Brother Kogyo Kabushiki-Kaisha

Naoki Otsuka

Masaaki Hibino

Koshi Fukazawa

Kiyotaka Ohara

Masafumi Miyazawa

Kazuma Aoki

Makoto Matsuda

Satoru Yanagi

Masatoshi Kokubo

Hideto Matsumoto

Satoshi Okimoto

Norio Tagawa

Yukiharu Fujikawa

Miyuki Sato

A composite service providing system including a plurality of network electronic devices communicatively connected with each other. The plurality of network electronic devices includes electronic devices, each of which is capable of providing at least one service. A plurality of services provided by a plurality of electronic devices are combined to constitute a composite service. The composite service providing system further includes a composite service designating system that designates a composite service to be provided, an electronic device determining system that determines an electronic device that provides each of a plurality of services necessary for providing the composite service designated with the composite service designating system, and a controlling system that control the electronic devices determined by the electronic device determining system to provide the services so that the composite service designated by the designating system is provided.

Composite service providing system

A device configured to connect to a terminal device, the device including: a supply unit, which supplies management screen data to the terminal device, wherein the management screen data represents a management screen including at least one item, which is related to the device, and which includes a target item for which help information is to be displayed, wherein, in response to a help command received by the terminal device, the management screen data include instructions to control the terminal device to: acquire the help information corresponding to the target item of the item displayed on the management screen; and display a help screen indicating the help information.

Device and help server

A printer may comprise a command file storage unit, a receiving unit, a command file sending unit, and a first data sending unit. The command file storage unit may store a command file including a first command, a second command, and a third command. The first command is a command for sending a request for first data. The second command includes design data, and is a command for converting the first data into second data in accordance with the design data. The third command is a command for displaying a web page in accordance with the second data. The receiving unit may receive a request. The command file sending unit may send a response including the command file when a request for the command file is received. The first data sending unit may send a response including the first data when the request for the first data is received.

Printer having web server function

A printer includes a print setting folder storage area, a data sending device, a data receiving device, and a print device. The print setting folder storage area may store print setting folders. Each print setting folder may associate print setting data and a print setting folder address. The data sending device may send the print setting folder address of each print setting folder to an information processing device. The data receiving device may receive combination data from the information processing device. The combination data may include a data file and a data file storage command that may include a print setting folder address. Where the data receiving device receives the combination data, the print device may print the data file included in the combination data in accordance with the print setting data associated with the print setting folder address. A scanner may have a similar configuration to the printer.

Printer and scanner utilizing a file sharing protocol

A communication device is connected to a terminal device including a display and a web browser through a network. The communication device includes: a first providing unit that provides a first web page display instruction to the terminal device; and a second providing unit that provides a second web page display instruction to the terminal device for making the web browser display a second web page including a specific message on the display unit. The specific message indicates a solution when the first web page including the predetermined information acquired from the external server is not displayed on the display unit of the terminal device, and the solution is for making the web browser acquire the predetermined information by a different method from the method of acquiring the predetermined information from the external server and display the predetermined information on the display unit of the terminal device.

Communication device

A communication device includes a receiver, a command supplying device, an information transmitter, and a web-page transmitter. The receiver receives requests from an external device. The command supplying device determines that a request including a first address including a specific host name is a first request. The command supplying device transmits a command, including an instruction to transmit a second request, to the external device when the first request is received. The command supplying device determines that a request including a second address including a specific IP address is a second request. The information transmitter transmits information to the external device when the second request is received. A combination of the specific IP address and a cookie is stored on the external device when the information is received. The web-page transmitter transmits web page data to the external device when the second request is received.

Communication devices that send web pages and computer readable media comprising instructions for controlling such communication devices

A computer-readable medium having a link tree creation program stored thereon and readable by a computer, the link tree creation program, when executed by the computer, causes the computer to create a link tree in relation to links pertaining to Web pages receivable via a network. The link tree creation program causes a computer to function as a link search unit that searches a link from a file of a specified Web page, a link list preparation unit that adds the searched link to a list of a link tree, which root indicating a link to the specified Web page, a tree addition determination unit that compares the searched link with the root of the link tree and determines whether creating an additional link tree rooted from the searched link, and a tree creation unit that creates an additional link tree from a determination of the tree addition determination unit.

Link tree creation device

An image forming device may be provided with a setting data storage device, a preview image creation device, and an output device. The setting data storage device may be capable of storing a plurality of patterns of setting data. The preview image creation device may create, for each pattern of setting data stored in the setting data storage device, a preview image to which the pattern of setting data is reflected. The output device may output the plurality of preview images created by the preview image creation device.

Image forming device creating a preview image

In a communication system having a client and a server capable of communicating with each other via a network, the server can transmit a command to the client in response to a command request transmitted from the client to the server. The server may include a replying unit that transmits replaying data in response to the command received from the client in such a manner that (a) if there is a command to be transmitted to the client, replying data including the command is transmitted to the client, and (b) if there is not a command to be transmitted to the client, replying data, which does not include a command is transmitted to the client. Further, the replying unit may transmit the replying data without a command to the client when a no-command status lasts a predetermined standby period after receipt of the command request.

Growing community of inventors

Konan, Japan

Naoki Otsuka