Information processing apparatus, information processing system and information processing method for executing document reading processing

An information processing system that includes a document reading apparatus and an information processing apparatus that is capable of transmitting and receiving data to and from that document reading apparatus;

• wherein
• the document reading apparatus comprises a first controller and a storage unit comprising a non-transitory recording medium having a first control program stored thereon, wherein the first controller reads the first control program to operate as:
• a service-level-information-transmitting unit that transmits service-level information that indicates a level of service for service that causes a workflow, which is a series of tasks including at least OCR processing for data of a document that is read by the document reading apparatus, to be executed by the information processing apparatus, wherein the service-level-information-acquiring unit can acquire the level of service as a normal service and can acquire the level of service as a premium service;
• and
• the information processing apparatus comprises a second controller and a storage unit comprising a non-transitory recording medium having a second control program stored thereon, wherein the second controller reads the second control program to operate as:
• a service-level-information-acquiring unit that acquires the service-level information from the document reading apparatus;
• a process-capacity-changing unit that changes the degree of processing capacity by the own apparatus in accordance with the service-level information that is acquired by the service-level-information-acquiring unit;
• and
• a task-executing unit that executes the tasks within a specified time wherein
• the processing-capacity-changing unit changes the degree of the processing capacity by changing a number of allocated execution units of the task-executing unit;
• the processing-capacity-changing unit allocates a larger number of allocated execution units for the premium service relative to the normal service;
• and
• increasing the number of allocated execution units reduces total time for execution of the series of tasks of the workflow.

An information processing method that is executed by an information processing apparatus that is capable of transmitting and receiving data to and from a document reading apparatus, and causes the information processing apparatus to:

• acquire service-level information that indicates a level of service for a service that executes a workflow, which is a series of tasks including at least OCR processing for data of a document that is read by the document reading apparatus by an own apparatus, wherein the acquired level of service can independently be a normal service level and a premium service level;
• change the degree of processing capacity by the own apparatus in accordance with the acquired service-level information;
• and
• change the degree of the processing capacity by changing a number of allocated execution units of a task-executing unit that executes the tasks within a specified time,
• wherein a larger number of allocated execution units is allocated for the premium service level relative to the normal service level;
• and
• wherein increasing the number of allocated execution units reduces total time for execution of the series of tasks of the workflow.