Image forming apparatus and image forming method

An image forming apparatus comprising:

• a display section;
• an operation acceptance section that accepts an operating instruction from a user;
• a printing section that performs print processing on a recording medium;
• an external terminal allowing an external memory to be connected thereto;
• a display control section that controls a display operation of the display section;
• a readout control section that performs processing for reading data through the external terminal from the external memory;
• an interpreter section that analyzes metadata read from the external memory;
• and
• a control section that controls the printing section,
• wherein when the external memory is connected to the external terminal, the readout control section reads from the external memory an execution program for starting execution of the print processing,
• the readout control section further reads the metadata from the external memory according to the read execution program, the metadata containing:
• attribute information indicating a predetermined attribute of document data converted to printer language data contained in a print job to be subjected to the print processing;
• and association information for associating the printer language data with the document data,
• the interpreter section analyzes the attribute information and the association information of the metadata read by the readout control section,
• the display control section uses a result of analysis of the attribute information in the interpreter section to allow the display section to display:
• a file name representing the document data and previously contained as a portion of the attribute information in the metadata;
• and a display prompting the user to specify a print target area of the document data to be subjected to the print processing,
• when the operation acceptance section accepts a request to specify the print target area from the user, the readout control section uses a result of analysis of the association information in the interpreter section to read from the external memory a portion of the printer language data contained in the print job, the portion corresponding to the print target area specified by the request, and
• when the readout control section reads the portion of printer language data corresponding to the specified print target area, the control section allows the printing section to perform the print processing based on the read portion of printer language data corresponding to the print target area according to the execution program read by the readout control section.