Management device, management method, and recording medium

• US 9,860,105 B2
• Filed: 12/28/2012
• Issued: 01/02/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 09/17/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Original Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Inventors: Wang, Weibo
• Primary Examiner(s): Blair, Douglas
• Application Number:
  US13/729,845
• Publication Number:
  US 20130117412A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,831 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G03G 15/5079 for maintenance
• CPC Class Codes: G03G 15/55 Self-diagnostics; Malfunction or lifetime display
• CPC Class Codes: G03G 15/553 Monitoring or warning means for exhaustion or lifetime end of consumables, e.g. indication of insufficient copy sheet quantity for a job
• CPC Class Codes: G03G 2215/00109 Remote control of apparatus, e.g. by a host
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/14 Multichannel or multilink protocols

Abstract

A first acquisition unit acquires an event notification from an MFP and updates first device-status information. A transmission unit transmits the event notification and first reference-destination information. A switching unit switches a first access to the first reference-destination information to a second access to second reference-destination information. A second acquisition unit issues an acquisition request at a first interval, issues an acquisition request at a second interval in response to the event notification, acquires the second device-status information, and update the first device-status information.

Claims

1. A device management apparatus comprising:

memory storing computer-readable instructions; and

a processor configured to execute the computer-readable instructions such that the processor is configured to,

acquire event information of an electronic device in response to an event occurring in the electronic device, the device management apparatus and the electronic device being connected to a first network,

notify a remote management apparatus of the event information so as to manage the event information together with the remote management apparatus, the remote management apparatus being connected to a second network,

store, in storage of the device management apparatus, a correspondence relation in which each event of the electronic device is associated with first device-status information of the electronic device, first reference-destination information indicating a reference destination of the first device-status information, and second reference-destination information indicating a reference destination of second device-status information of the electronic device that is managed by the remote management device apparatus,

switch, based on the correspondence relation, from an access to the first reference-destination information to an access to the second reference-destination information associated with the event occurring in the electronic device in response to accepting the access to the first reference-destination information from a first terminal on the first network before reference-inhibition instruction information indicating an instruction to inhibit reference to the first device-status information is acquired from the remote management apparatus, and

inhibit the first terminal from accessing the first reference-destination information in response to acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus, based on the remote management apparatus accepting the access to the second reference-destination information from a second terminal on the second network, before the access to the first reference-destination information is accepted from the first terminal.

2. The device management apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to execute the computer-readable instructions such that the processor is further configured to,

output a request for acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus at an interval shorter than a communication interval at which polling the remote management apparatus is performed prior to acquiring the event information from the electronic device.

3. The device management apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the processor is configured to execute the computer-readable instructions such that the processor is further configured to,

update the first device-status information at the interval shorter than the communication interval.

4. The device management apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the processor is configured to execute the computer-readable instructions such that the processor is further configured to,

stop outputting the request for acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus at the interval shorter than the communication interval in response to completing updating the first device-status information in accordance with the event information.

5. The device management apparatus according to claim 1, wherein,

the first reference-destination information includes a uniform resource locator (URL) of the device management apparatus,

the second reference-destination information includes a URL of the remote management apparatus, and

the second network is a different network from the first network.

6. A device management method comprising:

acquiring, by a device management apparatus, event information of an electronic device in response to an event occurring in the electronic device, the device management apparatus and the electronic device being connected to a first network;

notifying, by the device management apparatus, a remote management apparatus of the event information so as to manage the event information together with the remote management apparatus, the remote management apparatus being connected to a second network;

storing, in storage of the device management apparatus, a correspondence relation in which each event of the electronic device is associated with first device-status information of the electronic device, first reference-destination information indicating a reference destination of the first device-status information, and second reference-destination information indicating a reference destination of second device-status information of the electronic device that is managed by the remote management apparatus;

switching, by the device management apparatus, based on the correspondence relation, from an access to the first reference-destination information to an access to the second reference-destination information associated with the event occurring in the electronic device in response to accepting the access to the first reference-destination information from a first terminal on the first network before reference-inhibition instruction information indicating an instruction to inhibit reference to the first device-status information is acquired from the remote management apparatus; and

inhibiting, by the device management apparatus, the first terminal from accessing the first reference-destination information in response to acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus, based on the remote management apparatus accepting the access to the second reference-destination information from a second terminal on the second network, before the access to the first reference-destination information is accepted from the first terminal.

7. The device management method of claim 6, further comprising:

outputting, by the device management apparatus, a request for acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus at an interval shorter than a communication interval at which polling the remote management apparatus is performed prior to acquiring the event information from the electronic device.

8. The device management method of claim 7, further comprising:

updating, by the device management apparatus, the first device-status information at the interval shorter than the communication interval.

9. The device management method of claim 8, further comprising:

stopping, by the device management apparatus, the outputting the request for acquiring the reference-inhibition instruction information from the remote management apparatus at the interval shorter than the communication interval in response to completing updating the first device-status information in accordance with the event information.

10. The device management method of claim 6, wherein,

the first reference-destination information includes a uniform resource locator (URL) of the device management apparatus,

the second reference-destination information includes a URL of the remote management apparatus, and

the second network is a different network from the first network.