Patent
1991-11-27
1997-09-30
Tung, Kee M.
395101, 395107, 395112, G06F 1500
Patent
active
056733720
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to a printer designed to print in any one of various printing colors, and more particularly, to a device mounted on such a printer to display a printing color which has been manually selected by an operator.
BACKGROUND ART
A printer is known which is comprised of an ink ribbon consisting of a plurality of color bands, a means to manually select a printing color, and a ribbon shifting means for moving the ink ribbon to a height where a color band corresponding to a color which has been selected manually faces a printing head and for retaining it at that height, thus printing in the selected printing color. In this type of printer, it is also widely known that any two color bands are used for superimposition-printing to print in a color other than the one which corresponds to a single color band.
In such a printer, however, it is difficult for an operator to check which printing color has been selected through a selecting means. For this reason, the operator checks a selected color by having the printer actually print it out.
DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION
An object of the present invention is to provide a printing color display device for a printer, which is designed to enable an operator to easily check, without printing, a printing color which has been manually selected.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a printing color display device which permits accurate and easy manual selection of an intended printing color when a selected printing color is found different from what was intended.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a printing color display device which is capable of preventing printing in a wrong color caused by erroneous operation by an operator.
To fulfill the aforementioned objects, according to the present invention, a printing color display device is provided, which is used for a printer designed to print in a desired printing color by using any one of a plurality of color bands making up an ink ribbon or a combination of any two different color bands. The printing color display device is comprised of a printing color selecting means which is manually operated by an operator, a controlling means which operates in response to manual operation of the printing color selecting means by the operator, and a printing color displaying means which is actuated under the control of the controlling means. The controlling means operates the printing color displaying means so that it displays a printing color which is manually selected by the operator through the printing color selecting means.
Preferably, the printing color selecting means includes a plurality of printing color selectors which are independently operated by the operator by hand. More preferably, the printing color selectors correspond to their respective color bands of the ink ribbon. The printing color displaying means includes a plurality of printing color displays, and preferably, the printing color displays correspond to their respective printing color selectors, and more preferably, correspond to their respective color bands of the ink ribbon. The controlling means controls the operation of the printing color displaying means so that at least one printing color display which corresponds to a printing color selector for a single color or a printing color selector for a combination of any two different colors, which is manually operated by the operator, performs displaying operation.
Preferably, the controlling means controls the operation of the printing color displaying means so that a printing color which is different from an already selected printing color is displayed each time the printing color selecting means is operated with the already selected printing color displayed.
Preferably, the controlling means allows the printing color displaying means to display a printing color only when the manual operation of the printing color selecting means by the operator continues for a specific time.
As described above, according to the present inven
REFERENCES:
patent: 4280767 (1981-07-01), Heath
patent: 4543002 (1985-09-01), Bittner et al.
patent: 4707159 (1987-11-01), Hirano et al.
patent: 4846597 (1989-07-01), Bryant et al.
Chauhan U.
Citizen Watch Co. Ltd.
Tung Kee M.
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