Label Printer

• US 20150239260A1
• Filed: 12/29/2014
• Published: 08/27/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 09/26/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: DYMO BVBA (Newell Brands Inc.)
• Original Assignee: DYMO BVBA (Newell Brands Inc.)
• Inventors: De Munck, Elke, Dullaert, Jimmy, Vleurinck, Jos, Nuyens, Lore
• Granted Patent: US 9,649,857 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 3/4075 Tape printers; Label printers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/041 Digitisers, e.g. for touch screens or touch pads, characterised by the transducing means
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00392 Other manual input means, e.g. digitisers or writing tablets

Abstract

A label printer has a touchscreen for displaying and inputting label data, and comprising at least one input area. The label printer also has a hardware keyboard for inputting label data, and comprising at least one hardware key. The label printer also has control means arranged to control printing means for printing a label in accordance with label information. The label information is derived from a combination of label data input via the at least one hardware key of said hardware keyboard and label data input via the at least one input area of said touchscreen.

Claims

1. A label printer having:

memory configured to store data defining plural different graphical control panel layouts, each of said layouts comprising an arrangement of input areas of a respective graphical control panel,

means for selecting one of said graphical control panel layouts, and

a touchscreen configured to display a graphical control panel with input areas arranged on the display in accordance with the selected graphical control panel layout,

wherein one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of data layout input areas that are operable to perform respective formatting functions to text comprised in label data to be printed onto a medium.

2. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein:

the touchscreen is configured to display a representation of the label data to be printed onto a medium, and

the label printer is arranged such that, when a part of the display at which one of the data layout input areas is displayed is touched by a user, an attribute of the representation of the label data to be printed onto the medium is changed.

3. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein the respective formatting functions comprise at least one of the following:

emboldening the text, making the text italic, rotating characters of the text by ninety degrees, changing the size of characters of the text, and applying a font to the text.

4. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein the means for selecting one of said graphical control panel layouts comprises a section of the touchscreen that is configured to send a signal to control means, when a user touches the section of the touchscreen.

5. A label printer as claimed in claim 4, wherein the section of the touchscreen comprises plural areas, each of which is associated with one of said graphical control panel layouts, and the touchscreen is configured to display the graphical control panel layout associated with one of the areas, when the user touches that area.

6. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of input areas corresponding to respective different letters of the alphabet.

7. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of input areas corresponding to accented letters of the alphabet, punctuation marks, currency symbols, numbers, or graphic symbols.

8. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein:

at least one of the layouts comprises a data field input area, and

the label printer is configured such that, when a part of the display at which the data field input area is displayed is touched by a user, a data field to which text or images are addable to create label data for printing onto a medium is displayed on the display.

9. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein the touchscreen is configured to display a representation of label data to be printed onto the medium as a first label and label data to be printed onto the medium as a second label.

10. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein the touchscreen is configured to display a representation of a position at which the medium is to be cut by cutting means of the label printer.

11. A label printer as claimed in claim 1, wherein the touchscreen is configured to display the representation of label data adjacent to the data input areas.

12. A method, comprising:

storing data defining plural different graphical control panel layouts, each of said layouts comprising an arrangement of input areas of a respective graphical control panel,

selecting one of said graphical control panel layouts, and

displaying on a touchscreen display a graphical control panel with input areas arranged on the display in accordance with the selected graphical control panel layout,

wherein one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of data layout input areas that are operable to perform respective formatting functions to text comprised in label data to be printed onto a medium.

13. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein:

the touchscreen displays a representation of the label data to be printed onto a medium, and

when a part of the display at which one of the data layout input areas is displayed is touched by a user, an attribute of the representation of the label data to be printed onto the medium is changed.

14. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein the respective formatting functions comprise at least one of the following:

emboldening the text, making the text italic, rotating characters of the text by ninety degrees, changing the size of characters of the text, and applying a font to the text.

15. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein selecting one of said graphical control panel layouts comprises operating a section of the touchscreen that is configured to send a signal to control means, when a user touches the section of the touchscreen.

16. A method as claimed in claim 15, wherein:

the section of the touchscreen comprises plural areas, each of which is associated with one of said graphical control panel layouts, and

the method comprises displaying the graphical control panel layout associated with one of the areas, when the user touches that area.

17. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein at least one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of input areas corresponding to respective different letters of the alphabet.

18. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein at least one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of input areas corresponding to accented letters of the alphabet, punctuation marks, currency symbols, numbers, or graphic symbols.

19. A method as claimed in claim 12, wherein:

at least one of the layouts comprises a data field input area, and

when a part of the display at which the data field input area is displayed is touched by a user, a data field to which text or images are addable to create label data for printing onto a medium is displayed on the display.

20. A computer program embodied on a computer readable medium, said computer program configured to control a controller of a label printer to:

store data defining plural different graphical control panel layouts, each of said layouts comprising an arrangement of input areas of a respective graphical control panel, and

in response to selection of one of said graphical control panel layouts, display on a touchscreen display a graphical control panel with input areas arranged on the display in accordance with the selected graphical control panel layout,

wherein one of the layouts comprises an arrangement of data layout input areas that are operable to perform respective formatting functions to text comprised in label data to be printed onto a medium.