A printing apparatus includes a printer unit that prints an image on a sheet, a network controller that instructs the printer unit to execute a preparation operation according to receipt of print data, and a controller that instructs the printer unit to execute the preparation operation according to input of an execution instruction in a case where a reservation function for reserving printing based on the print data received by the network controller until receipt of the execution instruction is received is enabled.

An image forming apparatus includes a generating unit configured to generate an image corresponding to at least part of a plurality of pages included in the print data according to acquisition of the print data, a holding unit configured to hold the image generated by the generating unit into a storage, and an obtaining unit configured to obtain images of all pages to be printed among the pages included in the print data according to the print instruction from the user, wherein the obtaining unit obtains the image of the page of which the image is already generated by the generating unit among the pages to be printed from the storage, and generates, after acceptance of the print instruction, an image of the page of which an image is not generated by the generating unit.

A print-mode determination processor determines the print mode of a print job that is described in a page description language (PDL) and that has a print mode set to an automatic determination mode, using image data generated for a preflight check by a preflight checker that performs a preflight check of image data of a print job. The image data for a preflight check has a resolution lower than that of thumbnail image data and sufficient to determine whether to set a color print mode or a black-and-white print mode, such as presence or absence of a color part in the image data of the print job or the degree of the color part, so that the time required for generating and analyzing image data for print mode determination can be shortened.

An image forming apparatus includes a communication interface configured to communicate with a portable terminal capable of receiving a signal from a transmitter in a detection area. A processor of the apparatus is configured to determine whether to shift to an operable state from a sleep state based on user information contained in proximity information when the proximity information, containing the user information indicating that a user enters the detection area, is received by the communication interface from the portable terminal receiving a signal from the transmitter.

An image forming apparatus includes a communication interface configured to communicate with a portable terminal capable of receiving a signal from a transmitter in a detection area. A processor of the apparatus is configured to determine whether to shift to an operable state from a sleep state based on user information contained in proximity information when the proximity information, containing the user information indicating that a user enters the detection area, is received by the communication interface from the portable terminal receiving a signal from the transmitter.

[Object] To be capable of further reducing time to obtain data from a server apparatus and form an image by an image forming apparatus.

[Solving Means] A server apparatus (20) includes: a storage device (26) configured to store a resolution table (204), the resolution table (204) being configured to record a plurality of image forming apparatuses (10) having different resolutions, the resolutions of the image forming apparatuses (10) respectively, and information processing abilities of the image forming apparatuses (10) respectively, in association with each other; a memory configured to store an information processing program; and a processor (21) configured to execute the information processing program, the processor (21) being configured to execute the information processing program to operate as a printable data obtaining unit (201) configured to obtain printable data from a terminal device, an intermediate data creating unit (202) configured to create intermediate data on a basis of the printable data, the intermediate data being independent of resolution, an image forming apparatus selecting unit (214) configured to select one image forming apparatus (10) having each of the different resolutions on a basis of priority from the plurality of image forming apparatuses (10) recorded in the resolution table (204), an intermediate data supplying unit (203) configured to supply the intermediate data to the plurality of image forming apparatuses (10) selected, a rasterized data obtaining unit (205) configured to obtain a plurality of rasterized data depending on the different resolutions respectively, the plurality of rasterized data being created by the plurality of image forming apparatuses (10) on a basis of the intermediate data, a pull-print receiving unit (210) configured to receive a pull-print request from a pull-print image forming apparatus (10) and obtain a pull-print resolution, the pull-print image forming apparatus (10) being an image forming apparatus (10) that executes pull-printing, the pull-print resolution being a resolution of the pull-print image forming apparatus (10), a resolution determining unit (211) configured to determine whether or not the resolution table (204) records a resolution that is same as the pull-print resolution, and a pull-print data supplying unit (212) configured to supply rasterized data depending on the resolution that is same as the pull-print resolution to the pull-print image forming apparatus (10).

The present disclosure discloses systems and methods for re-ordering queued print jobs. The method includes executing one or more already received print jobs listed in a print queue of a printer. Then, a new print job is received in the print queue of the printer. A message is displayed to the user with an option to re-order the new print job, via a user interface. Based on the user input, the new print job is re-ordered by moving the new print job to the top of the print queue of the printer. Finally, the new print job is printed first followed by printing the one or more already received print jobs.

A method for reducing a time-to-first-print in an imaging device that includes tracking a set of sleep times between print jobs in an imaging device and determining whether a predetermined number of sleep times in the set of sleep times is reached; and upon a positive determination, identifying a first and a second most recent sleep times stored among the set of sleep times tracked; determining whether each of the first sleep time and the second sleep time is less than a predetermined threshold; and upon a positive determination, determining a value based on an average of the first sleep time and the second sleep time. The value is used as a period of time that the imaging device is powered at a snooze mode prior to transitioning to a sleep mode, and when a print job is received in the imaging device while in the snooze mode, the time-to-first-print from the snooze mode is faster than the time-to-first print when the print job is received while in the sleep mode.

Provided is an industrial printing system that performs peer-to-peer distributed processing of variable content in variable printing for production printing. A variable attribute generating unit generates variable attribute information having content information that is variable content information of variable data for variable printing. A variable analyzing unit analyzes the content information of the variable attribute information generated by the variable attribute generating unit and determines other print server capable of processing the variable content of the variable data. A processing management unit that requests the other print server determined to be capable of processing by the variable analyzing unit to process the variable content.

A printing computing device connects to a multi-function printing (MFP) device to enable additional functionality and capabilities not offered by the MFP device. The printing computing device connects to a network to receive print jobs from external devices within the network. The printing computing device processes the print jobs according to rules such that print jobs are processed accordingly. The printing computing device also includes firmware not available on the MFP device such that print jobs not supported by the MFP device still may be processed. The printing computing device also includes an engine that determines whether an incoming print job is a PDL print job or a command to perform a function not available on the MFP device.