Patent ID: 9446598
Filing Date: 2016-09-20
CPC Classification: B41J

Claim Text:
1. A method for controlling light emission of an ink cartridge, wherein an ink cartridge control unit is provided on an ink cartridge removably mountable to an imaging device main body, and the imaging device main body is provided with a light receiver, the ink cartridge further comprises an interface unit for receiving a signal transmitted by the imaging device main body and a storage unit for storing ink cartridge identification information, the ink cartridge control unit is connected to a light emitting unit emitting light towards the light receiver and is configured to control the light emitting unit to emit or not emit light, and the imaging device main body is provided with at least two ink cartridges; wherein, the method comprises: receiving, by the ink cartridge control unit, a light emitting control instruction from the imaging device main body and identifying the instruction; and controlling, by the ink cartridge control unit, light emission of the light emitting unit of the ink cartridge according to the identified light emitting control instruction and preset control information corresponding to the light emitting control instruction, so that the light emitting unit does not emit light at an adjacent position light detection stage of a to-be-detected ink cartridge but emits light at an facing position light detection stage of the to-be-detected ink cartridge, wherein, the controlling, by the ink cartridge control unit, light emission of the light emitting unit of the ink cartridge according to the identified light emitting control instruction and preset control information corresponding to the light emitting control instruction comprises: when the ink cartridge control unit identifies that the light emitting control instruction is a light-on instruction, if occurrence number of the light-on instruction is 1, then controlling the light emitting unit to emit light; if occurrence number of the light-on instruction is greater than 1, then not executing the light-on instruction; when the ink cartridge control unit identifies that the light emitting control instruction is a light-off instruction, controlling the light emitting unit to be off, and starting timing simultaneously; when it is monitored that the timing reaches a preset threshold value, executing the last light emitting control instruction received during the timing process; the first period of time is a time interval of the facing position light detection stage of the to-be-detected ink cartridge, the second period of time is a time interval of the adjacent position light detection stage of the to-be-detected ink cartridge, and the third period of time is a time interval between the facing position light detection stage and the adjacent position light detection stage; the preset threshold value is greater than the sum of the second period of time and the third period of time, and is less than the sum of the first period of time and the third period of time.