Central management apparatus and management system
AssigneeMinolta Co., Ltd.
InventorsAtsushi Tomita, Masazumi Ito
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A central management apparatus determines whether or not data transmitted to the central management apparatus at the fixed time from a device management unit has arrived within the allowable time after the fixed time. When data have not arrived, it is determined that that device is a no reception device. When a plurality of devices are managed via connection to device management units using different communication methods, different allowable time are used for no reception determination in accordance with the communication method of the device management unit.
Claims11
A central management apparatus for managing devices connected to device management units by data communication with first and second device management units using different communication methods, the central management apparatus comprising:
- a memory for storing a first transmission time set for the first device management unit and a second transmission time set for the second device management unit;
- a first counting unit for counting elapsed time from the first transmission time when data have not been received from the first device management unit at the first transmission time;
- a second counting unit for counting the elapsed time from the second transmission time when data have not been received from the second device management unit at the second transmission time;
- a threshold setting unit for setting a first threshold value for the first device management unit and setting a second threshold value different from the first threshold value for the second device management unit;
- and
- a determining unit for determining a no reception condition when the elapsed time by the first counting unit exceeds the first threshold value or the elapsed time counted by the second counting unit exceeds the second threshold value.
A management system including a central management apparatus, a first device management unit for data communication with the central management apparatus using a first communication method, and a second device management unit for data communication with the central management apparatus using a second communication method, the first device management unit comprising:
- a first transmission unit for transmitting data relating to a connected device to the central management apparatus at a first fixed time,
- the second device management unit comprising:
- a second transmission unit for transmitting data relating to a connected device to the central management apparatus at a second fixed time, the central management apparatus comprising:
- a memory for storing a first transmission time set for the first device management unit and a second transmission time set for second device management unit;
- a first counting unit for counting elapsed time from the first transmission time when data have not been received from the first device management unit at the first transmission time;
- a second counting unit for counting elapsed time from the second transmission time when data have not been received from the second device management unit at the second transmission time;
- a threshold setting unit for setting a first threshold value for the first device management unit, and setting a second threshold value different from the first threshold value for the second device management unit;
- and
- a determining unit for determining a no reception condition when the elapsed time counted by the first counting unit exceeds the first threshold value or the elapsed time counted by the second counting unit exceeds the second threshold value.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.