginning with the initial tab 1, i.e., tab order 1, 2, 4 (locked), 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 1, 2, etc. There is provided a field 1810 to define the current bank position which is available for both locked, and locked & reset functions, and not for the automatic function. A preview region 1812 displays the current tab page and the next tab page in the job, illustrated by two tab icons 1814 and 1816. The operation of each of the fields is set forth in Table 3.

TABLE 3Field/ControlDescriptionAutomaticLets system determine the tab position based on:Bank Size, Tab Number, and the Reverse Order setting.LockedLocks the current tab page at the specified position(e.g., if you enter 3 in the Tab Position field, this page'stab will always remain at tab position 3). Tabs thatfollow will assume their position as though the lockedtab had been in order.Locked &Locks the current tab page at the specified positionResetand resets the order of the tabs that follow beginningwith tab 1.Current BankThe currently selected tab's location in the tab set.PositionNot available for Automatic.PreviewDisplays the current tab page and the next tab page inthe job (with tab position and status).

Referring now to FIG. 19, there is illustrated a chart for depicting the difference between the locked operation, and locked & reset operation with a set of five banked tabs, locked in position 3. On the left side of the chart in FIG. 19, there is illustrated the locked function and on the right side is illustrated the locked & reset function. In the locked function, there is provided a first depiction area 1902 that provides five bank tabs in an original document, illustrating that the tabs are oriented from 1 though 5 in a sequence. It is desired that Tab 3 be locked at position 1 and then a new tab inserted above that current tab. This will result in a tab 1904 being reassigned the position 1 tab as Tab 1906 in a modified tab orientation set forth in a region 1908. The new inserted tab will result in a Tab 1910 being inserted prior to the Tab 1906. The tab following Tab 1906 will be a Tab 1912 that is identical to the Tab 4 in the original tab orientation in region 1902. The original Tab 5 in the region 1902 will be Tab 1 in the start of the next bank. Therefore, it can be seen that the original Tab 3, Tab 1904 in the original region 1902, remained at tab position 1 but the other tabs maintain their order. As such, what will happen is that the first bank of tabs in the paper bin will be accessed such that Tab 1, Tab 2 and Tab 3 will be accessed for the first three tab sheets and then Tabs 4 and 5 from that bank discarded. Tab 1 from the next bank of sheets in the paper tray will be accessed, Tabs 2, 3 and 4 are discarded and then Tab 5 accessed. Thereafter, they can be accessed in order.

For the locked & reset operation, there is provided an original region 1920 which has a Tab 3, designated by reference numeral 1922 that is locked at position 1 and a new tab inserted thereabove. As such, a tab 1922 at tab position 3 in the original configuration will then constitute a Tab 1924 in a modified region 1926 that will be at tab position 1. A new Tab 1928 will be inserted at tab position 3, the original tab position for region 1920 will now comprise tab position 2 at a Tab 1930 in a modified region 1926 and the tab in tab position 5 in the original configuration will now constitute a Tab 1932 in tab position 3. Therefore, what will happen is that upon initiation of the job, the first three tab sheets in first bank set will be accessed and then Tab 4 and Tab 5 discarded, then Tab 1924, Tab 1, will be selected followed by Tab 2 and Tab 3 and so on.

Referring now to FIG. 20, there is illustrated a flowchart depicting the operation of processing a job with a locked tab. The program is initiated at a block 2002 and then proceeds to a decision block 2004 to determine if the operation is automatic, locked or locked & reset. If it is automatic, the program flows along the “Y” path to a decision 2004 to determine if the current tab is the first tab in the bank. If so, the program flows to a function block 2006 along a “Y” path so that the value of a tab counter within a bank is set to “0.” The program then flows to a function block 2008 to select the next tab or the topmost tab sheet and then to the function block 2010 to increment the counter and then to a return block 2012. However, if the tab sheet were not the first tab in the bank, the program will flow from the decision block 2004 along the “N” path to the function block 2008 to again select the topmost tab.

If the system were in the locked mode and not the locked & reset mode, the program will flow along a path 2014 to a function block 2016 to discard from the previous tab to the locked tab. The program then flows to function block 2018 to select the next tab sheet, which will be that associated with the locked tab value. The program then proceeds to a function block 2020 to increment the counter value and then to the function block 2022 in order to discard all tabs up to the current counter value and then to the function block 2008. This is substantially the operation illustrated in the region 1908 for the modified output.

If the system were determined to be in locked & reset mode, the program will flow from the decision block 2004 along a path 2024 to function block 2026 in order to discard tabs to the locked tab value and then to a function block 2028 in order to reset the counter to the locked tab value and the proceed to the function block 2008 to select the top sheet in the tab bin and then to the function block 2010 to increment the counter. When tab sheets are discarded, they are discarded to a separate output bin for later collection and disposal/reuse.

Referring now to FIG. 21, there is illustrated a screen shot for the Job Tab Properties dialog box 2102. This is selected by highlighting on the navigation tree in the dialog box of FIG. 12 one of the tab sheets and right clicking thereon. This will bring up a dialog box that will allow one to delete the selected tab page or access the properties of that tab sheet. The dialog box 2102 is utilized to set the properties for the tabs at the job level. Further, it can be selected from the tool bar 1208 with the appropriate icon or menu. A field 2104 provides for setting the paper size used in the job, and a check box 2106 allows the user to select the Auto Detect Tab Label feature when converting pages to tabs, as described hereinabove. A print option region 2108 provides three selections 2110 to allow selection of either printing the tabs at the jobs, not printing the tabs at the jobs or printing tabs only. A tab order region 2112 provides two selections 2114 to allow the tab order to be normal or reversed. Normal order is where the tabs are selected from the top of the bin. In this order, the tabs usually start with the first tab in the upper right hand corner and the last tab in a given bank disposed in the lower right corner. However, there are some printing systems that pull from the bottom of the stack, such that the first tab sheet in a bank will be that with a tab in the lower rightmost corner. To accommodate for this in prior art systems, it was necessary to reorder the tabs manually, which is difficult and time consuming. By selecting the reverse order option, the tabs are then numbered beginning with the lower rightmost tab and then proceeding to the upper rightmost tab for a given bank.

A template configuration region 2116 provides the user with the ability to set the various configuration for a tab, such as the type of tab template to use in a field 2118, the label height and width, associated with two fields 2120, the bank size in a field 2122, the top margin, bottom margin and vertical pitch in fields 2124. Each of these described in Table 4. Additionally, there is provided a template configuration panel illustrated in FIG. 22 that sets forth the template configuration panel.

TABLE 4Field/ControlDescriptionPaper SizeSelect the size of paper used for the job.Auto Detect Tab LabelSets auto detection of the tab label positionwhen Convertingwhen you use the Convert to Tab . . . method ofPages to Tabsadding tab pages.Print Tabs with JobPrints the tabs when the job is printed.Do Not Print TabsPrints the job without the tabs.with Job

Although the preferred embodiment has been described in detail, it should be understood that various changes, substitutions and alterations can be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.

Method and apparatus for inserting tabs in a print job

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