It is known to implement a combined color printing and MICR printing on one recording medium, for example a paper web. One use case for this is the printing of check forms. The generation of the check form occurs via a color printing device. Magnetically-readable data are then imprinted in the check form by a MICR printing examination volume. In the following the data to be printed on the recording medium by the color printing device are designated as color data and the data to be printed on the recording medium by the MICR printing device are designated as MICR data, wherein MICR stands for “Magnetic Ink Character Recognition”. What are to be understood by a color print are full color prints but also single color prints.
From US RE38,957 E it is known how information printed on a recording medium can be inspected, which information being printed on the recording medium via a color printing device or a MICR printing device. For this respective readers are provided that can read a barcode, that can read optical information or that can read magnetic information.
A printer that is designed such that it can ink charge images on a charge image substrate with both MICR toner and with standard toner is known from U.S. Pat. No. 6,236,816 B1. In order to achieve this goal, two developer stations are provided, one filled with MICR toner and one with standard toner. One of the two developer stations can optionally be used to develop the charge images on the charge image substrate.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,010,242 B2 describes a printing system made up of two printing devices between which is arranged one transfer unit for the recording medium. The printing devices can print images on the recording medium in different ways. For example, the first printing device can print images inked with MICR toner onto the recording medium and the second printing device can print images inked with standard toner. The printing devices are designed identically and can be swapped.
One problem in the sequential printing of a recording medium (for example of paper) with different printing devices is frequently that the one printing device (for example a color printing device) can print the recording medium with higher speed than the other printing device (for example an MICR printing device). For example, if a high-capacity inkjet printer is used as a color printing device for web-shaped recording media (what is known as continuous feed printing), this can print the recording medium in full color (for example CMYK) at up to 2.5 m/s. A comparable print speed is normally not achieved by an electrographic MICR printing device. Given a printing system made of a combination of such a color printing device and MICR printing device, the print speed of the printing system is then determined by the slower MICR printing device.
It is an object to specify a method and a printing system with which MICR printing and color printing can be combined on one (in particular web-shaped) recording medium without the print speed of the color printing device having to be adapted to that of the MICR printing device.
In a method or system for printing a recording medium with color data and MICR data, a color printing device and at least one MICR printing device are arranged independent and separate from one another. The color printing device prints both the color data and the MICR data in encoded form as code data onto the recording medium. The recording medium is then supplied to the at least one MICR printing device. The MICR data are decoded from the code data, and the MICR data are subsequently printed on the recording medium via the at least one MICR printing device.
For the purposes of promoting an understanding of the principles of the invention, reference will now be made to the preferred embodiments/best mode illustrated in the drawings and specific language will be used to describe the same. It will nevertheless be understood that no limitation of the scope of the invention is thereby intended, and such alterations and further modifications in the illustrated device and such further applications of the principles of the invention as illustrated as would normally occur to one skilled in the art to which the invention relates are included.
The preferred embodiment provides a method for printing a recording medium with color data and MICR data,
The printing devices are operated independently of and separate from one another (thus offline). A special control interface between the printing devices or a synchronization of the printing devices is not required; the recording medium (in particular a paper web) does not need to be continuously transported through both printing devices, but rather can be processed from roll to roll in both printing devices, for example, wherein the color-printed roll generated at the output of the color printing device can be coupled to the MICR printing device as an input roll with an arbitrary time delay for printing with MICR printing material, without a control-related coupling or electronic storage of print data having to occur.
It is advantageous when the code data contain the MICR data and additional information regarding the position of the MICR data on the recording medium. The color printing device can extract the MICR data and their position from the data stream having the color data and the MICR data and encode said MICR data and their position into the code data. For example, the code data can be printed on the recording medium by the color printing device as a 2D barcode.
In order to improve the security in the transmission of the code data, it is advantageous when the code data are supplemented with error correction data (for example Hamming code, Solomon-Reed).
The code data can be read by a reader arranged before the respective MICR printing device and be decoded in the MICR printing device. However, the code data can also be read by a reader arranged outside of the respective MICR printing device and be decoded outside of the MICR printing device, and then can be supplied to the MICR printing device as MICR data together with the position information.
An advantageous use case for the preferred embodiment exists when, for example, check forms are printed on the recording medium by the color printing device. Then it is advantageous when the code data are printed on the recording medium outside of the region for the check forms by the color printing device, for example as barcodes. If the barcodes with the code data associated with a check form are respectively arranged adjacent to the associated check form, the check form is not disruptively affected (to an observer, for example) by the barcode. The barcode can additionally be printed so far into the outer region of one check side that this can be truncated in the course of a subsequent processing of the printed pages of the recording medium, and thus is no longer present on the finished check delivered to the respective recipient.
The code data of multiple check forms can be comprised in the barcode. The color printing device can then print the barcode on the recording medium between the associated check forms.
An advantageous workflow of the method exists when
The aforementioned problem is also solved via a printing system for printing a recording medium with color data and MICR data,
And in particular, an optical camera with corresponding evaluation unit that is arranged before the associated MICR printing device can be used as a reader. The code data read by the reader can be decoded via the evaluation unit, for example via a controller (host system) arranged outside of the MICR printing device or via the print controller present in the MICR printing device (which print controller then has to be correspondingly expanded).
The advantages of the preferred embodiments in particular lie in the high performance of the printing system that can be adapted to the respective application case via combination of the color printing device with a selectable number of MICR printing devices. The color printing device can then be operated with maximum speed and utilization, just like the MICR printing device or devices. The offline operation additionally enables a simple implementation capability since the synchronization between the printing devices is omitted and no interface is required.
The color printing device F-DR and the MICR printing devices M-DR are arranged so as to be mechanically and electrically separate from one another and are operated offline. That means that the printed recording medium 1 must first be supplied to the MICR printing devices M-DR after the color printing device F-DR since no connecting unit for the recording medium 1 is provided between color printing device F-DR and MICR printing devices M-DR.
The color printing device F-DR can be realized as a full color printing device and have multiple printing groups 2, 3. For example, one printing group 2 can be provided for the front side of a recording medium 1 (for example a paper web) and one printing group 3 can be provided for the back side. The recording medium 1 is unwound by an unrolling unit 4 with a reservoir roller 5 and supplied to the printing groups 2, 3 of the color printing device F-DR. A rolling unit 6 that collects the recording medium 1 printed with color data on a winding roller 7 is arranged at the output of the printing groups 2, 3. The rolling unit 6 is subsequently supplied to the MICR printing devices M-DR, for example transported to the MICR printing devices that print the recording medium 1 with the MICR data. The recording medium I is supplied from the rolling unit 6 to the MICR printing devices M-DR, printed with MICR data and subsequently fed to an additional rolling unit 8. The recording medium 1 printed with color data and MICR data can be additionally treated in a known manner by devices for post-processing, for example in a cutting device, in a folding device or even in an envelope device (not shown in
The color printing device F-DR filters the color data and the MICR data from the data stream, which data stream has been supplied in a known manner from a printer control unit to the color printing device F-DR. The data to be printed and the position at which the data are to be printed are yielded by these color data and MICR data. The color data are printed by the color printing device F-DR on the recording medium 1 in a known manner; refer in this regard to U.S. Pat. No. 6,236,816 B1 or US RE38,957 E. The MICR data contain the data to be printed by an MICR printing device M-DR and the position at which the MICR data are to be printed on the recording medium 1. These MICR data are now encoded by the color printing device F-DR as code data, for example in a bar code that then contains the MICR data and the position at which the MICR data should be printed on the recording medium 1. The code data (for example a 2D barcode) are printed by the color printing device F-DR on the recording medium 1, appropriately in a region in which the code data are not disruptive (for example no color data should be printed). The recording medium 1 with color print and code data is removed from the color printing device F-DR and is subsequently supplied to an MICR printing device M-DR. This is shown in principle in
In all exemplary embodiments of
According to
According to
The reader 13 and the controller 16 or the host system 14 can be designed corresponding to US RE38,957 E; this is referenced.
Of the MICR printing device M-DR in
The preferred embodiment has in particular been described in the example of the printing of an recording medium 1 with check forms 9 and MICR data. However, the preferred embodiment is not limited to this. The preferred can be used anywhere that color data and MICR data should be printed on a recording medium 1.
Although in the drawings and in the foregoing description preferred exemplary embodiments have been indicated and described in detail, these are to be understood as purely exemplary, and not as limiting the present invention. It is to be noted that only the preferred exemplary embodiments have been presented and described, and that all modifications and changes lying within the scope of protection of the present invention, currently and in the future, are intended to be protected.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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10 2008 032 988.6 | Jul 2008 | DE | national |