A terminal device includes an operation interface, a short-range wireless communication interface, and a processor. The terminal device receives a designating operation of designating a model of an image processing device and a setting operation of setting an execution condition to perform an imaging process. After establishing a short-range wireless communication with the image processing device, the terminal device determines whether a model of the image processing device coincides with a designated model. When the two models coincide with each other, an execution instruction is transmitted to the image processing device.

A subset of pages in a job are analyzed for page complexity to determine if a repeating complexity pattern is present in the job. If a repeating complexity pattern is found, then the page complexities can be extrapolated to other pages in the job. One embodiment comprises a plurality of Raster Image Processors (RIPs) and a scheduler. The scheduler receives a print job, identifies a subset of logical pages in the print job for complexity analysis, and calculates a page complexity value for logical pages in the subset. The scheduler determines that a repeating pattern of page complexity values is present in the subset, and assigns page complexity values to remaining logical pages in the print job by extrapolating the repeating pattern of page complexity values to the remaining logical pages. The scheduler assigns the logical pages in the print job to the RIPs based on their page complexity value.

An information processing apparatus includes a print management unit configured to allocate a plurality of print data sets to a plurality of image forming apparatuses, respectively, the plurality of print data sets being obtained by dividing one print data set; a separator data generation unit configured to generate, for each of the plurality of image forming apparatuses, print data for a separator, the print data for the separator including management information that includes information regarding a particular print data set among the plurality of print data sets and information regarding a particular image forming apparatus among the plurality of image forming apparatuses to which the particular print data set is allocated; and an output unit configured to output, for each of the plurality of image forming apparatuses, the particular print data set and the print data for the separator to the particular image forming apparatus.

A method of using a central computer that is communicatively connectable to a first control computer and configured to dynamically allocate and transmit unique codes from a server to a first printing machine, having a first rate of printing. The method includes the steps of: receiving a first request for a first patch of unique codes from the first control computer of a first printing machine, wherein the first control computer is communicatively connected to the first printing machine and wherein the first control computer controls the first printing machine for printing the unique codes in package labels; obtaining printing parameters comprising a file size of a unique code and a printing speed of the first printing machine; determining a first time interval between the first request to the server and the unique code being available to be used by the first printing machine; determining a first communication speed between the server and the first printing machine; dynamically calculating a first optimum patch size of the first patch of unique codes to be delivered to the first printing machine based on the first request from the first control computer of the first printing machine, the printing parameters, the first time interval and the first communication speed; and communicating a first patch of unique codes having a patch size equal to the first optimum patch size to the first control computer of the first printing machine.

A subset of pages in a job are analyzed for page complexity to determine if a repeating complexity pattern is present in the job. If a repeating complexity pattern is found, then the page complexities can be extrapolated to other pages in the job. One embodiment comprises a plurality of Raster Image Processors (RIPs) and a scheduler. The scheduler receives a print job, identifies a subset of logical pages in the print job for complexity analysis, and calculates a page complexity value for logical pages in the subset. The scheduler determines that a repeating pattern of page complexity values is present in the subset, and assigns page complexity values to remaining logical pages in the print job by extrapolating the repeating pattern of page complexity values to the remaining logical pages. The scheduler assigns the logical pages in the print job to the RIPs based on their page complexity value.

A method, a non-transitory computer readable medium, and a system are disclosed for scheduling print jobs on a plurality of printers. The method includes collecting job information on each of a plurality of print jobs; assigning each of the plurality of print jobs to one or more printers of the plurality of printers; receiving a new print job, the new job including job product information; calculating a pre-processing time for the new print job; calculating a processing time for the new print job; determining at least one printer of the plurality of printers to execute the new print job; assigning the new print job to the at least one printer of the plurality of printers; and determining if one or more of the plurality of print jobs can be reassigned to another printer of the plurality of printers to minimize a print schedule for the plurality of print jobs.

In a printing apparatus, a controller is configured to: receive compressed image data; store the compressed image data into a memory; individually identify partial compressed data in the stored compressed image data, the partial compressed data corresponding to separate images; store the partial compressed data into the memory or store information identifying each of the partial compressed data, into the memory; a first creating processing for decompressing one of the partial compressed data and creating print data based on partial decompressed data obtained by decompressing the one partial compressed data; and a first output processing for outputting the created print data. The controller repeats the first creating processing and the first output processing a number of times corresponding to the number of the partial compressed data. The printing apparatus performs printing based on the print data output in the first output processing.

Embodiments herein describe a two-phase printing process that utilizes page-to-resource tracking during the first rip-to-spool phase in order to perform resource scheduling during the second print-from-spool phase. In one embodiment, compute nodes include a RIP and a raster builder. A controller receives a print job, identifies a distribution of logical pages in the print job to the compute nodes, and generates page assignment information that maps the logical pages to the compute nodes based on the distribution. The compute nodes rasterize the logical pages to generate intermediate data using the RIPs, and store the intermediate raster data at a RIP spool. The controller directs a distribution of the intermediate raster data from the RIP spool to the compute nodes based on the page assignment information, and the compute nodes assemble the intermediate raster data into complete raster data using the raster builders.

A non-transitory computer-readable recording medium stores therein a program that causes a computer to execute a process, the process including: specifying first job information related to a new job; referring to a storage that stores second job information and power information for each of past jobs to specify a predetermined number of pieces of third job information of which matching status with the first job information satisfies a first condition; determining, for each piece of the third job information, whether a matching status with the first job information satisfies a second condition; specifying one piece of the third job information based on a determination result; specifying power information associated with the one piece of the third job information; correcting the specified power information in accordance with the determination result; and estimating power information indicating power consumption at a time of executing the new job based on the corrected power information.

Disclosed herein is a technique to efficiently distribute a large number of printable CAD objects to a group of printers having variable settings and/or parameters. Each CAD object includes metadata specifying a particular set of production parameters (e.g., software settings, post-processing steps, production material, and/or physical location). The technique positions objects with the same set of production parameters metadata in similar print cycles subject to object nesting optimization.