In an image forming apparatus having a function of laying out and forming a plurality of identical images on one output sheet, in a case that a setting is done to give different copy numbers to the identical images laid out on the one output sheet, control is performed, in accordance with the setting, to give and form the different copy numbers to the identical images laid out on the one output sheet.

A print management system includes a printing section, a storage section that stores print information indicating a print status, a determination section that determines whether or not waste paper collection is necessary based on the print information, a print request section that prints a collection form based on a determination result of the determination section, and a collection request section that requests the waste paper collection using the collection form based on the determination result of the determination section.

An image forming apparatus includes an operation acceptance section, a storage section, a sheet feed cassette, a plurality of trays, a sorting mechanism, a scanner, a data analyzing section, and a control section. The scanner scans an image of a sheet. The data analyzing section analyzes image data of the sheet scanned by the scanner. When the operation acceptance section accepts a specification of a sorting condition from a user, the control section allows the storage section to store the sorting condition and allows the sorting mechanism to sort the sheet to one of the trays according to the sorting condition using an analysis result of the data analyzing section.

An inspection system inspects a grade of a print product based on comparison between a scanned image obtained by scanning a print product and a reference image, receives a first mode that does not switch a sheet discharge destination of the print product regardless of an inspection result of the print product or a second mode that switches the sheet discharge destination of the print product according to the inspection result of the print product is received through a screen, and controls the sheet discharge destination of the print product based on the received mode and the inspection result.

The disclosure discloses methods and systems for automatically sorting a plurality of pages of a document by a multi-function device. The device comprises a document feeder, a document swapper and a document collector. The multi-function device receives a request to sort the plurality of pages in accordance with at least one sorting parameter. The multi-function device scans the pages and identifies one or more character fields for each of the scanned pages and executes a plurality of page swap cycles between the document feeder, the document swapper, and the document collector until each of the scanned pages are sorted based on the at least one sorting parameter. The sorting is performed by comparing the character fields for each of the scanned pages, a first subset of scanned pages are placed in the document swapper and a second subset is placed in the document collector in each page swap cycle.

An image forming device includes: an image forming unit that forms an image on a recording medium; and a controller that controls image formation. The controller can determine whether the image on the recording medium is normal upon reception of a reading result obtained by reading an image on a recording medium that has passed through the image forming unit, and can exercise such control that a recording medium with an image that has been determined to be normal and a recording medium with an image that has been determined to be abnormal are sorted according to a determination result, the controller having a function of, upon such reading, dividing a reading result related to a recording medium and making a determination on an image on the recording medium in accordance with reading results related to segments obtained by division.

A system and method provide an improvement to ordering pages for a multi-page print job. In an exemplary embodiment, a user interface includes a layout control feature which when engaged, invokes an underlying process that computes which pages are to be initially imposed onto a sheet, and thereafter, based on an increment value assigned to one or more of the pages entries, automatically imposes pages (and their content) to the page order for the print job. Page entries may have different increment values and thus a non-sequential and/or heterogenous page output may result alleviating the user from having to individually manually assign each page to a print position in the print job.

A printing apparatus capable of conveying sheets to a sheet processing apparatus and to control the type of a sheet to be used as a cover sheet in a case where a book bound product is generated by switching back sheets each having an image printed, inverting the sheets and folding the inverted sheets, and to notify an error to a user based on the type of a sheet to be used as the cover sheet in a case where printing an image on the cover sheet is designated.

An image forming apparatus includes an operation acceptance section, a storage section, a sheet feed cassette, a plurality of trays, a sorting mechanism, a scanner, a data analyzing section, and a control section. The scanner scans an image of a sheet. The data analyzing section analyzes image data of the sheet scanned by the scanner. When the operation acceptance section accepts a specification of a sorting condition from a user, the control section allows the storage section to store the sorting condition and allows the sorting mechanism to sort the sheet to one of the trays according to the sorting condition using an analysis result of the data analyzing section.

A method and apparatus for processing documents is provided. The documents may be conveyed to a feeder for feeding documents to a scanner. The scanner scans each document to obtain image data and then discharges the document to one or more output or sort locations. The system may include a skew reduction assembly for reducing skew in the documents as the documents are fed to the scanner. The system may also include elements for improving image quality and reducing document damage while the document is scanned. The system may further include features for improving the stacking of the discharged documents.