Patent ID: 8270018

Claim:
A document processing system in which a plurality of image forming apparatuses that are connected to a network, and communicate with each other by transmitting/receiving document data to/from each other, and execute processing of document data in accordance with a workflow that defines contents of processes to be executed by the respective image forming apparatuses, each image forming apparatus comprising: an analysis unit adapted to analyze, for a workflow selected from a plurality of workflows stored in advance in a storage unit, a content of processing document data by the image forming apparatus and a content of processing document data by another image forming apparatus; a reception unit adapted to receive document data and store the document data in the storage unit; an association unit adapted to associate the workflow with the document data by combining identification information for identifying the selected workflow, and the document data; an execution unit adapted to execute processing based on an analysis result of said analysis unit for the document data; a transmission unit adapted to, when processing to be executed by another image forming apparatus is designated in the selected workflow as a result of analysis by said analysis unit, transmit the document data to the other image forming apparatus upon completion of processing the document data; an acceptance unit adapted to accept a cancellation instruction for specifying and canceling processing of a workflow; a determination unit adapted to determine, based on whether identification information of the workflow specified by the cancellation instruction coincides with identification information of the workflow associated with the document data stored in the storage unit, whether the processing of the workflow specified by the cancellation instruction is in execution by said execution unit; a cancellation processing unit adapted to, when said determination unit determines that the processing of the workflow corresponding to the cancellation instruction is in execution, cancel the processing of the workflow; and a log information management unit adapted to store, as log information in the storage unit, the document data transmitted by said transmission unit and information of the other image forming apparatus serving as a destination of the document data, wherein when the processing of the workflow is not in execution and the content of the processing to be executed by the other image forming apparatus is designated in the selected workflow, said cancellation processing unit transmits the cancellation instruction to the other image forming apparatus specified based on the log information.