The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 29, 1994
Filed:
Jun. 04, 1993
Ricoh Company, Ltd., San Jose, CA (US);
Ricoh Corporation, San Jose, CA (US);
Abstract
A multi-function machine with interleaved job execution is disclosed. The multi-function machine performs multiple functions such as printing and digital copying. Multiple users of the machine are intermittently serviced as the machine switches from printing to copying jobs and vice versa. The manner of switching is partially determined by whether the requisite set-up time for a particular job is complete. The manner of switching may also be determined by user-set priorities. In either embodiment, jobs are interleaved so as to eliminate unused time associated with the period required to set-up a job. As a result, the machine operates optimally while intermittently making progress on multiple jobs.