JP4388333B2 - Server apparatus, server method, recording medium, printing system, and printing service - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a server device, a server method, and a printing system.

In recent years, there has been a remarkable spread of mobile phones, and browser phones that can browse contents in the Internet using the mobile phones have become widespread. However, since the display screen of a mobile phone is small compared to a PC or the like, only the contents of limited content centered on text information can be grasped.
In view of this, there is a service that enables the content of a content to be grasped on a paper basis by outputting the content of the content from a mobile terminal to a printer or by FAX transmission. In connection with this service, the techniques described in Patent Documents 1 to 5 below are known.
JP 2000-242444 A JP 2001-125982 A Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-057724 JP 2002-182866 A JP 2002-259098 A

However, this service needs to be a browser phone as a terminal, and the page description language of content to be displayed on the browser phone needs to depend on each terminal.
On the other hand, as a means for accessing the Internet using a voice terminal such as a voice telephone terminal, one using a voice browser and a voice dialogue description language has been proposed. In the content server, Internet content is described in a voice interaction description language such as VoiceXML in the content server, and the user can access the Internet via voice by accessing the content via a voice browser.
In the voice browser, the input speech is converted into input text data using speech recognition technology, the content server processes the input text data and the content described in the spoken dialogue description language, and the processed text data is converted into the text data. Then, it is converted into speech using speech synthesis processing or speech coding processing and output.
In addition, in order to access a voice browser from a voice telephone terminal, it is necessary to convert voice into voice data via a voice card or a voice over IP (VoIP) gateway device.
In view of the above background, a server apparatus, a server method, and a content printing system using the server apparatus according to the present invention access contents on the Internet or a LAN using voice input of a voice telephone terminal, and perform desired printing. The purpose is to print a document using a device.

In order to solve the above-described problem, the invention according to claim 1 is directed to an audio terminal device, a content server device, a print server device, and a server device connected to the audio server device via a communication network. Content server interface means storing at least the IP address of the content server apparatus, print server interface means storing the IP address of the print server apparatus, terminal determining means for determining the voice terminal apparatus, description language switching Means and display content generation means, wherein the terminal determination means determines the type of the voice terminal device based on a command input from the voice server device, and the description language switching means is the voice terminal determination means Depending on the type of the voice terminal device determined by The language is switched, the display content generation unit generates display content in the description language switched by the description language switching unit, and the content server interface unit displays the display content generated by the display content generation unit The content server device has a server device that transmits the instructed content to the print server device as the main feature.
According to a second aspect of the present invention, when content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device to the print server device, the content is received from the content server device and transferred to the print server device. The main feature is the server device.
According to a third aspect of the present invention, the server device according to the first or second aspect is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server device is HTTP .
According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, the server device according to the first to third aspects is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server device is a mail transmission / reception protocol .
The invention according to claim 5 is characterized in that the server device according to claims 1 to 3 is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server device is FTP .

According to a sixth aspect of the present invention, the server apparatus according to the first to third aspects is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server apparatus can be arbitrarily selected from any one of HTTP, a mail transmission / reception protocol, and FTP .
According to a seventh aspect of the present invention, the server apparatus according to any one of the first to third aspects includes a history recording step capable of recording a history of print commands from the voice server apparatus .
The invention according to claim 8 is an audio terminal device, a content server device, a print server device, an audio server device, and a server device connected to a communication terminal device via a communication network, wherein the server device includes at least the content server. Content server interface means storing the IP address of the apparatus, print server interface means storing the IP address of the print server apparatus, terminal determining means for determining the voice terminal apparatus, description language switching means, and display content Generating means, wherein the terminal discriminating means discriminates the type of the voice terminal device based on a command inputted from the voice server device or the communication terminal device, and the description language switching means is the voice terminal discriminating means The type of the voice terminal device determined by Depending switch the description language,
The display content generation unit generates display content in the description language switched by the description language switching unit, and the content server interface unit displays the display content generated by the display content generation unit as a content server device. The content server device has a server device that transmits the instructed content to the print server device as the main feature.
According to a ninth aspect of the present invention, when content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device to the print server device, the content is received from the content server device and transferred to the print server device. The described server apparatus is a main feature.
The invention according to claim 10 is characterized in that the server device according to claim 8 or 9 is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server device is HTTP .
The invention according to claim 11 is characterized in that the server device according to claims 8 to 10 whose communication protocol with the content server device is a mail transmission / reception protocol .
The invention according to claim 12 is characterized in that the server apparatus according to claims 8 to 10 is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server apparatus is FTP.
According to a thirteenth aspect of the present invention, the server apparatus according to the eighth to tenth aspects is characterized in that a communication protocol with the content server apparatus can be arbitrarily selected from any one of HTTP, mail transmission / reception protocol, and FTP .
According to a fourteenth aspect of the present invention, the server apparatus according to any one of the eighth to thirteenth aspects includes a history recording step capable of recording a history of print commands from the voice server apparatus.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to access contents on the Internet or LAN using voice input of a voice telephone terminal and print a document using a desired printing device.

Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a server device and a printing system according to the first embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of a server device and a printing system according to the second embodiment of the present invention. In the second embodiment shown in FIG. 2, an internet facsimile machine is used as the printing device. The following description is common to FIGS.
Server device 100, content server device 200, print server device 300, voice server device 400, communication terminal device 500, voice over IP (hereinafter referred to as VoIP) gateway device 600, and print device device 700 are connected to a communication network. Further, the VoIP gateway device 600 and the voice terminal device 800 are connected to a voice communication network to constitute a printing system. Any of the components may be singular or plural.

Next, each device constituting the printing system will be described. First, the server device 100 includes content server interface means 110, print server interface means 120, terminal determination means 130, description language switching means 140, and display content generation means 150. Further, the IP addresses of the content server device 200 and the print server device 300 that are the connection destinations are stored.
Examples of communication networks include wired and wireless networks based on the Internet protocol (IP). As this network, the Internet, a network including a LAN, and the like can be considered. However, in the following, description will be given first as an Internet including a mobile communication network for enabling Internet access using a mobile phone. .
Examples of the voice communication network include a public network including a voice communication network for mobile phones and an ISDN network.
Examples of the content server device 200 include a computer having a Web server function and a data storage function.
Examples of the print server device 300 include a computer installed with software necessary for printing part or all of data stored in the content server device 200, such as a printer driver. The print server device 300 and the content server device 200 may be the same computer.

The voice server device 400 includes a computer equipped with voice browser software. Voice browser software includes VoiceXML browsers such as IBM's "WebSphere Voice Server". Below, the case where this VoiceXML browser is used is demonstrated. The voice server device 400 stores data associating the dialed telephone number with the IP address of the connection destination server device.
An example of the communication terminal device 500 is an internet terminal. Internet terminals include computers equipped with network cards, PDAs, and mobile phones with Internet access functions.
Examples of the VoIP gateway device 600 include a network routing device having a VoIP gateway function, and a computer equipped with an expansion card and a network card having a function of accessing a public line network. The VoIP gateway device 600 stores data associating the telephone number dialed by the voice terminal device 800 with the voice server device 400 to be connected.
Examples of the printing device device 700 include a printer, a facsimile, a copier equipped with a facsimile function, and a computer equipped with software for realizing a facsimile transmission function.
In the following, an Internet facsimile machine is used as the voice device, and the Internet facsimile machine is also connected to a voice communication network, and facsimile transmission is performed to another facsimile machine 900 via the voice communication network (see FIG. 2). ).
Examples of the voice terminal device 800 include telephones including mobile phones and IP phones.

Next, a basic series of operation examples when the printing system is accessed from the voice terminal device 800 will be described. In the present printing system, a user accesses from the communication terminal device 500 or the voice terminal device 800, and the data stored in the content server device 200 is printed by the printing device device 700 via the print server device 300, so that the mobile It is possible to perform printing by the communication terminal device 500 and the voice terminal device 800 in the environment.
First, a case where a telephone terminal is used as the voice terminal device 800 will be described below. When a telephone terminal as the voice terminal device 800 dials the printing system, first, the VoIP gateway device 600 responds, and the VoIP gateway device 600 is based on the correspondence between the telephone number held inside and the voice server device 400. The voice server device 400 corresponding to the dialed telephone number is activated. Furthermore, the voice server device 400 connects to the server device 100 based on data that associates the telephone number stored therein with the server device 100 to be connected.
In the server apparatus 100, the terminal determination unit 130 determines the type of terminal. In this case, since the access is from the voice server device 400, it is determined that the voice browser is used. As a terminal type discrimination method, there is a method using terminal information in HTTP header information.
Further, since it is determined by the terminal determination unit 130 that the voice browser is used, the description language switching unit 140 selects VoiceXML and inputs it to the display content generation unit 150. In the display content generation means 150, the content to be output is generated by VoiceXML.

As described above, when the connection is established, a session between the voice terminal device 800 and the content server device 200 is performed via the voice communication network, the VoIP gateway device 600, the communication network, and the server device 100.
In this session, a voice signal input from the voice terminal device 800 via the voice communication network is converted into a voice packet signal in the VoIP gateway device 600, and the voice packet signal is further converted into voice recognition technology or DTMF in the voice server device 400. It is converted into text data using a signal recognition technique and input to the server apparatus 100 as HTTP request data. The server device 100 performs exchange with the content server device 200 and necessary processing based on the content of the request data.
Output content is generated based on the exchange result and the processing result. As described above, here, the output content is generated using VoiceXML. VoiceXML is transmitted to the voice server device 400. The voice server device 400 generates a response voice based on the received VoiceXML, converts it into a voice packet using a voice synthesis technique, and transmits the voice packet to the VoIP gateway device 600.
The VoIP gateway device 600 converts the voice packet into a voice signal and transmits the voice signal to the voice terminal device 800 via the voice communication network. Through the above exchange of data, the voice terminal device 800 communicates with the content server device 200 via the server device 100, and a session is performed.

An example session procedure is given below. First, authentication processing is performed. The user's ID and password are referenced, and if authentication is not successful, a message prompting the user to re-enter the ID or password is returned to the voice terminal device 800.
When the authentication process is correctly performed, the contents of the list of contents stored in the content server apparatus 200 are returned. The user selects content to be printed from the content. If the content has a hierarchical directory structure or the number of content is too large, the next content list may be selected when returning the content list divided into multiple times.
When the user finally selects the content, the telephone number of another facsimile apparatus 900 (FIG. 2) as a transmission destination is input. When the telephone number is input, the server apparatus 100 instructs the content server apparatus 200 to print the selected content. The instructed content server 200 transmits the selected content to the print server device 300 and issues a print command.
Further, in this case, if the content cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device 200 to the print server device 300 due to a security problem or the like, the content is transmitted to the server device 100 and the print server interface unit 120 of the server device 100 is transmitted. To the print server apparatus 300.
The print server apparatus 300 transmits the transmitted content to the print device apparatus. The printing device apparatus 700, that is, the Internet facsimile machine transmits the transmitted content to another facsimile apparatus 900 via the voice communication network.
When the communication terminal device 500 is used as a terminal used by the user, the description language switching unit 140 selects a display language other than VoiceXML, for example, cHTML in the case of an i-mode mobile phone, and A similar session is performed between the communication terminal device 500 and the content server device 200 except that the VoIP gateway device 600 and the voice server device 400 are not passed.

According to the above-described procedure, the printing system can cause the content stored in the desired content server device 200 to be output from any other facsimile device 900 from the voice terminal device 800 or the communication terminal device 500. Is.
According to the first aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400.
According to the second aspect, even when the content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device 200 to the print server device 300, the content in the content server device 200 is obtained based on the sound input via the sound server device 400. Can be printed.
According to the third aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400.
In claim 4, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using HTTP.
According to the fifth aspect, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using a mail transmission / reception protocol.
According to the sixth aspect, it is possible to send a command to the content server apparatus 200 using FTP.
According to the seventh aspect, an optimal communication protocol with the content server device 200 can be selected according to the situation.
According to an eighth aspect of the present invention, a billing system using a print command history can be configured.
In the ninth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500.
In claim 10, even when the content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device 200 to the print server device 300, based on the audio input via the audio server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500. The content in the content server device 200 can be printed.
According to the eleventh aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the voice input via the voice server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500.
According to the twelfth aspect, the display content can be generated by using the description language that is most suitable for each type of the voice server device 400 and the communication terminal device 500.

According to the thirteenth aspect, the command can be transmitted to the content server apparatus 200 using HTTP.
According to the fourteenth aspect, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using a mail transmission / reception protocol.
According to the fifteenth aspect, it is possible to perform command transmission to the content server apparatus 200 using FTP.
According to the sixteenth aspect, an optimal communication protocol with the content server apparatus 200 can be selected according to the situation.
According to the seventeenth aspect of the present invention, a billing system using a print command history can be configured.
According to the eighteenth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400.
According to the nineteenth aspect, even when the content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device 200 to the print server device 300, the content in the content server device 200 is obtained based on the voice input via the voice server device 400. Can be printed.
In the twentieth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400.
In claim 21, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using HTTP.
According to the twenty-second aspect, command transmission to the content server apparatus 200 can be performed using a mail transmission / reception protocol.
In the twenty-third aspect, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using FTP.
In claim 24, an optimal communication protocol with the content server apparatus 200 can be selected according to the situation.

According to a twenty-fifth aspect of the present invention, a billing system using a print command history can be configured.
According to the twenty-sixth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the voice input via the voice server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500.
In claim 27, even when the content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device 200 to the print server device 300, based on the audio input via the audio server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500. The content in the content server device 200 can be printed.
In the twenty-eighth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be printed based on the sound input via the sound server device 400 and the input from the communication terminal device 500.
In claim 29, display content can be generated using a description language that is optimal for each type of voice server device 400 and communication terminal device 500.
In claim 30, it is possible to transmit a command to the content server apparatus 200 using HTTP.
In Claim 31, it is possible to perform command transmission to the content server apparatus 200 using a mail transmission / reception protocol.
According to the thirty-second aspect, command transmission to the content server apparatus 200 can be performed using FTP.
According to the thirty-third aspect, an optimal communication protocol with the content server device 200 can be selected according to the situation.
According to the thirty-fourth aspect, a billing system using a print command history can be configured.
In Claim 35, the function of the server method of Claims 26-34 is realizable using a computer.

According to the thirty-sixth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be browsed or the content can be printed from the printing device in accordance with an input from the voice terminal device 800 connected to the voice communication network.
According to the thirty-seventh aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be browsed or the content can be printed from the printing device in accordance with an input from the voice terminal device 800 connected to the voice communication network.
According to the thirty-eighth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be browsed or the content can be printed from the printing device according to the input from the communication terminal device 500 or the voice terminal device 800 connected to the voice communication network.
According to the thirty-ninth aspect, the content in the content server device 200 can be browsed or the content can be printed from the printing device in accordance with the input from the communication terminal device 500 or the voice terminal device 800 connected to the voice communication network.
In claim 40, it is possible to realize a print service that can be charged by the user.

1 is a configuration diagram of a server device and a printing system according to a first embodiment of the present invention. It is a block diagram of the server apparatus and printing system which concern on the 2nd Embodiment of this invention.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 100 Server apparatus 200 Content server apparatus 300 Print server apparatus 400 Audio | voice server apparatus

Claims (14)

In a server device connected to a voice terminal device, a content server device, a print server device, and a voice server device via a communication network,
Content server interface means for storing at least the IP address of the content server apparatus in the server apparatus, print server interface means for storing the IP address of the print server apparatus, and terminal determination means for determining the voice terminal apparatus Providing a description language switching means and a display content generation means,
The terminal determination means determines the type of the voice terminal device based on a command input from the voice server device,
The description language switching means switches the description language according to the type of the voice terminal device determined by the voice terminal determination means,
The display content generation means generates display content in the description language switched by the description language switching means,
The content server interface means instructs the content server device to display content generated by the display content generation means;
The content server apparatus transmits the instructed content to the print server apparatus.   2. The server device according to claim 1, wherein when content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device to the print server device, the content is received from the content server device and transferred to the print server device. . The server device according to claim 1 or 2, wherein a communication protocol with the content server device is HTTP. The server apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a communication protocol with the content server apparatus is a mail transmission / reception protocol . The server apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a communication protocol with the content server apparatus is FTP . 4. The server apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a communication protocol with the content server apparatus can be arbitrarily selected from any one of HTTP, mail transmission / reception protocol, and FTP . The server apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a history recording step capable of recording a history of a print command from the voice server apparatus. In a server device connected to a voice terminal device, a content server device, a print server device, a voice server device, and a communication terminal device via a communication network,
Content server interface means for storing at least the IP address of the content server apparatus in the server apparatus, print server interface means for storing the IP address of the print server apparatus, and terminal determination means for determining the voice terminal apparatus Providing a description language switching means and a display content generation means,
The terminal determination means determines the type of the voice terminal device based on a command input from the voice server device or the communication terminal device,
The description language switching means switches the description language according to the type of the voice terminal device determined by the voice terminal determination means,
The display content generation means generates display content in the description language switched by the description language switching means,
The content server interface means instructs the content server device to display content generated by the display content generation means;
The content server apparatus transmits the instructed content to the print server apparatus. 9. The server device according to claim 8, wherein when content to be printed cannot be directly transmitted from the content server device to the print server device, the content is received from the content server device and transferred to the print server device. . The server device according to claim 8 or 9, wherein a communication protocol with the content server device is HTTP . 11. The server apparatus according to claim 8, wherein a communication protocol with the content server apparatus is a mail transmission / reception protocol . 11. The server apparatus according to claim 8, wherein a communication protocol with the content server apparatus is FTP. 11. The server device according to claim 8, wherein a communication protocol with the content server device can be arbitrarily selected from any one of HTTP, a mail transmission / reception protocol, and FTP . The server apparatus according to claim 8, further comprising a history recording step capable of recording a history of a print command from the voice server apparatus.

Images