Printing system and program
AssigneeDai Nippon Printing Co., Ltd.
InventorsNobuya Fukano, Yoshihiro Yano, Takayuki Chikada
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A printing system and a program ensuring an improved security. A printing system (1) has printers (20A, 20B, 20C) for printing according to printing data further having a printer managing device (30) having a printing data managing section (311) for limiting the printing data supplied to the printers (20A, 20B, 20C) to printing data having a security level matching the security level based on the installation environment of the printer (20A) and a communication section (34) for providing the limited printing data to the printer (20A).
Claims8
A printing system having a printing means performing printing based on print data, comprising:
- a plurality of printer apparatuses;
- a print data supplying apparatus for supplying print data to the printer apparatuses;
- an input portion for receiving print instructions from a user;
- a print attribute setting means for performing setting of print attributes comprising receiving from the input portion security attributes for the print data input by the user during the input of the print instructions for instructing formation of the print data from the user and setting the security attributes for the print data;
- a print data restricting means for determining whether to provide the print data to each of the printer apparatuses based on the security attributes for the print data and the security attributes based on a degree of safety of an installation environment of each of the printer apparatuses;
- an authentication information input means for inputting authentication information for authenticating print instruction authority of the user carrying out print instructions;
- and
- an authentication means for authenticating the print instruction authority of the user based on authentication information inputted by the authentication information input means,
- wherein a trigger for a start of a print processing occurs upon detection of availability of reading of the authentication information,
- wherein the print data restricting means identifies printer apparatuses that are permitted to print based on the print instruction authority authenticated by the authentication means,
- wherein the printing system restricts printing the data on a printer apparatus identified by the print data restricting means when the security attributes for the print data has a security level higher than the security attributes of a printer apparatus among the printer apparatuses.
A non-transitory computer readable storage medium having stored therein a program executable by a computer, the program being a program for managing print data supplied to at least one of printer apparatuses performing printing based on the print data, comprising:
- recording printer apparatus management information of each of the printer apparatuses, wherein the printer apparatus management information having security attributes includes a security level set at each of the printer apparatuses;
- receiving from an input portion security attributes for the print data contained within print data attribute information and selected by a user during an input of print instructions for instructing formation of the print data from the user;
- storing the print data and print data attribute information received from a communication portion;
- receiving user identification information for identifying the user carrying out a print instruction wherein a trigger for a start of a print processing occurs upon detection of availability of reading of the authentication information;
- identifying printer apparatus permitted to print the print data based on the user identification information;
- and
- determining whether to supply the print data to the identified printer apparatus based on the user identification information, the security attributes for the print data contained within the print data attribute information and the security attributes of the printer apparatus based on a degree of safety of an installation environment of each of the printer apparatuses,
- wherein the program restricts a predetermined printer apparatus access to the print data when the security attributes for the print data has a security level higher than the security attributes of a printer apparatus among the printer apparatuses.
A print data supplying apparatus for supplying print data to printer apparatuses, the print data supplying apparatus comprising:
- an input portion for receiving print data attribute information contained within security attributes for the print data selected by a user during an input of print instructions for instructing formation of the print data from the user;
- a print data communication means;
- a storage means for storing the print data;
- a printer apparatus attribute storage means for storing security attributes including a security level set at each of the printer apparatuses;
- a print data restricting means for restricting the print data supplied to each of the printer apparatuses to print data having security attributes corresponding to the security attributes based on a degree of safety of an installation environment of each of the printer apparatuses stored in the printer apparatus attribute storage means;
- an authentication information input means for inputting authentication information for authenticating print instruction authority of the user carrying out print instructions;
- and
- an authentication means for authenticating the print instruction authority of the user based on authentication information inputted by the authentication information input means,
- wherein a trigger for a start of a print processing occurs upon detection of availability of reading of the authentication information,
- wherein the print data restricting means identifies printer apparatuses that are permitted to print based on the print instruction authority authenticated by the authentication means,
- wherein the print data supplying apparatus restricts printing the data on a printer apparatus identified by the print data restricting means when the security attributes for the print data has a security level higher than the security attributes of a printer apparatus among the printer apparatuses.
The print data supplying apparatus according to 7, further comprises a print data management information storing means for storing the print data attribute information and user identification information for identifying a user carrying out a print instruction, related to the print data received from the print data communication means, wherein
- the print data restricting means determines whether to provide the print data to each of the printer apparatuses based on the user identification information, the security attributes of the print data and the security attributes of each of the printer apparatuses.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.