JPS63244168A - Document image processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve retrieving efficiency by providing a means for storing image data independent of those stored in a storing means as data used for retrieval to a retrieving means. CONSTITUTION:A reading means is provided to read the image data out of a scanner together with a means which displays the read image data on a display device, and a register means which stores a part of the read image data in a memory and at the same time stores a key code proper to said image data in correspondence. In other words, a magnetic disk 6 is used to store control information, etc., on the image data in a necessary file or an optical disk device 7 together wit said device 7 which stores the document image data in the unrewritable way, a pointing device 8 used for input of position designation on a displayed picture, and an image reader 9 for reading image data. Thus a part of the image data read by the reading means is written in a memory medium. Then the data containing the correspondence between a writing address and an intrinsic key code is written in the memory medium. In such constitution, the data retrieving efficiency is improved.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention particularly relates to a document image IA embedding device that electronically processes, stores, and retrieves documents as image data.

[Prior Art] Conventionally, in this type of device, a large amount of image data is registered on a medium such as a magnetic disk or an optical disk. At the same time, several key codes are registered, and when searching, the key codes are specified and the corresponding document image data is retrieved.

Normally, the key code is entered from the keyboard when registering or searching, but in order to save the trouble of entering it each time, you can create a key code file in which only the key code is registered in advance, and use the key code file when registering or searching. A commonly used method is to display the contents on a CRT for the operator to select.

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve] However,
In the above conventional example, for example, there are three "name", "material", "
If you want to manage document images by setting a key item called ``shape'', you can easily set ``name'' and ``material'' as key items, but you can use ``shape'' as a key item as the shape becomes more complex. The major drawback was that it was difficult.

This invention was made in order to solve the above-mentioned problems. For example, when trying to search for document image data based on a certain shape that can be easily recognized visually, it can be registered in advance like a key code file. An object of the present invention is to provide a text image processing device that allows a user to visually specify a key item at the time of a search by displaying image data showing the shape of the object on a CRT.

[Means for Solving the Problems] The present invention provides a reading means for reading image data from a scanner, a means for displaying the read image data on a display, and a part of the read image data is stored in a storage medium. In addition, it is provided with a registration means for storing a unique key code in association with the image data.

In this invention, part of the image data read by the reading means is written to the storage medium, and further, data corresponding to the writing address and the unique key code is written to the storage medium.

[Embodiment] Fig. 2 is a system block diagram showing the configuration when an embodiment of the present invention is applied to a document image processing device. In the central processing unit (CPU), R
It operates according to a control program built into the OM section 1-1. 2 is a high-resolution bitmap display (CRT) that displays a window or displays an image in that window.
), and in this example, a resolution of 4 dots per 1 mm was used. 3 is a keyboard (KB) for inputting character data and commands, and 4 is a memory (RAM), which is a work area or processing area that stores image data that is the source of display images and temporarily stores data to be stored in a disk device. It can be used as a work area to temporarily store data that you want to memorize during battles. Reference numeral 5 denotes a memory called a video RAM (VRAM), and the CRT 2 displays the contents of the VRAM by, for example, lighting dots where the bit is 1 and turning off dots where the bit is 0. Therefore, from the CPUI side, changing the contents of the VRAM 5 means changing the display contents of the CRT 2. 6 is a magnetic disk device (DISK) that stores files necessary for this device and management information of image data stored in the optical disk device 7 described later, and 7 is an optical disk that stores a large amount of document image data in a non-rewritable manner. A disk device (OD), 8 a pointing device (PD) used to input a position on the displayed image, and 9 an image reader (IR) for reading image data. I used resolution. These are connected by 10 BUS.

FIG. 3A is a conceptual diagram of the CRT 2, and shows an example in which a window 20 and an arrow cursor 21 are displayed on the CRT.

FIG. 3(B) is an external view of the pointing device 8,
By moving this, the ball provided inside rotates, and the amount of rotation is converted by the CPU 1 into an amount of movement, and the result is displayed as the movement of the arrow cursor 21 on the CRTZ. By pressing the button 81, the position coordinates of the arrow cursor 21 on the window are displayed by the CPU 1.
It has the function of notifying.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the relationship between the entire image data read by the image reader (IR) 9 and a part of the image data registered as a keyword (independent of the image registered as a file). - For example, certain image data is read by an image reader (IFL) 9, and its entire image is displayed on the window 20 of the CRT 2. A part of the image data registered as a keyword is a part surrounded by a rectangle 22. The rectangle 22 is generated when the button 81 of the pointing device 8 is pressed.
, ya ) point and the current arrow cursor 21 point, i.e. 2
Continue to maintain a rectangle with the (Xb, yb) point of 4 as the diagonal. Therefore, when the 24 (x6.yb) points change, the rectangle 22 is also regenerated accordingly. When the user stops pressing the button 81, the 24 (Xb, yb) points are fixed and the area to be registered as image data is determined.

25 is the read command 26 in the command menu window.
, a registration command 27, and an end command are displayed.

Each command is activated by the operator moving the arrow cursor 21 over the desired command in the command menu window 25, pressing and releasing the button 81 once.

When the registration command 26 is specified, the portion of the image data surrounded by the rectangle 22 is registered. When the end command 27 is specified, the process ends. When a read command 26 is issued, images are read from the image reader (IR) 9 and displayed on the window 20.

Figures 4 and 5 are diagrams explaining the structure of files in DISKe, where 61 in Figure 4 is a document management file, 62 in Figure 5 is an image information management file, and 63 is an image data file. As an example, FIG. 5 shows that there is one image information management file 62 for each type of key item, that is, one image information management file 62 for each "shape key." The image data file 63 is one file for each image data, that is, one file for each image representing one shape.
FIG. 5 shows by way of example that there are two image data files 63.

The document management file 61 in FIG. 4 is the document management record 61.
It is a collection of records with R as one unit. In the example, the document management record 61R has a name key 61a and a material key 51.
b, the three key codes of the shape key 61c, and the 0 name key, material key, and shape key consisting of each record element of the document storage position 61d are the key names used in this embodiment,
0 name key 61a and material key 61 whose name, type, and number should originally be set in each implementation case.
b is data that directly represents the name and material of the item, whereas the item content of the shape key stores a key code number 62b of the image information management file 62, which will be described later.

The document storage position 61d is information indicating the position of document image data stored on the optical disc (OD) 7. If you want to search for a certain document, use the name key 61a and the material key 61.
b. By specifying the required key among the shape keys 61c, the CPU 1 selects all document management records 61R that have the specified key as an element of the record, and stores the document storage positions 61d of these records. A document image is called up from the optical disc (OD) 7 as a clue.

The image information management file 62 in FIG. 5 is a file that manages various types of image data expressing "shape" and key codes associated with the image data, including the file name 62d of the image data and the It consists of an image information management record 62R whose elements are a size 62c in the X direction, a key code No. 62b which is a key code in the document management record 61R. Key code No. 6
2b also serves as the record number of the image information management record 0 The data 62a at the beginning of the image information management file 62 stores the final record number, and from this the key value of the shape key 61c to be assigned next can be determined. Ru.

The image data file 63 is a file that stores image data specified by the rectangle 22 in FIG.
Among the images read from 9, rectangle 22 in FIG.
However, since the read image is 16 dots per mm and the display on the CRT2 is 4 dots per mm, the dots in the X direction and X direction of the original image data are thinned out by 1/4 each. In this embodiment, data stored in the image data file 63 is thinned out for display on the CRT 2.

Next, the image data registration operation according to the present invention will be described with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG.

In this embodiment, it is assumed that the command to start the image data registration process has already been given, the image information management file to be registered has been determined, and the command menu land 25 has been displayed, and the explanation will be given from immediately after that.

First, in step S1, the key code No. to be set next,
In order to know the value of 62b, read the final record No. 62a, which is the first record of the image information management file 62, and save that value in the work area in RAMJ. , called the storage area.

In step S2, an input from the pointing device 8 is waited for, and if there is an input, the content of the instruction is determined and each process is executed. If the arrow cursor 21 is located on the read command 26 on the command menu window 25 and the button 81 of the pointing device 8 is pressed once, the process advances to step S3. If the button 81 remains pressed on the window 2o, the process advances to step s5. If the arrow cursor 21 is located on the registration command 27 or the end command 28 on the command menu 25 and the button 81 of the pointing device 8 is pressed once, the process advances to step S8 and step Sit, respectively. If none of the above applies to the determination in step s1, it is determined that the operation is meaningless, and the process returns to step s1 to wait for an instruction.

In step S2, an image is read by the image reader (IR) 9. In this embodiment, reading is performed at a resolution of 16 dots per mm. In step S4, window 2o
is generated on the CRT 2, and the image read in step S3 is thinned out by 1/4 in each of the X and X directions to make 4 dots, and the data is transferred to the VRAM 5. As a result, the image read in step s4 is displayed on the window 2o of the CRT 2.

In step S5, the first starting point when the button 81 is kept pressed is obtained and its coordinates are set as (xa, ya).
Furthermore, input the current position of the arrow cursor 21 and enter its coordinates (
xc, ye) and draw a rectangle with diagonal vertices at (xa, ya) and (xc, yc) on the window 20. In step S6, wait for the button 81 to be released, and move the arrow cursor 21 at the point when the button 81 is released. Obtain the position (Xb + yb). In step S7, the operator finally creates a rectangle 2.
The horizontal size Xb-X and vertical size 3'b-yl of 2 are calculated, and the results are held in the work area in RAMJ as the X-direction and X-direction sizes of the image data. For convenience of explanation, the work area is referred to as the rectangular size holding area, and at the same time (Xa.

The value of ya) is also saved.

In step S8, the image data (xa
, 3'a), DISK the size stored in the rectangular size storage area saved in step S7.
6 as an image data file 63. W
The file name for RITE may be any unique name, but in this embodiment it is "File-n'". However, n is the final number saved in step S1, which is the value of the save area plus 1. In step S9, the image information management record 62R is assembled, and the record is added to the image information management file.
Set the final number saved in , add 1 to the value of the save area, set the x and y values of the rectangular size save area saved in step S7 to size 62c, and set the file name 62d to the values of x and y of the rectangular size save area saved in step S9. Set the file name of the WRITE image data file 63. Step S
10, the final number and the contents of the storage area saved in step S1 are updated by adding 1 to generate the next image information management record.

In step Sll, the final record number of the image information management file 62 is determined by the final number and the value of the storage area.

The contents of 62a are rewritten and the process ends.

Also, when searching, registered keyword images are displayed,
When a desired image is specified using the corresponding key or pointing device, the file name of the image corresponding to the keyword image is displayed. When there is only one corresponding image, the image may be displayed directly.

Note that in the above embodiment, a rectangular portion of the image data read by the image reader is registered, but if the entire image data read by the image reader is thinned out at an appropriate reduction ratio and then registered, each time. There is no need to specify a rectangle, and images read one after another from an image reader can be automatically registered.

Further, in the present invention, the image data file is generated on a magnetic disk, but it may be generated on a non-rewritable optical disk or a rewritable magneto-optical disk. When writing data, if the data is compressed and saved, the storage area will be small, which can be effectively utilized in conjunction with the present invention.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to register as a keyword for a search something that can be determined immediately by looking at it with the naked eye but is difficult to express in words, thereby improving search efficiency. There is an effect.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of a display display to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 2 is a system block diagram of an embodiment of a document image processing device to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 3(A) is an example of a display display. Figure 3 (B) is an external view showing an example of a pointing device. Figure 4 is a diagram explaining the structure of the document management file of DISK 6. Figure 5 is the image information management file and image data file of DISK 8. FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the registration process of the embodiment. In the diagram, 1...CRU, 1-1...ROM, 2...CRT
. 20...Window, 21...Arrow cursor. 22... Rectangle, 23... Upper left corner point of the rectangle. 24...Lower right corner point of the rectangle. 25...Command menu window. 26...Read command, 27...Register command. 28...End command, 3...-CRT, 4...-RA
M. 5-VRAM, 6-DISK. 61... Document management file, 61a... Name key. 61b...Material key, 61C...Shape key. 61d...Document storage position. SIR...Document management record. 62... Image information management file. 62a...Final record No. 62b...Key code No -+ 62c...
·size. 62d...File name. 62R... Image information management record. 63...Image data file, 7...OD. 8...PD, 81...button, 9...IR. 10...BUS.

Claims (3)

[Claims] (1) In a document image processing device having means for storing input image data, means for displaying input image data, and means for searching image data stored in the storage means. . A document image processing apparatus, wherein the retrieval means includes means for storing image data independent of the image data stored in the storage means as data for retrieval. (2) A document according to claim 1, wherein the retrieval means further includes a second storage means storing code data for retrieving the image data stored in the storage means. Image processing device. (3) In claim 2, the document image is characterized in that the second storage means stores code data corresponding to the search image data stored in the first storage means. Processing equipment.